Only Human: Hide and Seek

Chapter 196: June Jackson

Back to Original POV

I watched him. I studied the way his eyes studied me, and I refused to move or engage until he said something. Yet time ticked by painstakingly slow. I had forgotten that I was outside of Cenderion's protection, and sleep was now as risky as being awake. I had forgotten that the last time I saw his crimson eyes and loosely tied hair, I had told him I was an angel. He didn't believe me then, but that was days ago. He was here in my dream space sitting in that armchair holding his book of memories in his lap as nonchalant as he usually did, but this time he was quiet. His lips were not playfully smirking or relaxed, but they weren't sneering or frowning either. I couldn't read him, and all I could do was try to appear just as unbothered and neutral.

This could go either way. Geralt could spin his rhetoric of obsession and love, or he could start in on the threats and demands. Was he officially my enemy now, or was he still pushing for lover? That aside, how did I feel about him? I saw the destruction and agony his shaded dragon caused in his futile pursuit of me, but I also saw that black string that tied us together through love. He loved me. He said he did, but now I knew it. The Minister of Darkness was in love with a wild human from Oregon who he knew was mated and married. He could have had anyone, but he set his sights on me. The problem was that I wasn't an ordinary human woman, and he also claimed that he could never love an angel. Did the string mean that he still didn't believe I was an angel, or that he chose to move past the fact I was? No. There was no way he believed me. Even Eros said the dragon fiasco would have been much worse if he did.

"I know what you are." Geralt suddenly said yanking me to the present. I swallowed my fluttering chest and stomach back down.

"You do?" I said back while willing my body to remain still. "I mean, I did tell you."

His eyes narrowed. "I know more than what you told me, June. I know that you were born September 9th, 1999 in Redbank, New Jersey. I know that you were chosen to be my antithesis." He stood and placed his book on the coffee table. I fought the urge to step back as he drew closer. "I know that, like me, you were forced into this war between angel and demon. But unlike me, your angel went rogue." He finished stopping five feet in front of me.

I realized I wasn't breathing and quickly took a breath. I had no idea how he learned all that, but he did. It meant that he had to believe me now. "So you understand." I said feeling my heart sink.

"I understand your apprehension, yes." He said staring me down. He then turned around and started strolling back to his seat. "But I have no intention of accepting it."

I blinked and racked my brain for what that meant. "What? You're not going to accept it?" I asked following after him. "What does that even mean?"

I managed to get his face in my sights, but he didn't glance in my direction once. "Obviously Philomena has some intriguing plans, and is both powerful and clever. For an angel." He stopped and turned to face me head on. "But she doesn't own you. She can have her Celine Lupine and her delusions of grandeur, but you are mine. I don't even care if you capturing my attention and desire was her plan, because if it was, it backfired. You are mine, Baby. Even she can't keep us apart."

What on earth was he saying? He knew even more than I thought, down to the actual angel that occupied this body, but some things were off. He spoke as if Philomena was still an angel separate from me, and that Celine Lupine was someone else. He did know more than I anticipated, but he didn't know everything. "You don't know what you're talking about, Geralt. This was never anyone's intention. We were a mistake." I said deciding not to correct him. I couldn't reveal all my cards. He could turn enemy at any moment, and his proclamations of love and determination will not change that.