“It smells delicious, Amelia” I commented, drawing Amelia’s attention to me.

She turned her head from overseeing the table of food and looked over me with barely concealed annoyance. “Thank you.”

She turned back to the buffet line.

“Are you going to get something to eat?” I asked and when she didn’t answer, I pressed my luck. “I could get you a plate if you would like? So you don’t have to fight the crowd?”

She turned back to me, the infectious smile she wore for everyone else was long gone. “That’s alright Avalon, I can take care of myself.”

“I never thought you couldn’t,” I defended softly. My hand reached for her elbow and I found myself leading her to the back of the line before I could stop myself. She bristled under my touch, but let me lead her without making a scene. I placed her in front of me and stood behind her as close as I thought I could get away with without pissing her off more.

“Have you seen Jericho?” She asked in a clipped tone, her English accent making every word she said sound important.

“Not in a while,” I answered, thankful for any kind of conversation even if it had to do with Jericho. “I think he might still be out hunting.” I remembered the teenage boys dragging him along with them with several old rifles in their hands.

“Oh,” Amelia answered simply turning back around to face forward.

“Doesn’t it bother you?” I pressed my luck some more.

She waited a beat, audibly sighing in frustration. She straightened her stiff shoulders before turning around, her delicate faced pinched in irritation and her pouty lips that made such a great smile pressed into an adorable frown.

“Does what bother me?” She asked on a sigh.

“Jericho hunting? You are a vegetarian,” I reminded her playfully. The line moved behind her and I instinctively moved forward with it, but she didn’t. She stood her ground, not expecting me to step so close. She looked up at me, her mouth falling open just barely.

“I know I’m a vegetarian,” she tried to snap, but her voice came out breathy and unsure and impossibly sexy. I stared intently into those golden brown eyes, desperate to keep my hands to myself and my thoughts from getting away from me.

We stood there staring at each other for a few more moments, the attraction between us snapping and popping in our separated magic. I knew she couldn’t feel my magic like I could feel hers because she didn’t have any Titan in her. She was half Witch, half Medium just like every other Kendrick before her. She could feel how her magic was affected by mine and she could feel the heat with which she wanted me, but how our separate electricity reacted to each other was my little secret; my little secret that had started to intoxicate me and cloud my judgment whenever she was around. She was obviously attracted to me, but didn’t like me. That alone should be enough for me to stay away. I didn’t have time for a girl, let alone a girl that didn’t like me. Still I couldn’t move my gaze away from hers or talk myself out of trying to get to know her better.

She took a step back, breaking the spell between us. Her eyes darted around discreetly revealing her level of panic.

“So it doesn’t bother you?” I murmured.

“That Jericho went off to hunt? Why should it? Jericho is free to do as he pleases,” she replied curtly.

“I’m sure Jericho would agree with you,” I agreed. “But I meant for the sake of the animals it doesn’t bother you?”

“There is a big difference between the livestock farms from your country and hunting in order to feed a village of hungry children,” she replied snidely. People had started to just move around us in order to get at the table of food, so when Amelia stepped over to where the backs of the huts met the Romanian wilderness I followed her. The sun had dipped below the mountainous horizon by now, and this far away from the large fire we were cloaked in darkness.

“Is that your problem with me?” I laughed, trying but not succeeding to make it seem like I wasn’t laughing at her. “You don’t like that I’m American?”

Her response was an indignant snort that had my smile growing. “Avalon is that why you won’t leave me alone? You’re upset that I don’t like you?”

“That’s one of the reasons,” I admitted in a husky voice. The sounds of a gypsy trio began to liven the night as the fiddle, violin and accordion drifted through the air melting into a fast tempo, melancholy rhythm that called those who had finished their meal to dance around the fire. The cool breeze moved Amelia’s hair off her delicate shoulders and around her face and her eyes shone even through the dark night. I leaned forward with only the promise of her soft lips against mine. Her eyes flicked down to my mouth as I moved slowly towards her, her irresistible lips had a gravitational pull of their own and she made no attempt to move.

“Would you like to hear all the reasons I don’t like you, then? Would that help cure your curiosity?” She laughed mockingly, turning her head back to the village and moving her mouth out of my reach.

“Probably not,” I admitted truthfully. She snapped her head back to me like she was going to tell me anyway, so I had to interrupt. I actually physically had to or I would lose myself even more to the emptiness of monotony, there was something there, something between us and I was going to be damned if I let her talk me out of it before I figured out what it was. I leaned in, inhaling her as I drew closer to her ear. She smelled like lilacs and vanilla and…. happiness. “Dance with me,” I ordered softly into her ear.

She shivered under my breath and I felt it to my core. I slipped my hand around hers before she could decline and led her over to the fire. She followed me, letting me drag her along and then pull her into me once we were in line with the other dancers. She looked up at me with wide eyes that narrowed into defiance, but behind her rebelliousness was something like fear.

Yet she didn’t walk away.

And even though I could have easily danced with a hundred girls that would have gladly stayed because they wanted to, I only wanted to dance with her because she stayed when she didn’t want to.

I could relate. And the thought made me smile down at her, even while she glared unsurely up at me. Before she could change her mind, I put my hands on her hips and moved her with the complicated steps of the gypsy folk dance. The dance was fast paced and there was not time to really talk, but it also kept our bodies close together, constantly touching. My magic jumped and sizzled inside my veins with her so close, her delicate waist in my hands, the scent of her hair and skin intoxicating me.

She let me move her around, not trying to fight the dance, or my touch or what I was realizing was between us. The music picked up speed and so did our dance steps, soon we were out of breath and laughing with the effort to keep up to the practiced gypsies. I moved faster, more accurately and found myself caught up in the dance…. caught up in Amelia. Soon, it was just us dancing around the fire, just us in the Romanian wilderness, just us in….

The song ended, breaking the trance dancing with her put me into. I stared down at her as her chest heaved with the effort to breathe and her hair was pushed back away from her face. Her eyes held mine for a few moments with nothing in between us but the raw attraction that ignited her blood as hotly as it did mine.

It was at that moment the night ended and it was time to leave. I didn’t have time for girls. Even if one had finally managed to grab my attention. And I didn’t have the patience for the complexity I knew was love.

“Thank you for the dance, Amelia,” I forced a strong polite voice, when she had left me frustratingly breathless and dizzy.

Her eyes narrowed on me, and she waited a second before speaking. “I think you should call me Mimi,” she struggled to make herself sound stern. “I think I would like it better if you called me Mimi,” she agreed with herself, nodding her head slowly.

“And I think I like calling you Amelia better,” I confessed, biting back a grin. Her eyes widened with the sound of her name and I couldn’t help it, I really liked how she reacted when I used it.

With that, I turned around half loving how I left her staring after me and half hating how I had to walk away from her. But there were more important things than an infatuation with a spoiled princess and sick curiosity for how she made me feel. Hundreds of girls had been paraded in front of me and not one of them had caught my full attention. Amelia would be no different as soon as I distanced myself from her.

And I needed to distance myself from her. I needed to get back to the castle and figure out how to protect my Kingdom from another round of evil set on their destruction.

Chapter Eight

“Ah! Sorry!” I all but shouted on my way out of the throne room when I accidentally walked in on a very private moment between Eden and Kiran.

I shuddered against the image I was pretty sure would never be erased from my memory. I wondered if there was a magical ceremony that could cleanse my brain, like scrub it completely clean. That was going to take years of therapy before I could emotionally move on from that. And they were crazy if they ever thought I was going to sit in one of those thrones again.

I shuddered again.

“Avalon, is everything alright?” Talbott asked while walking briskly towards me. He was in full military mode with his soldier style walk and classic black dress pants and gray polo, the casual uniform of the Titan.

“No!” I whined, knowing I was being a baby, but there was nothing I could do to stop it at this point. “Nothing is alright! I will never be the same after that!”

I shuddered again. Violently.

“After what?” Talbott asked but then seemed to think better of the hallway. “Here, let’s go in here and we can wait for Eden and Kiran.”

“Uh, maybe we should wait before we-“

“Avalon, I’m sorry about that,” Eden peeked past the heavy brass door to the throne room. I looked away afraid of what I would see. And then I looked away in a different direction and then in another direction, basically I needed to look anywhere but at her. “Oh don’t be a baby, it’s not like we were having sex.”

I let out a growl of disgust and slapped my hands over my ears. “Don’t ever say that word around me again. Ever!”

I got giggles in response. Giggles.

“Sorry about that, brother,” Kiran offered.

“Wait, what actually happened Avalon?” Talbott asked, while putting these very awkward pieces together. “Is this why you called me in to talk? Listen I can solve a lot of problems for you, but I don’t think that is one of them.” And then he laughed. Talbott laughed.

“No, that is not why I called a meeting,” I snapped. “And, honestly I’m not sure anyone can help with the emotional damage from that.” I gestured in the general direction of Eden and Kiran still not able to make eye contact with them.

“You are a full grown adult now, Avalon. Please tell me a little PDA does not make you this uncomfortable,” Eden chastised me. And she was right. A little PDA shouldn’t make me uncomfortable. But there was nothing little about that public display of affection happening in the throne room, unless you wanted to call it a little PDB…. public display of banging.