*** This is book two in a series. YOU MUST READ The Prophecy first***
Ariella's life had changed drastically in the last month. Each day seemed to bring a new devastating truth to light. After the events of the last month she's started to change. Th...
Oops! This image does not follow our content guidelines. To continue publishing, please remove it or upload a different image.
When I finally blink my eyes open from the first night of peaceful sleep I've had in six months, I'm confused at first. My fingers aching, I flex them gently, realizing they hurt because of the tight grip I have on Lucien's t-shirt. Apparently, my subconscious was worried about him disappearing while I slept, so I slept with my arm stretched across the space between us with his shirt in a death grip.
He lays on his side of the bed, propped up against the headboard with his arms crossed behind his head. His eyes shift from the TV at the foot of the bed over to me when he feels my fingers move.
"Bout time you woke up," he says with a grin, and I grunt in response, my mind still foggy with sleep. "You slept about twelve hours."
Releasing my grip on his shirt, I roll onto my stomach, pressing my face into the pillow.
"How do you feel this morning?" I mumble into the pillow.
"I'm fine, AJ. Stop worrying."
"You definitely smell better," I mumble again, turning my face just enough to smirk at him.
"Yeah, your breath doesn't though," he says with a smirk of his own, and my hand shoots out to hit him in the side, the bed shaking with his laughter. The sound soothes the worry and pain I've been living with since he's been gone.
A quiet chuckle from the corner of the room draws my attention to Dante, still sitting in the chair he was in last night. I give him a half hearted little finger wave before turning my attention back to Lucien.
His eyes catch on my throat, and he reaches out, running a thumb over the pendant hanging from my neck, reminding me that I'm wearing it.
"Oh, yeah, I borrowed this while you were gone," I say, reaching up to pull it over my head, but he stops me with a hand on my wrist and a shake of his head.
"Keep it," he says with a smile.
"Thanks," I respond. "You good to head home today?"
He nods. "Like I said, I'm fine. Julian healed everybody else's injuries, and yours seem to have healed while you slept. I think everybody's just waiting for you to wake up."
"Do we have plane tickets booked?" I ask, and he shrugs. "Ask Everett."
"Why don't you ask him?" he asks, giving me a strange look.
"Because he basically asked me to stay away from him," I mumble back, realizing I never told Lucien that Everett was the other guy I was interested in before he went missing. He knew there was someone besides Lawrence, but he never knew who it was.
His brown eyes study me curiously before widening slightly, and I know he just put two and two together.
"Lawrence's brother?" He says in a disbelieving tone, and I roll my eyes.
