Page 118 of Falling in Love with A Tiny Bat

His arms drop. “It was worth a try, right?” Allowing his bunny costume to morph into his day attire, he tucks his gloved hands in his pockets. “You’re anxious, afraid, conflicted, and it tastes different than the anxieties and conflicts you’ve been wading through since you talked to Castor. What happened, and what can I do to help?”

It’s such a simple offer, void of the initial humor he presented.

Maybe it’s because of that I abandon my phone on the counter beside my burnt breakfast and go to him.

His heartbeat leaps against my ear, and he straightens before wrapping his arms around me. Voice soft with nerves, he says, “This is…unprecedented.”

“There is not much of you to hug, Xios…”

“I apologize.” Warmly, he sinks around me, melting into the embrace until we fit so perfectly together it hardly matters that he’s not exactly what I’d callcuddly. He murmurs, “I do not share your discomfort.”

“Are you calling me fat?”

“Are you not?” he asks, so…casually. Then, more content than I’ve ever witnessed, he says, “You are proportioned perfectly for hugs. Flawlessly friend-shaped.” He kisses my temple, and his voice lowers to a rumble that works its way through the worry bundling in my chest. “Talk to me, Zahra.”

Squeezing him, I say, “It’s Dani.”

“Is she all right?”

“For right now, but she’s leaving everything behind and running away, and I don’t know when she’ll contact me again.”

His fingers work into my hair, bracing my head against his chest. “So she has decided to flee?”

“At least from what she just told me, yes.”

Alexios’s hum vibrates in my entire body. Then he kisses the top of my head and moves back. “I’ll stay here and watch Ash. Go ask Castor to find Dani for you. He can position his pets to watch her on your behalf and make sure she’s okay as she escapes. As needed, we’ll then know how to intervene.”

My eyes widen. “What? I don’t have anything from her. I don’t have her full name. I don’t even know the state she lives in. He has the ability to find her with nothing?”

“We are beings made of emotion, snowflake. Your feelings for your friend connect to hers for you. Castor can follow that trail. I can only take or manipulate it, which is less helpful right now.” He cups my cheek, so gently. “It’s okay, angel. Castor won’t have any inhibitions where it concerns sending his minions to stalk your friend. Under his orders, they’ll protect her while she gets out of the situation she’s in.” He lets his forehead rest against mine for a moment. “Worst case, we learn she’s hesitating to free herself, and Castor kidnaps her for you.”

“That is a very bad case. We shouldn’t force her to make the decision to leave against her will. If I’d been forced out of my home, who knows how I may have romanticized the horrors that happened. She needs to believe in what she’s doing; otherwise,the solution won’t last.”

His dark eyes open, gaze colliding with mine. “True enough. In that case, do make such a specification known when you ask Castor for help. You know how he is. With kidnapping.”

I sure do.

Darn those cheekbones…

After getting to know him, I am nearly convinced his little kidnappings thus far have had some deeper, kinder purpose. But accepting as much is the same as accepting he’s a masterful manipulator. And the thing about manipulators is that they shouldn’t be trusted.

“Okay,” I breathe, breaking away from Alexios. “I’ll be back soon.”

“Bark at any redcaps that try to give you trouble.” He lifts his hand, smiling as he pleasantly waves goodbye. “Or just tell them if they dare to scratch you, Xios will tear them to pieces with their albino lord’s assistance.”

I turn back around, heading for the stairs instead of my front door. “I think I’m going to bring my pepper spray.”

“Or that works, too.”

?

“It’s rare that guests come to ask favors of me,” Castor murmurs, holding back his long black sleeve to pour tea into a dark cup.

My spine prickles in response to the wordfavor, and I shift in my seat at the small round table covered in an array of dainty pastries, cakes, and cookies. Given the gothic furniture and a crystalline skull atop the fireplace mantel, the ornate delicacies appear starkly out of place. I say, “I have nothing to offer in return for your help.”

He lounges on a sofa across from me and pops a small cake in his mouth. “Untrue. You have many things to offer. You simply aren’t willing.”

Those words roll over in my mind for a moment, then I nod. “You told me to come find you if there was anything you could do. I didn’t realize that offer disguised a price.”

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