Wings of the Wicked - By Courtney Allison Moulton Page 0,40
I wouldn’t have believed me, either. At least there was one less of Bastian’s lackeys to worry about. A demonic reaper asked to be my valentine and then killed his crazy ex-girlfriend to save my life. Tomorrow I was starting up antipsychotic meds.
“Let’s get you home before your fingers freeze off,” Will suggested. He stood and took my hand, then helped me to my feet, and we walked to my car in silence.
12
“WHAT ARE YOU DOING AGAIN?” WILL ASKED IN A bored voice, on the other side of my closet door. “A Valentine’s Day party?”
I rolled my eyes as I shimmied the red strapless sheath dress up and over my hips. The difficulty in accomplishing this made me wish I’d started putting it on over my head. “It is not a Valentine’s Day party. That would be lame.”
He laughed. “It’s the same thing.”
“No, it’s not,” I grumbled. “This is a Hearts Afire party. Totally different.”
“How is it different? Valentine’s Day is in a few days.”
“It’s a Hearts Afire party.” The seam along the side of the dress was ruched and allowed a little movement, and the pencil shape gave me more of an hourglass figure than I had in normal clothes. I leaned against the closet shelves to keep my balance as I slipped on a pair of black heels.
All I needed now was someone to zip up my dress in the back. I examined myself vainly from every angle in the floor-length mirror hooked onto the back of my closet door. It used to be on the other side of my door, but the more Will hung out over here while I was getting ready, the more I had needed to switch it so I could change in private. I had to make sure I looked good before leaving the closet. “Why do you care anyway?”
“You go to these parties a lot.”
“Do not. This is my first party in practically a month.”
“Didn’t Kate have a party two weeks ago?”
I glowered. “That was in January. It’s February now. What are you going to do when I’m at college and go to parties three nights a week? You’re going to go crazy.”
“I hope you can fit patrolling in between all these future parties.”
“I live like five different lives. I’m the goddess of multitasking. You know this.”
I opened the closet door and stepped out. Heat flushed through me when Will’s eyes went wide and he gaped at me from my desk chair.
I strode across the room toward him, my hand pinning the front of my dress to my chest. “I need your help.”
“What?” His eyebrows lifted almost imperceptibly, but there was no way I could have missed that look.
I chomped on the inside of my cheek to keep from grinning like an idiot and turned my back to him. “Zip me?”
“Uh, yeah.”
The heat of his gaze on my back was scorching as he stood up. His fingers brushed my bare skin as he zipped up the remaining inches of my open dress.
“You look … beautiful,” he said softly, the breath of his words on my neck.
I inhaled deeply and swallowed hard as I imagined him drawing the zipper in the opposite direction and his lips touching the place his breath had warmed. Things fluttered in my chest, and I shivered. “Thank you.”
He didn’t step away and I didn’t move for the longest, most excruciating moment. At last I turned to my dresser to touch up my makeup in the mirror. I glanced at him from the corner of my eye and grinned, my confidence returning.
“You’ve got a little drool,” I teased, tapping the corner of my mouth. “Right here.”
His cheeks actually grew rosy and he gave a nervous laugh as he sat back down on the chair. “You’re funny. Really.”
I looked back into the mirror and applied another coat of mascara. My heart pounded as I tried to be fearless. “Not as funny as your face right now.”
“How can you walk in those heels?” he asked, changing the subject.
“You have entirely too little faith in me.” I turned around to look at his outfit. I grimaced. “Is that what you’re wearing? Really?”
He frowned and looked down at his jeans and long-sleeved tee. “What’s wrong with it?”
I tilted my head to examine him. “You look normal. You don’t look afire at all. At least your shirt is black. Dress code said red or black only. Anything else will get you thrown out, just warning you.”