A Curse Of Goodness

The Witches

           "Why do you smell like tomatoes?"

           My stomach dropped. Uh oh.

I had certainly not considered his heightened sense of smell. After working several hours in the kitchen and dicing vegetables, of course he'd sense the traces on me!

"Um... It's.. I-I ate tomatoes. This morning. With Ny-ell." I lied pathetically. Even I knew that my words didn't sound true.

His brows furrowed at my obvious lie and then his gaze went to my hair. A large, warm hand left my waist and gently reached into my blonde locks, pulling something from them, "Why are you covered in... In cobwebs?"

              I didn't even consider the sentence before it left my lips, "I-I haven't showered!"

              I wanted to smack my forehead at what I had just said. Gross, Annabella!

              He stared at me for a moment, still holding up the cobwebs in his fingers. "You didn't smell like that earlier today. And you didn't have dust covering you." His deep voice rumbled out.

"Yes I did...." I said quietly.

"No you did not. I know exactly what you smell like and it is not tomatoes." He growled lowly.

I squirmed in his tight hold and avoided his eyes. I had always been awful at lying. "M-Maybe you couldn't smell it because we were outside?" I offered.

"Annabella."

               I kept my gaze down at our shoes. His looked so much bigger than mine. The black material of the shoe was so shiny I could practically see my reflection in it. Does he have someone polish his shoes? I bet he does.

              "Annabella."

              "Bron." I muttered back with a frown.

               He calloused finger curled under my chin, pulling my gaze upward. His nose was practically touching my own and I gasped.

"Tell me before I lose my patience."

              His words were clipped and threatening, yet somehow I didn't feel threatened at all. Bron's constant anger was something to fear, I could see that. But I never felt at risk, if that makes sense. Which is probably why I continued the lie.

              "I wasn't doing anything." I whispered to him, feeling distracted by how close his face was to my own. He was doing it to intimidate me, but I was simply admiring his eyes from the new distance.

Bron's intense stare continued for a silent moment, as if waiting for me to confess. When I only returned the gaze, he released an annoyed sigh and turned away.

His arms left me and I was immediately cold. I watched as he walked over to the couch, glanced at the empty plate he had brought earlier, and then turn back to me. "It's late and you need to sleep now."

            This time, I didn't refuse. I nodded my head and mumbled out an "Okay."

            I already felt shameful for blatantly lying to him, so maybe I should let go of my pettiness for now. Which was hard, because I felt as though I was just allowing this to happen to me. Allowing him to steal me and keep me here.

            When he began to walk to the door, I followed behind him still lost in my thoughts. We left the library and began to walk down the halls. I tried to discreetly scoot a bit closer to him, remembering the disaster that occurred last time I wandered through the hallways.