Wickedly Good (Hex Appeal) Page 9

  “I remember sleeping maybe three hours a day when I was a freshman,” Aston admitted in the hope sharing would prompt her into returning the favor.

  “Freshman year was a cakewalk compared to my last two years,” Gemma said without tearing her attention from the road to their right. “But I learned sleep was critical during the second semester of my first year. So when I wasn’t studying, I was sleeping.”

  “You must have gone out with friends…”

  She shot him skeptical look that seemed to ask why must I? Aston didn’t back down. The skittish girl hadn’t turned into a strong woman by hiding out in her dorm room, sleeping away the year.

  Finally, Gemma relented. “There was a group of us majoring in art history who got on well. On the weekends, we did day trips to museums within driving distance. A few times we booked trips to places farther when we had short vacations. We spent spring break of our sophomore year in New York City. We also had craft day every other week at one of the rest homes and several visits to the elementary and middle schools for art awareness campaigns. I preferred the visits to the schools.”

  She’d engaged in community service in between sleeping and studying? Impressive. However, his perception of her strength would be tarnished if she’d gone to England with a large group of friends. “Did you go to England with your group?”

  “One of them went to England with me,” she admitted. “Two studied in Paris instead. We met up twice while we were abroad.”

  He tried to hide his disappointment. Yes, she’d studied in a foreign country as she’d said, but she’d had some support from home with her. “So you had a friend with you? That must have been nice.”

  Gemma shook her head slightly. “My friend studied ceramics at a nearby college. We visited at one of the pubs a few nights a week, when we could.”

  “Did your friend…know?” Why couldn’t he finish the question?

  Gemma turned. He caught her gaze during his next glance. Aston now had her full attention. He should have stuttered earlier. “Did he know I was a witch?”

  Though Gemma had accurately finished his question, Aston heard only one word. He. Gemma’s friend—the one she’d met at a pub several nights a week in England—had been male. Had there been something between them? Something more than friendship? Was it still there? Or had her return to Haizea House and Drew’s subsequent interest wiped it away?

  He cleared his throat, attempting to focus his thoughts. “Yes.”

  She shook her head twice and then resumed her view out the window.

  Her friend had been human. The news made him uncommonly pleased. She’d braved the vicious Underground of an ancient city to study what she loved. And she’d done it with only the occasional support of a human who didn’t truly know her and would never understand her.

  “What sort of job were you thinking of getting?”

  Gemma stiffened. Was this a new tack? He would arrange for her to get her dream job so she’d have no choice but to leave the state? Would that be worse than accepting his bribe? “I worked a few summers as a museum intern,” she told him cautiously.

  “You liked it?”

  She nodded reluctantly.

  “Do you have a museum in mind?”

  “I was considering trying to start my own gallery.” Why had she felt compelled to tell him her true dream, one she hadn’t even told her mother? She blamed Aston’s urging voice and his steady gaze when he should have been driving.

  His response came out at a slow, nearly incredulous pace. “Really?”

  She shifted uncomfortably in her seat. Clearly he didn’t believe her capable of running a business. She slumped before she was able to catch herself. “Yes,” she managed to reply.

  Gemma’s phone rang, a rarity when the majority of her friends preferred to text. Relief coursed through her at the name flashing on the screen. She’d found a way out of the uncomfortable discussion.

  With only a brief apologetic look tossed Aston’s way, Gemma answered the call. “Are you home?” she asked her friend Justin by way of a greeting.

  “Yup,” Justin’s tenor voice replied over the distance from Connecticut. “Made it safe. My luggage is even here.”

  “Rub it in,” she grumbled.

  He let out the wicked laugh that was a precursor to flirting. They’d gone to dinner once and quickly discovered they weren’t compatible for anything more than friendship. The primary issues were that he was human and didn’t like children. But that didn’t stop the flirting.

  “Has your mum made you look for a job yet?” Gemma cut in before he could begin teasing.

  “My ‘mum’?” There was a small chortle as he emphasized her word choice. “We’re not in England any longer. You can call her my mom.”

  “Mum is quicker off the tongue. And yeah, I’m having a hard time remembering which terms I switched up for the Brits. But you didn’t answer the question.”

  “I got in last night, slept for fifteen hours and then called you first thing. Mum hasn’t had time to ask me how my trip was let alone demand I seek gainful employment.” Justin paused to weather a particularly violent yawn, during which Gemma noted Aston’s abrupt shift to the left of his bucket seat. “What about yours?”

  “She’s not mentioned jobs or money,” Gemma admitted. Her focus moved to her traveling companion. He could abuse a little magic to hear both sides of the conversation. But would he?

  “Yet,” Justin put in. “She will. Parents always do.”

  “Maybe.” Silently, she considered the truth of the matter. Her mother hadn’t demanded Gemma get a job when she was younger. And employment hadn’t come up as a topic of conversation since she’d been back. But that would certainly change if the Haizeas’ housekeeper learned of what her daughter had done with one of the Haizea men.

  A wooden bang implied someone had hit Justin’s door. He made a small disgruntled noise. “I’ve been found out,” he told Gemma. “I best go face the music. Talk later?”

  “Okay,” she mumbled.

  How would she cope during the rest of the drive without Justin to distract her? Maybe Aston would remain silent.

  Chapter Nine

  Aston shouldn’t feel threatened by a college-aged boy who had expressed little affection during Gemma’s call. But he couldn’t deny he’d had the urge to grab the phone and tell the young man never to call Gemma again. It was this urge and his darkening mood that kept him quiet during the three-quarters of an hour drive to the seaside city.

  He pulled into a downtown parking garage with the ease of someone familiar with the location. And he was. He’d been on good terms with the Portsmouth priestess for years. She’d already given him her nomination for regional high priest.

  Gemma was quiet as they exited the vehicle. Her reticence continued on the trip to the cement stairs that would bring them to street level. He trotted behind her, catching a glimpse of her creamy thighs beneath her light dress. His dick stirred at the considerations racing through his mind.

  Aston wanted her. Again. Still. It worried him that his lust for Gemma wasn’t fading. He wanted her to know it had been him in Drew’s bed these past two nights. Above all, Aston wanted her to come to him knowingly.

  Shoving the lustful thoughts aside, he indicated for her to head west, leading the way for once. It meant he didn’t get to watch her luscious body moving. Perhaps that was a good thing.

  She stepped into the art gallery when he held the door for her. He studied Gemma closely because of her admission in the car. Her measuring gaze was for more than the works of art. She took in the space’s layout, location, lighting and probably a slew of other things he’d not understand.

  When he’d considered Gemma’s future vocation, Aston had imagined her working for someone else—an experienced curator. But looking at her now, he could see her reigning supreme over a small, independent gallery such as this one. A protective instinct welled within him at the thought of her working alone. And an entirely different one made its
elf known when he imagined her working with the young man on the phone.

  Aston jerked forward, following behind her. She paused at the nearest painting, a landscape he found rather uninspiring. It must have had the same effect on her, for she soon glided to the next piece.

  He found himself watching her reactions rather than viewing the art. Aston didn’t care about the framed works on the walls. While he did need a few pieces for the charity auction, he could call his contact at the Manchester gallery to have something held for him. This trip was simply an excuse to spend time with Gemma.

  Surely she’d guessed that. Yet she’d agreed to accompany him all the same. Why, when she seemed frightened by him? Dare he hope she held a secret fondness for him?

  “See anything you like?” he asked once they’d viewed two-thirds of the available items.

  Her eyes hadn’t lit up once. Not like when she’d spotted the sculpted books last night. Nothing here caught her fancy.

  “There aren’t many environmentally conscious pieces here,” she replied without turning toward him. “I suppose an argument could be made for the papier-mâché falcons.” Gemma gestured a limp wrist toward the painted birds set atop a display in the middle of the gallery. “But they’re not particularly well done.”

  She’d vocalized his thoughts to a T. Maybe Aston knew more about art than he’d realized.

  “The landscapes I’ve seen so far are idealized,” she went on. “I’m not sure what message they would send to your organization. Seabrook hasn’t looked like that since the seventies before the plant went in. I know it’s the artist’s commentary on nuclear power destroying the environment, but do you want to incite political debate with your art choices?”

  The clean air committee was broken into two groups. Both were in favor of clean energy but they disagreed on how to accomplish their goal. He wouldn’t have given the landscapes a second glance if he’d noticed they were idealized pictures of Seabrook.

  “No,” he replied.

  She gave a slight nod and then started for the remaining third of the gallery. He trailed close to her right side, discreetly drawing in a nose full of her lilac scent. Home, she smelled of home. How was he going to get her into bed a third time?

  “I haven’t seen Drew,” she mentioned as they paused beside a copper sculpture of a curled, sleeping feline. “Is everything all right with him?”

  His body tightened in all the wrong ways. “He had a bit of car trouble.” Though it was a lie, she’d miss any betraying body language thanks to her pose facing away from him. “And he’s been dealing with a demanding fiancée.” At least that bit wasn’t a lie. Elizabeth, though a nice female, knew exactly what sort of man Drew was, and thus had attempted to keep him on a short leash.

  To her credit, Gemma hid her disappointment. Her fingers hovered over the burnished metal. Aston imagined them hovering over him instead. His balls tightened.

  “It seems like it’s been days since I’ve seen him,” she commented.

  Aston scrutinized her profile with a force he was certain she could feel. Was she hinting she knew it hadn’t been Drew in bed last night? Or was she merely pointing out she hadn’t seen her lover in the light of day?

  It gave him no end of frustration that though he could speak in her mind if he so chose, thanks to Air magic, he couldn’t hear any responses. He needed to know what was going on beneath her auburn locks.

  “You know how Drew is.” Aston hoped the cryptic response wouldn’t damn him.

  “I just thought…” She walked across the next space to a display of sparkling hair clips. Again her fingertips hovered just above the pieces, as if she could sense the artist’s intent simply by touching the air around it. “He seemed so happy to see me.”

  Aston’s good-for-nothing brother had been happy to see Gemma. Another sycophantic follower for his vast harem would no doubt please Drew. It certainly helped that Gemma was gorgeous.

  “I only hoped we’d get a chance to talk some,” she continued.

  “Drew is more of an action kind of man.” Aston’s reply was stilted rather than nonchalant as he’d hoped. Color appeared in her cheeks. Aston silently cursed himself for giving her a reason to think of sex with his brother. He wanted to grab her by the cheeks and show her exactly who she’d been kissing for two nights.

  “Yes.” Her quiet agreement came on the trip to the next display, this one a set of earrings and a matching necklace. She lit up as though she liked them. The green stones would look good against her auburn hair. Aston wanted buy them for her—to buy her all manner of baubles—simply to see that light in her eyes. “But I’d hoped he’d talk to me this time,” she half whispered.

  He set his jaw with an angry snap. “Why? He doesn’t deserve you. Why do you persist in fawning over a man who clearly cares only for himself?” Only when she turned her startled expression on him and took a step back did he recognize the vitriol his voice held. And exactly what he’d said.

  “He doesn’t care only for himself,” she insisted, passion lifting her pitch as she bravely held what was surely a black look. “When I was five, I fell into the pond on the next property over. Drew dove in, fully clothed with his shoes still on, and he saved me. He carried me all the way back to the house. It ruined everything he was wearing, especially his leather shoes. But he didn’t yell at me. A selfish person wouldn’t have done that.”

  Aston’s breath caught. She’d remembered.

  But she’d remembered wrong.

  If Gemma didn’t know better, she might think the quick flash of Aston’s eyes before they narrowed to slivers was the sign of a stunned man. But nothing startled him. And the dark, crinkled expression that overtook his features was worlds away from surprise.

  “Drew didn’t save you.”

  What did those carefully enunciated words mean? Was Aston’s opinion of his brother truly so low he refused to entertain the idea of Drew doing a good deed?

  “He did,” she insisted. “I’d have died that day if not for your brother.”

  “If not for my brother—” Aston halted his echo in mid-thought. For what reason, she couldn’t guess.

  He grabbed her arm and hauled her out of the gallery before she could protest. Unwilling to make a scene in front of a potential business associate, Gemma let him manhandle her onto the sidewalk. And she didn’t fight him when he drew her to a brick wall between the businesses.

  He was too close, that deeply hooded gaze too angry. Gemma flattened herself against the wall, avoiding his proximity.

  “If not for my brother, you wouldn’t have fallen in that pond,” Aston finished.

  “No. I was playing where I shouldn’t have been. I slipped and fell on a slimy stone.”

  “You didn’t slip, Gemma.” It was the firm delivery of an authority figure, one who would not be questioned. And yet he couldn’t know. He wasn’t there. “I saw,” Aston went on, seemingly reading her mind. “My mother sent me to fetch Drew for dinner. I tracked him to that pond—to where you were. I emerged from the woods in time to watch him sneak up behind you. And I saw my little brother invoke Air to knock you into the water.”

  Gemma shook her head in rapid determination. Drew had saved her. He’d ruined his clothes. She recalled it vividly. “No.”

  “Yes.” Aston’s insistence was simple, as if he didn’t require dramatics to make his point. “I felt the draw on the aether. I saw Drew focusing the blast. And then I watched as you plunged into the pond following the flick of his fingers.”

  He couldn’t possibly be right, not with the memory burned in her mind. But Gemma couldn’t argue with her priest more than she had. “If he did what you said, he made it better by saving me.”

  He pounced, fingers curling around her biceps. “He didn’t save you, Gemma. I saved you.”

  “No,” she whispered below his towering presence.

  “Think!” He tightened his grip as he gave her a small shake. “How could a weak eleven-year-old boy carry a sopping five-year
-old girl, in a dripping blue frock, two miles back to the house?”

  Her breath caught in her throat at the mention of the blue dress. She had been wearing blue that day so long ago. “But I re-remember him,” she stammered in rising horror. Drew’s daring rescue had been one of her first memories of the younger Haizea brother, and certainly her fondest. It couldn’t be false. It simply couldn’t. Gemma shook away the doubt. “His clothes were ruined. He told me when I woke in his bed. He saved me.”

  “When you woke in my bed, Drew was required to apologize for trying to hurt you. Clearly I should have witnessed the apology to be certain he gave one.”

  Drew hadn’t apologized. He’d proclaimed he was her savior, that he’d personally carried her the distance even though it meant the destruction of his favorite shoes. She’d believed him. Why wouldn’t she?

  There was one last mystery Gemma needed solved. “But if you were there, why don’t I remember seeing you?”

  “I had to resuscitate you once I fished you out of the pond,” Aston replied through clenched teeth. Slowly his grip on her arms began to relax without releasing. Likewise, his expression returned to the one she’d grown accustomed to seeing. “You fainted straightaway the moment I brought you ‘round. And you remained unconscious during the walk back. You woke while I was downstairs working the gates for the ambulance. Our mothers took over from there.”

  She recalled that. Amanda had sent Drew away when the hospital men arrived to take Gemma on their stretcher. And she recalled that the only Haizea to visit her in the hospital had been intimidating Aston.

  Good grief. Could her fondest memory of her lifelong crush really be false? Worse, did she have to replace him in her memory with this man?

  “He could barely lift his book bag.” Aston’s volume softened, as if he thought he might spook her if he spoke louder. The lines framing his features shifted, lifting until he appeared emphatic rather than angry. “Drew couldn’t have carried you up the embankment, let alone back to the house.”