Page 3 of Zero Happily Ever Afters

“Good.” I crossed my arms. “Wouldn’t want you to miss your flight.”

“You’re so sassy this morning.” Milo’s smile filled his face, making my cheeks heat and burn with flustered frustration. “I like sassy Dorian. You gonna get like this every time the Global Guild calls on me for an out-of-town trip?”

“Don’t know,” I practically growled, attempting to show his absence wouldn’t bother me, which obviously had the opposite effect since Milo giggled. “How many trips are you planning?”

“However many the Global Guild requires my assistance on.” Milo channeled his magic, sending it into the enchantment he’d placed on my shoulder and cascading through my body. “Or however many I deem appropriate for the best possible future. Only happily ever afters if I have anything to do with it.”

Milo waved a hand, herding the loose visions like wrangling cattle. He had such a knack for it.

“Like a Border Collie,” Milo said, playfully panting with his tongue out. “Except I think they herd sheep.”

I tsked, reminded how unified our minds were when he dived into my inner core with that enchantment. He’d gotten better at reading the exposed frequencies of thoughts floating inside my head; it was as if he’d read my mind.

While he worked on restoring order in my head, I sat and watched. Whenever I gestured, commanded, or demanded for the visions to move, they ignored my actions. It was enough to make me feel impotent in a psychic sense. As a telepath,controlling things within a mind was supposed to be easy. Controlling things in my own head—I should’ve held complete and total mastery, but I sat and studied Milo like a novice.

The way he pulled the visions, some in big sweeping groups, others he’d pluck one at a time, but everything he did held some specific arrangement. I couldn’t see the system behind his method. There was a purpose, though. He stacked visions on top of each other meticulously. He sorted which piles sat beside each other and which were placed furthest apart. He hummed as he worked. Not to keep me out of his thoughts, which he willingly shared. No, he enjoyed the melody in his head. It helped ignore that what he did was work, instead thinking of it like a treat.

A day inside the head of your grumpy boyfriend. What a field trip.

“Someone’s extra sassy this morning.”

I sighed. My thoughts rang a little louder than intended.

“Loving it.” Milo winked, then continued working. “Wish I had time to show you what happens to sassy boys who mouth off.”

I took an immediate deep exhale, forcing a breath to settle the sudden shudder of exhilaration that traveled across my skin. A tingling sensation of lust and love and kink all roused tightly in my chest before blood flow found another outlet, making it difficult to hide how much I enjoyed Milo’s thoughts when my morning boner rubbed against his inner thigh as he worked.

We lay together while Milo finished locking away the visions, slamming them together with such force they appeared welded. It wouldn’t last, it never did, but I’d slowly learned to adapt to the presence of Milo’s visions in my head.

“They’ll hold long enough,” Milo said, turning to me and smirking from the shadows of my inner core. “And when I return from my case, I’ll make my next mission helping you master the art of clairvoyant Tetris.”

“Seriously?”

“Seriously. Each potential future needs to fit together just right so they don’t stack too high and crumble in your mind.”

“Then why do they keep crumbling? Or exploding. Or whatever.”

“Because visions are also like cats,” Milo said, grimacing as Carlie bit his toes outside my mind. She’d grown impatient and planned to drag us out of the depths of my inner core if it was the last thing she did. Anything for breakfast.

“Tetris cats?” I quirked a brow, telekinetically removing the fat cat from the bed so she didn’t claw up Milo’s leg.

He moved closer, cuddling against me. The scruff on his face rubbed against mine while inside my head, he swaggered closer, bringing us together in an embrace inside and outside my mind.

“You have to get ready,” I whispered.

Milo’s mind buzzed with a checklist of a thousand different things he needed to get finished before going to the airport, yet the highest priority sang in his mind. He wanted to enjoy every second in bed we had together. He wanted to hold me so tightly that I’d feel this hug for the next several weeks in his absence.

“We still have a few minutes left.” Milo kissed my neck.

With Milo heading off for this Global Guild mission, I’d have to learn how to be independent again. I wouldn’t have him around for weeks. Longer maybe. After pushing him away for over a decade, the idea of spending more than a few days without his light, his joy, his love—it felt impossible. I didn’t know how I’d cope without having him here, so I lay in bed soaking up a few more minutes of cuddling and doing my best to savor these precious moments.

Chapter Two

Everything about this second and final semester of working with my homeroom coven moved too quickly. Between lessons, meetings, grading, check-ins, alternating trainings, and research into potential enchanters for internships, my mind fell into a fog. It was already February, and I hadn’t accomplished half of what I set out to cross off my to-do list.

It didn’t help matters that my telepathy coiled at the back of my head, squeezing against my skull and ready to burst. Milo’s trip had only just begun, yet his absence left me craving his presence. I’d become completely reliant on his joy, his love, his everything. Milo completed the missing pieces in my heart and mind, and as such, my branch ached for the comfort he offered. Even so, I wouldn’t find him. I couldn’t reach across the country to follow his thoughts while he worked on a case with the Global Guild in California. Or wherever the hell in the airport he currently waited around before his flight took off.

It didn’t deter my magic to make the attempt. Hence, the fog of autopilot on my drive to work. While I remained firmly planted in my car, absent-mindedly driving through traffic and barely focused, my telepathy soared across the city of Chicago.

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