Shadow's Kiss (Monstrous Hearts: Fleur's Story)

Chapter Eight

"Is this really all you do?"

Fleur made a noise that could have been taken as a yes or no and kept playing.

They had been at her desk since sunrise because the only thing she could think to do was play a game. It couldn't solve her current situation, but at least she had stopped hyperventilating over a warlock being magically bound to her.

She had told him he could do whatever he wanted, but he had soon settled in Prosy's chair to watch quietly. Until now, anyway.

"We've been sitting here for two hours."

"Okay," she muttered, trying to concentrate. She wasn't great at the new Devil May Cry and was trying to practice some combos. It wasn't going well.

"You haven't once looked over at me." Dario sounded both baffled and charmed, as if failing to capture attention was something he had never experienced.

The lack of indignation worried her. Usually, people got mad or gave up whenever she ignored them. He was just growing more stubborn. In her silence, the buttons on her controller clicked at a rapid-fire rate, but she knew her timing was off even before she started missing the enemies and getting hit instead. Her attempts grew frantic.

"Why are your fingers doing that? Do you have a condition?"

"Sure do. A pain in my ass that won't go away."

"Can't go away."

At that, she finally paused the game, lifting the headphones from her nearest ear while turning to him. "Are you sure there's no way around that?"

"Not that I know of." When she groaned, he smiled and added, "Is there nothing appealing about having me around to serve your slightest whim?"

Before she could stop herself, her gaze slid along his body. He lounged in the chair, dressed in a white dress shirt and black slacks scavenged from her father's closet. The shirt was unbuttoned enough to reveal the hard muscles in his chest, all but inviting her gaze further down. If she looked closely, she could probably guess whether he had bothered with underwear.

She refused to give in to the temptation, focus shooting back to his face. Then she felt her own grow hot. He looked at her like he could sense the turn of her thoughts. Worse, he seemed interested instead of condescending or smug, which would have been an easy turn-off for her. Despite the harsh screen lights, his eyes were warm and mysterious, and for a moment, she wished she didn't know anything about witches and what they did to people.

As if sensing her struggle, he glanced back at the monitors, giving her a break from the intensity of his gaze.

She blinked rapidly, deciding it was better not to answer his question. "Look, if you're bored of watching me, then I'll give you my second monitor. You can go online and find out about everything you missed in the last 200 years. Greg was an idiot, so you probably didn't learn much from him."

She rose to her feet and quickly plugged the monitor into her old PC. Then she booted it up for him. The feeling of his interest made her more nervous than she would have thought, and she mistyped her password twice before finally logging on. "There. Have fun."

That seemed to satisfy him for a while, and she continued playing in peace. In fact, she zoned him out entirely after switching over to one of her favorite games. Some part of her knew she had to face the facts eventually, but the rest wanted to forget about Hayley, and nearly being sacrificed, and living like a loser because it was less painful than being around other people.

The sun hung bright and high by the time she paused to roll out a crick in her neck and thought to look over at him. Then she saw what he was doing. "Hey!"