Page 33 of Forged In Magic

Isaac feared they might be. Since even he didn’t know where they were, and he was awake during the entire journey, he figured it would take a while for their friends to figure it out. His even bigger fear was that they wouldn’t be able to figure it out at all. And if their friends thought they were dead, then no one would even be looking for them.

Keeping his thoughts to himself, he conjured some fruit. “Banana or grapes?” he asked, holding the fruit out for Kate.

“A bit of both?”

“Sure.” After peeling the banana, he handed her half and they each took some grapes.

Once they finished the fruit, he conjured water into the bottles he had created the night before. Without scaring Kate, he’d have to make sure she knew not to create any more waste than necessary. It wasn’t that he wanted to coddle her, but he needed her to stay hopeful. Since he had no idea the distance they’d traveled—only that it seemed far—he wasn’t as hopeful they’d be found as he wished he could be.

Isaac put their banana peel and grape stems in the garbage bag and frowned when he turned back to the bed. Kate was kneeling on the mattress with her palms above the headboard, flat against the wall, and her eyes closed.

“Any change?” he asked as he climbed back onto the bed and settled against the headboard.

“No. It still feels evil.”

He pulled Kate between his legs, her back to his chest. Not only did he want to get her away from the wall, he was going to take full advantage of their forced proximity. Isaac wasn’t happy they were stuck wherever the hell they were but… making lemonade, and all that jazz… he was going to enjoy the time he had with Kate.

She relaxed back against him without even a small protest, and something settled within him.

With his arms wrapped around her, he let his hands stay loose in her lap beside hers. Neither of them said anything for several minutes. Isaac guessed Kate was as lost in her thoughts as he was.

Letting his mind wander, he went over everything she had accused him of the day before. Although she was wrong on several fronts and he knew she had been projecting her fear onto him, it had gotten him thinking about trust. Ever since they’d been dumped into this room, the idea of trust had been running through his mind. If he had trusted Kate more, he might have tattooed her over a week ago, and Maverick might already have been a thing of the past.

Isaac remembered what Damon had said about them being sexist. If considering the strong women he knew as stubborn instead of respecting and trusting their judgment like he would a man’s, maybe Damon was right.

He bounced the concepts back and forth in his mind for a while. Trust and respect were two-way streets, and maybe that was another way Isaac had failed. He had told Damon that Kate was stubborn for not just accepting that he couldn’t give her the tattoo. Yet he’d never explained why. Perhaps Isaac hadn’t trusted Kate enough to tell her the truth about what had happened.

If he wanted her to be vulnerable with him and open up, then he was going to have to do the same, no matter how much it hurt.

“Kate?”

“Hmm?”

“I should have told you why I refused to tattoo you.”

She shifted in his lap, and he spread his legs so she could sit sideways and see him, the blankets falling around her hips.

Looking into her eyes made his guilt harder to confess, but she deserved the truth. “If a person’s essence gives me the slightest bit of resistance, I won’t tattoo them.”

“I know that, but why?”

“Because I tattooed my brother and it led him to commit suicide.”

* * *

Isaac’s internal pain was etched on his face. Kate wished there was something she could do to ease it. When she lifted her hand to his face, he captured it and kissed her palm. Then he gently rotated her hips so she was once more leaning back against him, his arms circling her. She smiled when the blankets floated up around them. Even dealing with his own pain, he thought of her comfort.

He didn’t have to voice the words for her to understand that sometimes it was easier to talk when you weren’t facing the person you were talking to. She picked up one of his hands in both of hers and trailed one finger along his palm and then each of his fingers.

Isaac’s hands were scarred and strong, just like him. She’d watched him work before and admired what he could do, especially the magic tattoos. But not once had she considered that there could be a cost for him.

She continued to trace his fingers and slowly massage his hands but didn’t speak. The urge to ask him about his brother was so strong it felt like it had its own pulse within her body, but she refused to heed it.

Isaac had never pushed her to talk, only asked and waited. It was her turn to do the same for him.

“Austin was five years younger than me,” Isaac said quietly, finally breaking the silence. “He was only sixteen when our dad died. It felt like the worst thing that could ever happen to us.”

Kate didn’t say she understood, because this was Isaac’s story, but she did understand. More than she wished she did. She’d been a young teenager when her own dad died.

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