dropping an octave as he leaned in close to her ear.
The butterflies that had been sleeping soundly in her stomach suddenly lifted their little heads, their ears perking up at the sound of Ra’s sexy suggestion. As if Shelly needed any encouragement from her internal winged friends. “We aren’t alone, Casanova,” Shelly reminded him. “You keep those talented hands to yourself.”
“Then go to sleep. We can teach you all about the different elementals when you aren’t exhausted and we aren’t hours away from trying to keep a power plant from shutting down and plunging a city into cold and darkness.”
“I’m not sure that qualifies as a pep talk, if that was what you were going for,” Shelly said.
“It was a sleep warning,” Ra rumbled. “Not a pep talk to get you motivated.”
“It still needs work.”
She heard Ra chuckle and smiled to herself. Shelly loved making Ra laugh. He didn’t do it often, and she liked knowing she was able to add humor to his life.
“Good night, Ra,” she whispered.
He pressed a kiss to her neck. “Good night, my mate.”
Tara stared at her phone, waiting to see if Shelly would respond to her text. When nothing appeared after a couple of minutes, she tossed it onto the bedside table next to Elias’s bed and sighed.
“Did she finally get the hint?” Elias asked as he walked back into the room from the bathroom. He was freshly showered and shirtless. Dangerous combination in Tara’s book. Not that she had a book that listed all of the things that were dangerous to her libido. But maybe she should. It might be a way to keep her from groping her man at inappropriate times. Having a plan was always a good thing, right? She would call it her “keep from embarrassing yourself and Elias by not sexually assaulting him in front of unsuspecting people” manual. Okay, so maybe the title needed some work.
“Yes. She tends to be a worrywart,” Tara said.
“Ra probably took her phone away,” Elias said with a grin that made it clear he thought that would be hilarious.
Tara didn’t think he was too far off the mark. Ra seemed completely set on taking care of Shelly and making sure she got rest would definitely be a way to take care of her.
“He’s certainly got the bossy thing down,” Tara agreed. Though that wasn’t exactly what Elias had said.
He looked at her, tilting his head, seeming to study her. “How are you?” he asked. “Today was rough, not just with Carol but with the assignment we were given.”
Tara wasn’t about to deny her emotions felt raw. Carol was a force to be reckoned with, yet Tara was still shocked at how well her foster mother had handled all the new revelations. It’s not every day a person learns there is a supernatural war going on all around them.
Carol was also stoic about Tara’s departure. She’d been worried that her foster mom might fight her on it. Tara didn’t want to feel torn between Elias and the only thing she had that resembled a family, the person who had helped pull her from a very dark time in her life. She owed Carol. Not that her foster mom felt that way, but Tara didn’t believe in not giving back to someone who’d sacrificed so much for her.
“I’m good,” she said after several heartbeats. “But I do have a question.”
“Yeah?”
“Remember when that giant troll was stomping around all over the place and trying to bash our heads in?”
“A bit hard to forget, luv.”
“Well, what happens if someone hears them or sees them? I haven’t heard anything on the news about a mountain troll attack in Wisconsin.”
“Ah, good question. The forest sprites will have cleaned up the mess.”
“Sprites?”
“Yeah, they’re a bit like our … well … our cleanup crew, for lack of a better term. At least the light ones are. That’s why no one would have seen or heard the trolls crashing around. The sprites would have placed a glamour over everything during the fight so the mortals wouldn’t see us.”
“And why would they do that?”
“It’s just what they do. Of all the supernatural beings, sprites are the most secretive. They are distrustful of humans and feel they have the most to lose if the supernatural world is ever discovered.”
“Why is that?”
Elias shrugged. “I’m not entirely sure. Maybe it’s because they’re so small. They’re probably worried they’ll be captured and kept in cages in the zoo or something.”