“I know, I know.” His arms came around me, crushing me, and he rested his chin on top of my head. “I’m sorry.” His sigh rustled my hair. “I worry about you, Squirt. That’s all. I hate that I’m not here to protect you.” He pressed a warm kiss to my temple. “I’m proud of you. So damn proud.” Another brush of his lips attempted to distract me. “I’m a shit friend for robbing you of your pride. I never should have implied your grades weren’t earned or that your accomplishments weren’t deserved. Forgive me?”
“Consider yourself on probation.” I pinched his nipple and twisted until he shouted. He jumped back, releasing me, and I shook my head. “I don’t remember you being this possessive. You traded girlfriends like some boys traded baseball cards. I wasn’t expecting you to try and cram me into a plastic sleeve in your binder.”
He rubbed his chest with the heel of his palm. “Would that work?”
The poor guy sounded so hopeful, I almost hated to burst his bubble. Almost. “That’s going to be a hard no.”
“I don’t have a binder,” he confessed. “I don’t even own a plastic sleeve. I’ve never wanted to keep anyone.”
“Boaz,” I whispered, but he must not have heard.
“Amelie warned me I was suffocating you.” He palmed his nape and scrubbed a hand over his bristly hair. “Tell me when to poke air holes in the lid, even if you have to poke air holes in me to get my attention.” He tried for a charming smile, but his eyes were too raw to make it stick. “The army proved I’m trainable. I’m willing to learn if you’re willing to teach me.”
“We’ll have to figure it out together.” One day at a time. “Even if that means figuring out we can’t be together.”
A fraction of his confidence made a reappearance. “As long as you’ll still love me.”
“Boaz,” I told him with complete honesty, “I would have no idea how or where to stop.” Just what flavor of love existed between us required more extensive taste testing. “Are we still on for our date?”
“Do you mean are we still going out on the town, after which I will expect no sexual favors in exchange for providing you with dinner and entertainment? Yes. We are.”
“You are a true gentleman, Boaz Pritchard.”
“Can I pay you a dollar to say that again so I can record it?” He palmed his cell and wiggled it at me, his good mood restored. “Mom will never believe a girl said that about me without being coerced.”
“Except if you give me a dollar, that’s bribery. Pretty sure that’s the same thing as coercion.”
“Hmm.” He tapped the phone against his chin. “I could tickle you until you say it.”
I took a cautious step out of range. “So now you’ve escalated to threats?”
“What are a few threats between friends?” He rushed me, scooped me up and dumped me over his shoulder like a sack of potatoes. His fingers proved they still remembered all my most ticklish spots. The crease at the bend of my knee, the spot where my neck met my shoulder. My ribs. Goddess, my ribs. “Am I a gentleman now?”
“No,” I howled between bouts of laughter. “You’re a holy terror.”
“Hey, that’s not nice.” He smacked my butt, a stinging punishment. “Only my sister gets away with calling me HT.” He clomped up the steps with me writhing on his shoulder, and Woolly—the traitor—dialed the porch light up to blinding in greeting. “Aww shucks, Woolly. I missed you too.” And because he was an unrepentant flirt who couldn’t help himself, even where houses were concerned, he tacked on, “Your foundation is looking mighty fine tonight.”
The curtains in the front windows rustled in her version of tittering laughter.
“Woolly,” I panted, breathless from laughter and the bite of his hard shoulder in my soft gut, “I could really use a little help here.”
The front door swung open before we reached it so he could walk right in, potato sack and all.
Glowering up at the chandelier in the foyer as we passed beneath it, I growled, “That’s not what I meant.”
Once we hit the living room, he set me on my feet. “Get dressed.”
Rubbing my stomach, I noticed he was dressed as casually as me. “Is this the dress code?”
“Nope.” A smug grin curved his lips. “I have to go home and pretty up for you before we leave.” A trace of his earlier caginess returned. “After Taz texted me about the missed lesson, I figured I should go pry you from Linus’s clutches before I changed, in case things got messy.”
The idea of things getting messy between Boaz and Linus was laughable. Boaz was a hunk of muscle trained for war, and he was a natural-born brawler. Then again, Linus had a wraith on his side. Maybe the match would be more even than I’d first thought.
Thinking of the wraith left me with the unhappy reminder that Linus would be given a blow-by-blow accounting of our evening thanks to Cletus.
“Shorts, dress, pants, skirt...?” I rolled my hand. “What’s appropriate?”
“Wear whatever you want, whatever makes you comfortable.” He backed out onto the porch. “I’ll match our plans to your outfit.”
Woolly closed the door behind him with a sigh from the nearest floor register.
“Okay, you’ve got a point. That was a dreamy thing to say.” I just wished he hadn’t had so much practice in saying them. It was hard to know how many of his lines were off the cuff—he really did have a silver tongue—and how many were taken from his well-worn playbook. “I hope he wasn’t in the mood for steak and lobster.”
After hours spent hunched over a table with a pen in my hand, I wasn’t in the mood to be restricted again. Not in how I dressed or in how I ate. Casual suited me just fine. I did give a nod to the fact it was a datelike thing by wearing a swishy navy sundress with moons and stars embroidered on the hem. I kept my shoes flat and my hair down, and I skipped the makeup since I would make a hot mess of it without professional help.
Boaz took longer with his primping than any woman I had ever known, so I decided to wait for him on the porch to enjoy the cool night air. I plopped down on the slatted bench seat and kicked off the planks, setting the chains jangling until they fell in sync. I tipped my head back at the same time I caught movement out of the corner of my eye.
Turning my head, I spotted Linus strolling across the lawn, heading for the curb like he had a ride to catch. The urge to apologize for Boaz pushed me upright, and I smoothed a hand down my dress, pressing all the wrinkles flat. By the time I looked up with a hello in my throat, he was gone.
Seven
A shrill whistle let me know my date had arrived. Considering motorcycles didn’t have horns, I figured this was the equivalent of Boaz parking outside my house and honking. I wasn’t sure if I ought to be offended I didn’t rate a pickup at the door or relieved that he really was treating this like any of a thousand other dates he’d been on. As much as I didn’t want to be lumped in with all the others, there was a certain thrill in finally living what I had fantasized about for half my life.
I took the path leading toward the garage and stumbled at the sight of Boaz. He always had cleaned up nice. His tan cargo pants had been pressed, and his mossy green button-down shirt brought out the warmth of his eyes. With his milk-chocolate irises striated with lighter bands, they always reminded me of swirled caramel. As appealing as he was with his lips quirked up in one half of a knee-melting grin, it was what squirmed in his arms that held me transfixed.
“Kittens?” I couldn’t stop myself from rushing over or snatching the miniature orange tabby crawling up his shoulder. “Where did you find them?”
“They swarmed me when I opened the garage.” His gaze raked down me, and he moistened his lips. “You look good enough to eat.”
“Thank you, Mr. Big Bad.” I curtseyed. “Is this the part where you ask if my grandmother is home?”
“Sorry I didn’t pick you up at the door. I meant to but…” He lifted his hands, a kitten in each. “I wasn’t sure what to do with all this.”
A flutter behind my breastbone announced his lumping me in with past girls was forgiven and forgotten, as if that had ever been in question.
“Have you seen the momma cat?” I peered around him into the garage where Jolene and Willie stood together companionably in chromed silence. “We should probably leave the kittens how you found them.”
In this neighborhood, with so many Society residents sprinkled throughout, there was always the possibility the momma cat was someone’s familiar. If that was the case, the kittens were hereditary familiars and would mature into more powerful foci than their parents. Most likely, the fuzzballs were slated for kids waiting to begin the bonding process.
All High Society darlings were raised alongside their animals. All budding practitioners were expected to bond with their familiar, the true first test of their potential. That connection, once cemented, used a trickle of the child’s life force to slow the animal’s aging process.
Keet and I hadn’t bonded before he died. There hadn’t been time.
The upside of having a psychopomp was while other necromancers worried their familiars might die from accidents as mundane as getting backed over in the driveway, mine was already dead. Undead. Whatever. I would never have to part with him as long as I was around to revive him.
“There’s a box in the back.” Boaz aimed a kitten’s pink nose in that direction when he lifted his arm. “Can you get it down? We’ll dump the little guys in there then make our escape.”
“It depends.” I handed him the kitten back and sidled between the bikes to the back wall. “What’s in there? Knowing my luck, it’ll be your weights left over from high school. Or your football gear. Or your baseball gear. Or your soccer gear. Or—”