They were right.
“You guys are the best, I don’t know what I’d do without you two,” I smiled an apology between them. “Sorry I’ve been such a grouch to be around lately. I just can’t believe how long he’s been gone this time.” I winced just thinking about it. “A whole month.”
Cora glided across the kitchen and set a mug as tall as it was wide down in front of me, wrapping one of her china doll arms around my shoulders. “No need to apologize. We know how hard it’s been,” she said, encouraging me with the tone of her voice and the squeeze of her hand over my shoulder. “He’s been away so long I’m getting close to going mad missing him myself.”
“Hmmm,” Joseph mumbled to himself while he poured a cup of coffee—it was out of place, he neverhad a cup of coffee with his girls, as he called us. He obviously had something to add to our morning talks that circled around things as trivial as the color Cora should repaint the kitchen, to my anger at the Council for keeping William away on back-to-back missions.
I knew it was his duty, we were Guardians tasked with preserving and protecting Mortal life, but no other doctor in our Alliance was gone a third as much as William had been as of late. I suppose partial blame could be placed on the Inheritors, the other half of the Immortal world. Whereas our duty was to preserve Mortal life, their duty was to preserve the planet (A.K.A. Eden), two agendas that ideally should have worked well together, but over the past hundred years, Mortals and the planet had become more enemies than allies, resulting in the same between Guardians and Inheritors. The more tenuous that relationship became, the more tenuous the Immortal world became, translating into William being gone. A lot.
“I think I have a piece of news for you two that will brighten your outlook considerably today,” Joseph said, ambling over to the table as if he were enjoying a stroll along the beach.
“Are you going to share it with us anytime soon?” I wasn’t looking at her, but I knew her eyebrows were sky high from the tone of voice. “Or are you going to keep pretending to be so enthralled by that ‘perfectly ineffective Indulgence’?” Cora finished, mimicking his rebuff for us every morning he found us so engrossed over our steaming cups of nirvana.
He smiled into the cup of coffee, lifting his eyes to us. They were sparking out of control. “He’s back.”
Was it possible two words could make me want to drop to my knees at the same time I felt like levitating? I was living proof it was.
A shrill sound of elation came from Cora’s mouth and her hand was now slapping my shoulder in agitated fits.
“When?” I breathed, all I could muster.
His smile grew, a moment before I heard the screen door in the front room slam shut. I was out of my chair with the speed of a bullet and flying across the kitchen.
“Just now.” I heard Joseph chuckle behind me.
It felt like it took forever to pass through the hall to get into the front room. It was less than the tick of a watch’s second hand, but I knew it was the last second I’d spend without him—at least until the Council decided to send him away—and that gave it a never-ending quality that was torturous.
I skidded to a stop the moment I came in view of the entryway. Was it possible? Was he really standing here in front of me now, an agonizing, but easily remedied twenty feet away? Had he somehow grown more beautiful tramping through the African desert on his mission? It seemed plausible given the way my body ached just looking at him.
“Seeing you right now makes that hellacious month away from you almost worth it,” he said, and, despite the splendor of his mouth moving, his eyes held me like they always did—a bomb could have gone off in my hands and I wouldn’t have noticed.
“Almost,” he whispered, smiling the one he knew would undue my resolve ten days out of ten before dropping his bag and coming for me. It was a relief because I was frozen in place. A minute ago he’d been as far away as the North Pole and a minute later, he was here, closing the space between us in two final strides.
“Bryn,” he whispered, resting his hands over my cheeks. My stone-like condition shattered the instant his touch entered me and the current he’d loved me with . . . he’d saved me with, entered with such voltage it felt like it was jump-starting my heart.
I knew the tears were forming and would be spilling soon. There was too much emotion circling around me to contain their release. I was sweltering in it.
William’s eyes traced the first one that streamed down my face. “There’s no need to cry,” he said, erasing the wet sphere from my jaw. “No need to be sad. I’m back.”
“I’m not sad,” I said, my voice all high and pitchy. “I’m happy . . . it’s the happiest day of my life.”
He smiled and stopped another tear short with his thumb. “You say that every time I get back.”
“That’s because every time it’s true,” I whispered, as my emotions began to pull themselves together, only to be replaced by something else that spread through me like hot lava. He saw it in my eyes, recognized it, and responded.
His thumb moved from the corner of my eye to the tip of my chin. He tilted it up and his eyes burned with the kind of fire I could have stepped into. They burned all the way in his journey to my lips, until I lost my view of them when my eyelids dropped like heavy curtains when his mouth met mine. Whenever he kissed me, everything weakened, sending all my energy into my lips where they used every last bit of the stolen power.