Dusk Avenger (Flirting with Monsters #3) - Eva Chase Page 0,38

He’ll be having the table next!”

“And he may have it, if that’s what he’d like,” the incubus declared.

The mortal woman came over, still tugging at her red hair, which always drew my eye. It was more vibrant than even the furnishings in this extravagant room. She was tugging at it, I’d gathered, because she’d woken up to find the imp had woven it all into a mass of little braids while she’d slept.

Antic watched her work at untangling the strands with a huff. “I thought it looked nice that way.”

“It’s just—not my style,” Sorsha said. I got the impression she was trying to spare the imp’s feelings, which she seemed to do rather often, although I wasn’t sure why. The two of them hadn’t appeared to know each other already. The mortal obviously had a certain kindness to her. I liked that—and I liked her hair down in its loose waves best too.

She let go of the strands long enough to paw through the offerings on the table. “Didn’t we get a fruit salad? There it is. You can’t skip this, Snap.”

She pushed the shiny bowl with its glistening rainbow of chunks toward me, an emotion coming into her eyes that I saw quite a bit when she fixed them on me. Something hesitant but also hopeful, as if she were waiting for something she didn’t actually expect to happen. I hadn’t figured out what, but it made her sad, and that didn’t seem right.

All of them wanted more from me than I’d been able to give. They knew me from a long while before this, and I hadn’t known them until they’d pulled me from that prison.

I furrowed my brow as if that might push the memories to the surface, but I had nothing. Nothing except the journey on the large, sparkly vehicle and before that, the harsh lights in the uncomfortable cage—and before that, the stretch of hazy gloom in the shadow realm that I’d wandered through not knowing all the delights I was missing.

There must have been more experiences that I simply couldn’t remember. Ruse and Thorn had shown and told me so many fascinating things I couldn’t have imagined but had apparently encountered before. I supposed I’d have to seek out those they couldn’t immediately supply all over again. That didn’t sound like a horrible burden.

I popped a piece of banana into my mouth and reveled at the soft sweetness of it, even better with the peel removed. Oh, yes, I was looking forward to rediscovering everything that had slipped my mind. Even if this physical body had its quirks. A tiny itch had woken up in my forearm again. I scratched at it absently and reached for a perfect grape.

A small green shape launched itself onto the table with a warble of ineffective wings and a scrabbling of little claws against the polished wood. “Pickle!” Sorsha cried, leaping at the little dragon. He snapped up a piece of bacon before she managed to grab him. “You’ve had plenty already. Leave some for the rest of us.”

The shadowkind creature gave a snort of disagreement and scuttled away under the table as soon as she’d set him down. That made her appear sad too. No, I didn’t like that look on her at all.

“Are you going to have some eggs?” I asked. I was never sure how much I should say to her, since it seemed to both cheer and dishearten her when I spoke. I thought she might have grabbed a morsel or two in the midst of her work on her hair, but I’d been too absorbed in my own meal most of that time to pay attention.

“Nah, I’m more of a sausage gal myself,” she said, spearing one of those with a fork, and shot a grin at Ruse. The incubus guffawed as if she’d said something funny, which didn’t make much sense to me.

“I prefer the sausages too,” I offered, and suddenly Ruse was laughing so hard his breath sputtered, and Sorsha swiped her hand across her mouth as if she were holding back a snicker as well.

I turned my gaze to Thorn, who shrugged with a resigned shake of his head. I couldn’t tell whether that meant he didn’t understand the joke either or he simply didn’t approve of it. There appeared to be a fairly large number of things the large shadowkind didn’t approve of, from what I’d seen so far.

“Sausages, sausages!” the imp started to sing in her chirpy voice,