Page 41 of First Ritual
“Why are you reading this book? Have you formed a bond since joining the coven?” he asked, taking the seat beside me.
My heart hammered at the unexpected question—and how close it was to the reason I’d joined the coven. “Should I have?” When he didn’t respond, I continued with “Do you have a name?”
The magus nodded absently as he toyed with the edges of the book.
Cool. “My name is Bronte… as an example of how people usually answer that question.”
“We should kiss,” he announced.
I stared, then snorted. Ah, surprises.
Yet this proposal, unlike my spontaneous kissing proposal to Wild in the bar, was loaded. Or could be. “I don’t tickle your pickle. Why do you want to kiss me?”
“How do you know my pickle isn’t tickled?”
“Because I’ve tickled pickles before. I know what a pickle that’s been tickled looks like.” My gaze lowered to his lap. “That pickle… ain’t tickled.”
His lips twitched. Just. Maybe. “I want to know what the fuss is about. Sven and Wild are distracted by you. They don’t get distracted. Ever.”
“I haven’t kissed Sven.”
“Yes.”
“How do you know that?”
“Because we tell each other everything.”
I whispered, “What about tickled pickles?”
“Especially about tickled pickles.”
I rested against the hard wooden seat. You’d think grimoires would cushion the shit out of this place with the time they spent on their asses. “Do you guys have a special handshake? That’s what I want to know.”
He adjusted his glasses, and a swoop of lust hit me. The guy wasn’t much interested in me, but… yeah, pretty packaging. “For a kiss, I would tell you.”
“Unnecessary. My kisses are free.”
“You put your mouth on other people’s mouths just like that?”
The perfect entry point. “Kisses don’t mean much to me. I mean, Wild told you I kissed him in the bar, right?”
The magus searched my expression. “Do it then.”
I nearly laughed at his stoic expression.
He reared away when I tried to grab his chin. My hand hovered in the air between us. “I hold people’s chins when I kiss them.”
“Why?” he asked warily. “I don’t want tongue.”
My shoulders shook with silent laughter. “Because when you aren’t familiar with someone, it’s easy to kiss a nose or eye. More so if alcohol is a factor. Which, let’s be real, is often the case. Just habit to grab the chin now, I suppose.”
His expression suggested I’d lost my mind. “Right. Do it if you need to.”
Mr. Glasses squared his shoulders.
This guy was killing me. “Are you sure you want this to happen? You look like you’re marching to your execution.”
A flicker of humor lit his green eyes in the first show of openness since he’d arrived. The humor was gone the next second. “I want this to happen.”