Oh man, had I really just flashed him a thumbs-up?
I tore my hand out of the air. “Anyway, if you need anything, I’m in the master suite at the end of the hall.” I pointed at a wall. “I mean… You know.” I did finger acrobatics, as though he’d find his way through the halls thanks to my pointer finger tracing the invisible path. “So…”
“Thank you,” he said, stepping forward, his direct gaze intimidating, mostly because I was thinking impure thoughts. “This house—your magic—is a legend among our kind. It is a great honor to be summoned here.”
“Oh.” I smiled at him and then tucked a lock of hair behind my ear.
“I can help you. I can feel your magic, pulsing within you. I can help you release it. That is why you summoned me, is it not? You require…release?”
His eyes sparkled devilishly. My chest felt tight, like I wasn’t getting enough air.
“Y-yes.” I cleared my throat, trying to play it cool but so out of practice with all this. I hadn’t expected to be this fervently attracted to someone so quickly, especially someone much younger and way hotter.
“Power trumps beauty,” the walls whispered. But this was not the voice of Ivy House—it was a woman’s voice, the same one I’d heard before accepting the magic—Tamara Ivy, the creator of this place, if I had to guess. “But just like you wouldn’t trust someone who only valued you for your beauty, trust no one who only lusts after your power. Trust no one who doesn’t see you for you. Your life depends on it.”
Fair point, but a depressing sentiment. She wasn’t the happiest of women. Being murdered would certainly do that to a person. I really needed to find out the story behind that so I had a little reference for her words.
“I mean, I need help controlling the magic,” I said. “I can do some things, but I have a lot to learn. I need someone to help teach me.”
He took another step toward me, his head bowed to look down into my eyes. I licked my lips, trying to hold my ground. “You know all you need to know,” he said. “You merely have to release the information from your mind, and the magic with it. Slowly at first, to get used to it, but then in wild, hard, pleasurable gushes.”
Okay, that was a little much with the double entendres. I knew that logically, anyway, but my body hadn’t quite gotten the memo, because I shivered hot and cold.
“How do you know that?” I asked.
Another step, right in front of me now, leaning over me so our breath merged, the air between our mouths heating. “I don’t know,” he whispered, his voice not much more than a hum. “I just do. The second I landed on Ivy House soil after rescuing you, I felt it. I felt it as hard as I felt your summons. Just like I can feel your magic, which isn’t something I can normally do. I am meant for this role, Jacinta. I am meant to help make you our queen.”
Like Edgar finding the book because he was meant to read the old scripts. Clearly Ivy House had deemed Damarion worthy, and given him a few tools to help him train me.
She couldn’t somehow superheat my blood within his proximity, could she? Because that was just wrong on so many levels.
“Okay, well…” I took a nice, big step back, just in case. “O-kay. I’m going to go. I’ll see you tomorrow. Flying, right?”
“Yes. I’ll take you flying after your training, and then to dinner.” He put his forearm in front of his waist and bowed. “If you’ll allow me to escort you.”
My belly fluttered. “Uhm, sure. I should warn you, though, I haven’t been lucky on the dating front. Zero for two. Well, zero for three if you count the failed marriage…”
What was wrong with me? He’d said dinner, he hadn’t said anything about dating! Even if he had, my response shouldn’t have been to knock myself and call out my divorced status in the same breath. Abort, abort!
“Anyway…”
“Tomorrow, we will end your streak of bad luck.” He took hold of my hand gently, his palms baby-soft, and brushed his lips across my knuckles.
I wanted to swoon, but instead all I felt was awkward, especially since his pants had tented, I couldn’t stop from noticing, and this situation was escalating a lot