Page 6 of These Deadly Dreams
Stars dance in my vision, but I hear Ellis gasp. She kneels in front of me with her hands pressed to her mouth.
“Oh my gods, Kai. I am so sorry.” Her hands flutter over me, afraid to actually touch me.
I groan and close my eyes. Damn. That seriously hurts. My heartbeat echoes in the side of my face where it’s already swelling, the same rapid pace as Ellis’s.
“Here,” Cade says and pulls my hand away from my face. “Damn woman, you did a number on him.”
Through my closed eyelids I see the violet glow of Cade’s magic before his hand runs over the side of my face. The uncomfortable squeezing sensation of being healed replaces the throbbing from Ellis’s punch.
When Cade steps away I open my eyes and see Ellis crouching across the room with her wide eyes trained on me and silent tears streaming down her cheeks.
“Shit,” I mutter and walk over to her. “Hey, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have made you do that.” I sit on the floor next to her and scoop her up in my arms. “I should have found another way to test you.”
She looks at me through watery eyes before collapsing against my chest in great heaving sobs. I look at Cade as he sits on the floor beside us. His expression mirrors my own. Hopelessness. Desperation to make her pain go away. There isn’t a lot we can do though. So we sit with her, we hold her, we rub her back. We let her know we’re here, no matter what.
When her tears run their course, she sits up and rubs her face. “I’m sorry,” she whispers. “This is just so much to take in. I feel like I don’t even know who I am anymore.”
My senses are shut down but the strength of her feelings seeps through anyway. She is so lost and confused. She’s scared, and slipping back into the place she was in when we first met her. When she was stuck with an abusive fiance and a father who didn’t care.
“Ellis,” Cade says gently as he brushes curls away from her face. “You are not alone in this. Please don’t forget that. We are here for you, and we will be here for you until the end of time. Nothing will change that. Together we will figure out what’s happening and we’ll get through it. This won’t last forever.”
I hum agreement in the back of my throat. “A cabin in the mountains with a crystal clear lake surrounded by pine trees. That’s where I want to live when all of this is over.”
“Just the four of us,” Cade continues. “A whole cabin to ourselves, in the middle of nowhere. No one to bother us. Just snow, cozy fires, and hot chocolate.”
“And lots of sex,” I add.
Ellis huffs a small laugh, but I can feel her disbelief. I can only assume she’s still wondering why we want to stay with her. Somehow we’re going to have to find a way to prove to her the truth of our words.
“Come on, let’s go to the kitchen,” I suggest. “I’ve heard Cade makes an amazing chocolate cake.”
3. Ellis
Baking a cake with a mage and a vampire is exactly what I needed to get out of my own head. These two are able to make me laugh even when I’m surrounded by the deepest shadows. They have a way of making me feel like I matter and that I’m cared for. Their words can only do so much to ease my fears, but their actions fill in the spaces where that fear festers.
“What the fuck is the difference between baking powder and baking soda?” Kai asks as he holds up the two containers side by side.
“Baking soda is sodium bicarbonate,” Cade answers as he measures and pours ingredients. “It’s an alkaline salt compound that creates carbon dioxide gas when mixed with an acid. Baking powder is a mixture of sodium bicarbonate and an acid, like cream of tartar, which requires moisture and heat to activate.”
I can’t help but giggle at the blank stare Kai gives him at the explanation. It doesn’t help that he has a bit of flour on the tip of his nose.
Cade chuckles as well as he leans over and licks Kai’s nose. “They help make the cake fluffy.”
“Could have just said that,” he mumbles and wipes his nose off with his sleeve.
Cade opens a container with a brown powdery substance inside. With the lid off, I catch a whiff of the most heavenly scent.
“Is that coffee?” I ask, leaning forward to get a better sniff.
“Espresso powder. The secret ingredient in my chocolate cake.”
I’m pretty sure I’m drooling as he scoops out a large helping of espresso powder and adds it to the rest of the ingredients.
“Kai, can you crack the eggs?”
Cade tosses two eggs to Kai without a care of dropping them. Of course, Kai catches them with his supernatural reflexes. Reflexes I apparently have, too? I push the thought away and don’t let it ruin the good mood the guys have brought out in me. Kai studies the eggs like he has never seen them before.
I watch with amusement as he holds one of the eggs above a separate bowl Cade provided. He struggles with cracking it. First, tapping the egg too lightly, then way too hard. The shell shatters and egg splatters everywhere.