Compounding Traumas (Artemis University #6) - Erin R Flynn Page 0,108

your appetite. I love watching you eat and how adorable you are when you like something. You always appreciate the food and who makes it, and I think you are perfect.”

Nice save, but I also knew he meant it.

Which was why I picked one of the dinners I had asked for as well. I preheated the oven and put in the large catering-tray size of baked pasta. I set the timer and smiled at him. “We have forty minutes until dinner. Wanna make salad and sides or…” I dropped my towel and hopped on the counter.

Yeah, his answer was another round of me.

“I can’t move,” I panted when we finished and the timer was going off. “Best way to wait for dinner ever.”

“Best fucking sex and body ever,” he muttered under his breath as he hurried over to handle the oven. I was pretty sure he hadn’t meant for me to hear it, so I didn’t respond, but my cheeks flushed for sure.

Good thing I was already flushed from the sex and he wouldn’t see.

I knew from his thoughts he wanted me to eat naked so he could stare his fill, still shocked he was able to get me back. I wasn’t comfortable with it though. I was getting better and more confident with myself and my body, but after so many years of being abused and torn down, it would take more time.

And Izzy helped me see that was okay. At first, she thought I hid because she was a lesbian, and it hurt her. A lot. But after we talked more, she was patient, and now I could change in front of her and not be so… Uptight? I wasn’t sure that was the right term, but she teased me with it. Mel had been the only person I’d ever trusted, so I thought adding more in a year was great progress.

Even if some of them had betrayed me and completely broken my heart.

“What are you thinking about so hard, agra?” he whispered as he served me another helping.

“My progress.” I shrugged when he gave me a confused look, telling him where my head had been. “More than that; I laugh more. I smile more. I’m not a huge ball of aggression and pain. I still have a lot of that, and I will maybe never lose it all, but I feel better balanced.”

He swallowed loudly and tapped his fork to his plate, clearly wanting to say or ask something he didn’t think he should. “I’m glad. I want you happy.”

“Go ahead,” I whispered, but then heard his question in his thoughts. “Yes, Faerie takes power from fairies to sustain itself. It cleanses us of our overages in a way, and I think that’s why fairies don’t go off the rails like other supes. It’s…”

“What?” he asked, his eyes full of concern.

“Like jumping into a freezing cold shower and waking up, or when you’re super cold getting into a hot shower. It’s jarring, but also a rush and comforting? Yeah, comforting.”

He reached over and rubbed his hand over my arm. “You’ll find your people. I know you will.”

“How?”

He smiled at me. “Because you’re Tamsin fucking Vale, and you don’t let anyone or anything get in your way when you’ve got a mission or goal. You won’t stop, and I cannot see fate being so cruel as to leave you the last, allow you to get into Faerie, and not get answers and help the others. This is your fate, and you never fail.”

It was my turn to swallow loudly. I decided to tell him something I didn’t ever tell the others. “I feel like I’ve failed making them wait an extra year and not having answers already. I feel like—I’m losing hope.” I pulled my arm away and covered my face. “I’m losing hope and it’s hard. I don’t want to be the last.”

“Oh, agra, you won’t be,” he whispered. He came over and picked me up, sitting in my seat with me on his lap and hugging me tightly. “You won’t be. This is far from over, okay? Just hang in there. Let’s just get through the next round of shit, and we’ll keep going forward.”

I snuggled up against him and accepted the comfort. “Fine, you be the boss.”

He puffed out his chest and cupped my breast with a grunt. “Of course I am. I’m the man. Woman, do as I say, and I will—ouch.”

I pulled back my fork I had just jabbed in his arm. “You’re