Page 31 of How to Seduce a Slender

Fat globs for tears fell down her face as the hysteria hit her bloodstream. “I found it in your wardrobe! I was just like touching the jackets and seeing how many you had when it fell out. And then I touched it and it had flesh and eyes in it, and they blinked, so I panicked. Okay! I panicked, and I kicked it under the wardrobe. Then I was imagining it with little legs and that it would crawl up the side of the bed after me.And now it hasleeeeggggggs!”

She could feel the pitying,oh no, she’s lost her marbleslook plastered all over his featureless face. Smith didn’t have to have eyebrows for them to be practically shooting off his face in shock as the words fell out of her lips. Melody shook his hands as a whine was strangled out of her. “Please,Smith,you’ve gotta believe me!”

“There’s nothing under the bed!” Kevin called out, half his body and Carl’s clearly under the bed.

Melody whined again as all the proof she had went up in a cloud of smoke. She glanced at Agatha, “You saw it! Right? You saw the thing!”

“I saw somethingdefinitely not a ghoul!I’ve run into every undead thing in this house, and whatever was in that drawer wasn’tnormalfor this house.” Agatha carefully slipped out of the bed and onto the floor. Melody watched with bated breath as the banshee floated down to the floor, harumphed, then returned back up above the bed. “It’s gone. It’s either fallen through the floor or all together disappeared. Havershum!”

Agatha floated away as the wraith appeared in the hallway.

Kevin and Carl sat up, leaning over the side of the bed as Melody sat with the fact that…maybe she’d hallucinated it. In the last few hours was the first time in years she’d slept a whole night. Minus the one where she was with Dahlia—which she still hadn’t figured out. Maybe all her fried brain cells were catching up to her?No! No! It was definitely the journal!

“Smith, please, lie to me and tell me that you believe me. I swear! There was a thing in the drawer and when I kicked the drawer, it went flying, and it crawled out from there. It had legs! It didn’t have legs when I first saw it.” She couldn’t handle him trying to convince her it’d all been in her head.

“I do believe you,” he chuckled softly, stroking her hand. “And it’s not a lie. I’ll inquire with Sebastian and Greggory if one of the haunted tomes is missing from the library. They can escape at times if they’re possessed.”

Melody blinked at him before darting her attention to Kevin. He nodded with that same goober smile plastered to his face. Carl panted happily, his massive tail wagging behind him like a brush fire dancing in the wind. Then Melody glanced back at Smith.Right…it’s just…a haunted book.She let out a wheeze, “Of course!”

You’re in a Lich’s manor in the haunted woods, of course he’s got possessed books!She relaxed back on the bed, all the tension melting away. “Good, cause I wanted to write down a memory I’d got back when I felt it in the drawer.”

“Memory?” Smith perked up immediately as she slipped from his grip. She climbed to her feet on the floor, moving to retrieve the drawer she unfairly punted across the room. Carl met her, licking at her hands as she picked it up. Melody offered him a head scratch before she shoved the drawer back in the table. She found her sketch book sitting on top it.

With a squint, she eyed it suspiciously.Hadn’t it been…in the drawer last night?Carl slipped in under her hand sneakily to receive more scratches as she picked it up with her other hand.

“Melody, the memory, what was it?” Smith interrupted her suspicions.

She glanced back at him, “Oh! Uh…Pete, a regular of mine, I remembered him coming in and I showed him my sketches for the day—OH! OH! Smith, did my apron come yet? I wanted to see if he sent in my sketch book. I don’t know if I did, but I might have drawn them…. Why are you making that face?”

She eyed him as Smith loomed over her quietly. He blurted out, “I’m not making a face, Melody, I can’t make faces. I have no face.”

“No, no, she’s got a point.” Kevin slid in beside Melody, one gangly hand to his chin and the other to his hip. Chunks of dirt and cracked corn spilled across the ground as he nodded at Smith. “You’re making a face.”

“Get!” Smith huffed, shooing the gardener and his massive hound from the room. Melody couldn’t help the grin curling her lips at the clearly embarrassed Slender. It wasn’t a color, like a blush on someone with skin…but it was a shift in his static. The way it flickered, unsure, flitting between white noise and hard record scratches. Usually Smith was a steady fuzz, but Melody could pinpoint when he was Slender blushing. Immense, giddy joy filled her as she cocked out a hip, crossed her arms under her chest, and waited for him to turn to face her.

Smith returned to her, his attention clearly anywhere but the smug look on her face. Melody jabbed a finger into the center of his chest, “See! I told you! You’ve got a face.”

“It’s simply impossible for me to have a face.”

“Mmm, and yet, you’ve got the face of a busybody, nosey, in everyone’s business, lawyer!” she teased, grinning as his embarrassed flicker of static kicked up a notch. Melody broke, busting at the seam, “You’re blushing.”

“I am not! I have no flesh!”

“And yet!” She waggled her finger in his face, snickering as he swatted it away. “I see right through you, mister, you are a nosey nelly.”

“Listen—” But she erupted in more laughter. Her body melted into his as arms rushed to grab her. Maybe he thought she was fainting. Or maybe he didn’t know what to do. All she knew was she fell into him, heaving for air as she laughed harder.And it felt really fucking good.Her face ached as she clutched the lapels of his vest for dear life. Long arms wrapped around her and held her tight to his chest. She was a limp noodle in his grasp, but it didn’t matter.

Because she felt safe. Her legs were weak, her lungs half empty, her face burning red with tears trailing down her cheeks as she tried to gulp down air. It did nothing to stop the bubble of giggles that poured out of her. Soon her stomach clenched, and she winced. “Ow, ow, ow.”

“That’s what you get for laughing at my expense,” he blurted out, but there was a twinge of teasing to it.He wasn’t…no he couldn’t be…But when she reached a weak hand to her cheeks to swipe the tears away, she warmed all the way to the center of her being. He loomed over her, a soft chuckle under his breath.Was Smith…His rumble of a voice made her the blushing fool as he spoke. “Maybe you’ll think twice about mocking me, Ms. Deathless.”

“Pfft, no I won’t.” She shook her head, grinning ear to ear despite the pain in her cheek muscles. His static stilled. Long fingers pressed into the back of her nightgown, reminding her that only a slim silk separated her from him. Her heart skipped a beat as she could almost imagine he’d rolled his eyes. A shiver left a wash of cold uncertainty in her system. Melody didn’t even realize one of the straps of her nightgown fell off her shoulder…not while she was trapped in his hollow gaze.

“Ever tempting fate,” he muttered warmly to himself.

“Are you going to punish me for teasing you now?” she blurted out.He’s flirting, this is definitely flirting, right?She hadn’t imagined that.

“Well, seeing as my tactic for keeping that tongue in your mouth hasn’t worked, I shouldn’t. There’s no evidence punishment works on you.” One of his hands slithered up her back, leaving a trail of goose bumps in his wake. Unfortunately, it was those damned gloves. Not a singular touch from his vibrating skin as he brushed up the side of her bicep and took the strap back up to her shoulder. “But say that I do? What would befit the crime? Your tongue being caught is one thing…but for that mouth of yours…I’m not sure.”

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