“Her soul mate, her soul bonded, her husband, her friend, her lover, her everything,” Ra answered. “She is all those things to me as well. She is the air I breathe.” Ra turned to look at her and placed his forehead against hers. “I cannot live without her.” He didn’t simply mean figuratively. They literally couldn’t live without one another. But maybe her parents didn’t need to know that tidbit, at least not yet.
Shelly’s breath mingled with his as he stayed like that for several heartbeats. She knew her parents were probably having some serious internal freak-outs, but she couldn’t look away from the man who had saved her, loved her, and protected her. It made no sense to love someone she’d known for only a short time, but there it was. As real as the blood flowing through her veins, her love flowed for Ra.
“I’m sorry, did you say husband?” Shelly’s mom sputtered.
“LOVER?” Her dad practically roared.
Ooookay, so maybe Ra could have left that one out, too.
Ra stepped back and pushed her behind him, shielding her with his body as he faced her irate father. Shelly was shocked to find her dad’s face a shade of red she was sure it had never been before.
“Daddy,” Shelly said in a placating voice. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d called him that. At some point in her life, he’d become Dad, and when she was angry at him, she called him Father because it irritated him. “Let’s talk about this like rational adults.” Okay, so calling him Daddy didn’t sound like something an adult would say, especially not in that lost, little girl voice. But she was trying to prevent her father from doing something monumentally stupid, like attacking her mega bad-ass mate.
“You’re not an adult,” he yelled. “You’re a child! You haven’t even graduated from high school.”
Oh, no, he did not. She narrowed her eyes on her father. See, that’s how pissed she was. Daddy could take a hike. Shelly tried to step around Ra, but he’d become her personal Egyptian guard, pushing her easily with his arms to keep her behind him. She had to settle for leaning around his broad shoulders so she could effectively glare at her dad.
“Well, that isn’t exactly my fault. It’s not like they hand out diplomas in hell,” Shelly snapped back. “And I’m not a child. I’m eighteen, Dad. I know you still want to see me as a little girl, but I haven’t been a little girl for quite a while.”
“Eighteen, a legal adult, does not make you grown,” he huffed back.
“Do you love him?” her mom asked.
Shelly looked up at Ra and then back to her mom. “I do. I love him very much.”
“And do you love my daughter, Ra?”
“More than anything,” he said without hesitation.
“So why can’t you both stay here?” Shelly’s mom asked. “I mean, if you’re a package deal, and if I remember anything about young love, then trying to separate you two would just be a fool’s errand. You can both stay here, and Shelly can get her diploma, and—”
“I can’t mom,” Shelly stopped her. “Not because I don’t want to,” she hurried on when she saw the hurt in her mom’s eyes. “I can’t because I’m a part of the elementalist academy now. Someone has to stop the dark elementals, and I’m on the good team. Ra is a warrior, and I have to be with him.”
Her mom took a step toward Shelly, a frown creasing her brow. “What do you mean, you have to be with him?”
Of course, she would pick up on that little inflection.
“My soul is tied to Shelly’s,” Ra answered. “As is my life and hers to mine. It is the bargain we had to make with the lord of the underworld in order to leave and to ensure Shelly’s soul would not end up in the underworld when she dies.”
“Why are you so talkative and helpful when I need you to be the scary, mute pharaoh and not talkative when I need you to be a safe, cuddly-looking teddy bear?” Shelly asked as she glared at him.
Ra’s face was completely blank as he answered her. “I am never cuddly and safe.”
“No,” Shelly said, shaking her head, “no, you are most definitely not.”
“Could we please get back to the part where you said that my daughter’s life was tied to yours?” Shelly’s dad interrupted her glaring match with Ra.