Page 25 of Clause & Effect
“That doesn’t dignify a response.”
I laugh.
“You’re right,” I give him what he wants because he’s my cousin and I love the bastard. “I didn’t expect to meet anyone, let alonefeelanyone.”
Jayson opens his eyes and stares at me, eyes narrowed.
“You felt her?” He asks slowly dragging out the sentence like he’s afraid of my answer. “You sure?”
“Yes.” I admit hesitantly. He’s the only one I’d admit it to. Shit, saying it out loud makes it even more real, more terrifying.
Feelingsomeone before encountering them—especially the opposite sex—is the stuff of legends in the Nicholasen family. Only two St. Nick’s had found their fated partner to share Christmas cheer with.
Only two.
In seventeen fucking centuries.
“The ground will tremble with echoes of ancient past. Breath will falter. The heart will race. The stranger is no stranger. She is your face.”Jayson whispers the old words the way my grandfather would when he’d recount the tale.
“Did the ground tremble?” Jayson asks softly. “Or was it just the bear?”
My gaze flicks to his.
“It was more than the bear.”
It washer.
I felt her in my buggy. That’s why I jumped out the way I did, walking into an unknown blizzard feeling for her energy. It was overpowering, like a siren’s call. The blood pumping through my veins was racing so hard that I could feel it when I entered the buggy.
She was the first and only person I saw before I was pulled away by her friends.
But in that second, when I set eyes on her, the world shook. I still can’t explain it—like I was living in one reality where Charlie Horse (her parents are cocks) didn’t exist—and then she was there, and everything somehow changed.
And I don’t even know how.
I saw her last Christmas, the look on her face. I felt her loneliness, her pain like it was my own.
I saw my person… didn’t I?
I watch Jayson’s pensive face.
Frankly, I don’t have time to care what he’s thinking because I’m still processing the feeling myself.
I’d never felt anyone before.
Not another female.
Only relatives with my bloodline.
“Fuck. Me.” Jayson lets out a long sigh and leans back in the seat. He shakes his head and lets out whistle.
“Scared?” He finally asks.
“Hell no.”
Hell yes, but I’m not telling him that.
“Liar.”
