Chasing Secrets - Jessica Sorensen Page 0,33
across his face, and it takes me a moment to decipher it.
“You’re worried,” I state, “that she won’t want this.”
Won’t want us.
Won’t want me.
The last thought is my own worry, and it makes me feel sick to my stomach, which never, ever happens.
“I’m not sure,” Asher mutters with a crease between his brows. “Sometimes it feels like she’ll be okay with it, but then there are other times when I worry she’s too afraid of … love.”
“Aren’t we all?” East says, then shakes his head. “I refuse to get down about this. I know what I want, and I’m willing to try it, as long as our little thief is, too.”
Asher considers what he said with an unreadable expression. “Yeah, I think I am, too.” Silence ticks by, and then he slides his gaze to me. “What about you?”
East looks at me, as well, waiting for my answer.
I smash my lips together, my heart beating loudly in my chest. It’s been doing that a lot lately, ever since Harlynn came into my life.
“I want to,” I admit quietly.
I want her.
I want her more than I’ve ever wanted anything in my entire life, and it’s scary as hell.
Fear. It’s been a long damn time since I felt that.
No one utters a word for a moment, a rare occurrence for the three of us, but so is this entire situation.
“Okay, then,” Asher says, lacking his usual confidence.
East looks at Asher, his brow arched. “I’m going to take that ‘okay then’ as a ‘you’re in’.”
Asher pauses then gives an uneven nod.
And just like that, we’ve finally come to an agreement. A frightening yet kind of exciting agreement.
“How are we going to tell Harlynn?” I ask, weirdly feeling less tense than I did a moment ago.
The three of us trade a look, waiting for someone to speak.
“I have no damn idea,” Asher finally admits. “I’m thinking, though, that maybe we do it after we leave this planet when things are a little less stressful.” He looks at us for confirmation, and it takes a minute, but both East and I nod.
And that becomes that. A start to something new. At least I hope so. Really, none of this means anything, unless Harlynn is on board.
“Good. Now that that’s settled, let’s move on to this plan of finding out what in the hell is going on in the basement here,” Asher says, going straight back to business. “East is going to work on helping Max seduce a succubus.” Wariness creeps into his tone. “I’m honestly a little skeptical that’ll work, so I’d like to have a backup plan.”
“Which is?” East questions, leaning against the wall behind him.
“Arrow and I are going to go explore the town more and ask around,” he says. “I think maybe we should go a bit farther out, maybe into the next town.”
“Yeah, but how far is it?” East asks, propping his boot-clad foot against the wall. “And what about that creature that was tailing us during our journey here?”
“I almost forgot about that,” I say. “Does anyone know what it was?”
Asher shakes his head. “My best guess is an ice demon. Harlynn sensed it, too, but I didn’t want to tell her I saw it, because I didn’t want to scare her.”
East snorts a laugh. “Scare her? Our little mouse doesn’t get scared—you should know that by now.”
“If that’s the case,” I say, “maybe you should stop calling her little mouse.”
East smirks at me. “What do you propose I call her then? My lover?”
Heat rushes to my cheeks, causing his smirk to widen. He parts his lips to say who the heck knows what, but Asher talks over him.
“You’re wrong,” he says quietly. “She gets scared. She just pretends not to be. Not that she’s not tough. She might be one of the toughest creatures I’ve ever met. But she also has spent a lifetime trying to control her emotions so she doesn’t always show how she’s feeling.”
East eyes him over. “You’re speaking from experience.”
He shrugs. “I don’t know.”
“That was a rhetorical question,” he says. “I’ve known you long enough to know you do.”
Asher frowns then sighs. “Look, I didn’t bring that up so we could stand around and try to decipher the complications of my mind. I was just bringing it up so everyone knows to be careful around her and make sure you know what she’s really feeling.”
A smile glitters across East’s face. “I’ve never seen this side of you. It’s amusing.”
“Whatever,” Asher grumbles in annoyance. “We’ve discussed