Page 18 of A City of Hearts and Feathers

Zoe rolled her eyes, but she was smiling. "Thanks, but he's been taken care of. I am a big girl. He's already got another fiancée, who he believes could love him the way he wanted. According to him, I loved books more than people, and he was probably right."

Kahil clicked his tongue. "Sounds to me like you've been around the wrong people."

"I don't know about that. I've never had that 'I love you so much, I would die for you' feeling. I think it's only in books," she replied with a small sigh.

"Ah, my sweet, naive Zoe. It exists."

"In fairytales perhaps…" Zoe stopped walking as a lightning bolt of memory struck her. Oman sitting in his office with a book of fairytales open and reading them aloud to her.

"Zoe? What's wrong?" Kahil asked, moving her gently out of the way of the pedestrians.

"The message from my father, 'Princess or prince, which was more lovely?'" she said, rubbing at the back of her neck. "I think it was part of a fairytale he was reading to me in his office."

"Okay, so let's go check it out and see if the book is still there," Kahil replied.

Zoe followed him, only half paying attention to her surroundings. Oman had always been reading her stories, and many of them had princes and princesses. Something niggled at her, a story about a competition and arguing djinn?

Zoe looked up, and they were once again standing in front of the shop. She opened the door and walked in. Kahil followed her, and it wasn't until she was halfway through the shop that she turned and realized he was still with her.

"Hey! I thought you couldn't get in," she said, taking an extra step back from him.

"Oh, no." Kahil smiled wickedly. "You should have had a closer look at that contract,balim.I swore to be your bodyguard, which means protecting you with my life. The wards let me through because they know I'm magically bound to protect you."

Zoe rubbed at her temples. "I did read the contract. I just didn't realize it was also magical."

"Don't look so worried. It means I couldn't harm you even if I wanted to. Think of it as…forced trust? You know I can't hurt or betray you."

A cheeky thought occurred to Zoe, so she looked up at him and asked, "So what you are saying is that I'm your boss?"

"You wish," Kahil said and flicked her nose playfully. She batted his hand away. "The office is through here, yes?"

Zoe nodded and let him take the lead. She hadn't been into the office since she had returned. She hadn't had a chance to study the titles on the shelves either.

Kahil opened the door to the office and went in, leaving Zoe outside of it. She peered in at the carved wooden desk, the pictures on the walls, the bust of Plato on the bookshelf. The air smelled of Oman's spicy aftershave, ink, and book dust. There was no sign of his body or the pool of blood she had found him in, but she could suddenly smell the iron and death again. The confusion and fear that had washed over her that night hit like an invisible slap.

Zoe's hand clutched the doorframe, all her breath knocked out of her lungs. Kahil turned and caught her as she began to topple.

"I got you. Breathe, Zoe. You're okay," he said, pulling her back to his chest as they sank to the carpet. He placed a tattooed hand on her chest, the other around her waist to steady her. Her heart was pounding in her ears, vision going blurry. "Shhh, you're okay. Feel my heartbeat. Focus on it for me."

Zoe fought the panic attack to focus on his warmth and found the heart pounding against her back.

"There we go. Breathe with me now," Kahil said, taking a deep breath. Zoe forced herself to follow his instructions, matching the long inhales and exhales. "You're safe. You're safe. There's nothing in here that will harm you."

Zoe's vision began to clear, and she kept breathing slow and deep. There was no blood on the carpets or the body of her father. The man with the tattooed hands was now comforting her instead of starring in her nightmares.

"I'm… I'm okay," she said as her heart rate evened out and the dizziness passed.

Kahil brushed his fingers over her cheek. "You haven't been in here since that night, have you?"

Zoe shook her head. "I couldn't bring myself to do it yesterday. I'm sorry."

"Why are you apologizing? I should have known better. You want to wait outside? I can look for fairytale books. It won't take me long," he offered.

Zoe nodded, and he slowly helped her up. Kahil made sure she was sitting on one of the couches in the shop's front before he disappeared back into the office.

Zoe put her head in her hands, her face burning. She was embarrassed and felt like crying. She had to get over the memories, find some way to move through them, if she was going to have any luck finding the missing codex.

Kahil appeared ten minutes later. "I didn't find any fairytale books, but I did find his organizer. There might be some clues as to who he was meeting with in the weeks before his death."

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