Total pages in book: 131
Estimated words: 121389 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121389 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 607(@200wpm)___ 486(@250wpm)___ 405(@300wpm)
At that moment, her gaze held a wildness that he could almost identify, but then it was gone, and she was putting her shoe back on. “I have to meet my friend. We’re going to the theater—she bought the tickets two months ago.”
Ivan was considered smooth and sophisticated by the vast majority of people he met, the mask one he’d long perfected, but he found he couldn’t put it on with her. It was as if it didn’t exist, as if he could only interact with her in his rawest form.
“Will you meet me again?” he asked with no effort to hide his need to see her.
A long look, no smile now, just an intensity of focus.
He didn’t breathe until she said, “I’ll come tomorrow night.”
Ivan didn’t know what to offer her, how to make sure she didn’t change her mind. “I found a small cave while I was exploring. It has the imprint of a fossil.”
“Really?” She rose up on her tiptoes, rocked back, her expression alight. “Oh, we can go see that.”
And that was exactly what they did the following night, spending an hour on a gentle walk there, and an hour on the walk back. It was full dark on a moonless night, but he had a flashlight … and he was fairly certain Lei could either see in the dark or close to it. Despite his compulsive need to know her, he didn’t aggressively dig for more information.
She was … important to him, and they were too new, too fragile, for him to risk fracturing it. It was disturbing to him to admit that she’d walked right past his defenses as if they didn’t exist, but he couldn’t make himself be sorry about it. Not when she existed, this bright and wild creature who seemed to like him.
Just him. No mask. No sophistication. No Mercant power. Just Ivan.
“I can’t come tomorrow night,” she told him at the end of their time together, her teeth sinking into her lower lip. “I promised my friend I’d spend the time with her.”
That—the importance of keeping promises—was a thing Ivan did understand. “Do you have time in the afternoon?” It was easier to ask this time, with less risk of rejection. “I only have half a session tomorrow.” The morning was meant to be brutal, the afternoon intended for rest and repair.
That dazzling smile that did things to him that should’ve been impossible. “Yes. I was just going to forage for wild herbs to make a special oil. I could do that another day.”
“We could do that together.” Ivan just wanted to be with her; the activity was irrelevant. “You can teach me what to look for.”
That strangely familiar tilt to her head, a sparkle in the eyes he could see in the glow thrown off the flashlight. “Meet me at two thirty, then … cutie pie.” She was gone the next second, her laughter lingering behind her.
He dreamed of her that night, woke sweat-slick and with a racing heart at the thought that he’d imagined her. It took pulling up his sweatpants to look at his stitches to convince himself that she wasn’t an illusion. She existed … and she liked him. Enough to spend time with him.
Would she still like him if she knew what he was? If he told her of the thing that lived in his head? Of the damage done to his neural pathways that meant he’d never quite be “normal”?
Chapter 4
User 231i: No one goes after a Mercant and survives. Even if the assassin succeeds in eliminating the mark, the rest of that family would then hunt the assassin with unremitting focus, make their life a constant race for survival. Only an idiot would target them.
User 47x: Can confirm. Remember user 6nvy? Some CEO wanted Ena Mercant out of the picture and 6nvy decided to ignore our advice. Ena is still alive and kicking. Can’t say the same for the CEO, and 6nvy has never again posted here after taking that job. My guess is that they’re six feet under in some remote location, never to be discovered.
—Conversation on anonymous bulletin board reputed to be utilized by mercenaries and assassins (unconfirmed)
WOULD LEI STILL smile at him if he showed her the truth of himself?
Ivan stared at the wall in front of him, his gut tight as he pushed aside the question. He knew the answer and he didn’t want to face it. So he didn’t. Not today. But driven by his increasing panic at the inevitable—because not telling her the truth wasn’t an option—he aced the session that morning, which was about hand-to-hand combat with a highly trained changeling armed with claws and teeth.
He’d watched the wolves the entire time he’d been with them, learned how fast they could move, how flexible they could be—and he utilized all his knowledge against his opponent. When that opponent shifted without warning, coming at him in full wolf form, he handled that, too.