Page 8 of Conquering the King of Storms

She grinned. “Fine, fine. Tell me everything that happened while I was gone.”

That was a much safer topic, so I launched into an explanation of the many, many hours we’d spent wading through the swamp. Margo had woken Quake up a couple of times when we found a freaky animal or almost got eaten by a crocodile-hippo thing, but mainly, we had just been hiking.

And it sucked.

But now, we were walking on the beach, so things were better. I could get used to walking on the beach.

Maybe I should talk to Flood when we met the guy, and see if there was any way to do a mate-swap thing. The answer was probably no, but damn, it would be nice to get away from Storm.

Then again, the enemy you know is always better than the one you don’t.

So I was just going to have to get used to having Storm around.

Chapter 3

Storm’s eyesstill weren’t glowing when we stopped for the night after the sun had set. Flame set up a bonfire on the beach, and we all snuggled around it. I was smooshed between Margo and Ivy, by my own choice, and gripping Margo’s arm tightly enough that Storm couldn’t whisk me off and seduce me into happy oblivion or anything.

I couldn’t help but watch the guy. He was gorgeous, and spending most of a day without his magic whispering to me had been kind of strange. There had been no sensual promises or sexy warnings about how soon he would have me in his arms. I thought it would be nice to have silence again, but as we walked, I realized I had kind of enjoyed hearing his magic speak to me.

What that said about me, I didn’t want to know.

Storm and Dove were talking on the other side of the fire—though she was the one really doing the talking—and the way he listened to her was swoon-worthy. I couldn’t swoon, or admit that, but it was still true.

I kept my gaze on the fire even as I watched him from the corner of my eye. He carried Dove over to Tariq, setting her down next to the gigantic fae on the other side of Ivy. I hadn’t heard what he said to her earlier, the crackling of the fire just a little too loud, but she snuggled up against Tariq without hesitation.

Her gaze landed on mine, and she gave me a quick smile. I returned it—and then my head tilted backward when a gigantic dude stepped in front of me.

Storm crouched down so our faces were closer to the same height. He rested his arms on his thighs, and I tried hard not to notice how good his muscles looked when he did.

“Will you go for a walk with me?” he asked me.

I blinked at him.

A walk?

It was so… mundane.

Human.

I’d always loved walking around outside before our walk-across-the-elemental-lands quest started. When I explained to Steven how much I liked walking out in the fresh air, and asked him to go with me, he’d put a treadmill in the backyard of his house.

The man had never liked spending time with me. Looking back, that was one of so many red flags. All of which I’d either never identified, or just flat-out ignored. He was rich and attractive, with a degree and a kind family. On Earth, that was a pretty standard definition of perfection.

If only the standard definition of perfection was an equation for happiness.

“Harper?” Storm’s words snapped me out of my shitty trip into the past.

I still hesitated to answer him, though.

“Come on.” Ivy nudged my side with her elbow. “It’ll be fun.”

“She doesn’t have to do anything she doesn’t want to do,” Margo snapped at Ivy. “Just because you can’t keep your hands off your king doesn’t mean the rest of us have to hook up with ours.”

Yikes.

Something told me this was about to turn into a fight.

And suddenly, walking with Storm sounded excellent.

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