Intuition: The Premonition Series (8 page)

“I think I’m experiencing culture shock, Reed. Everything you’re saying sounds so primitive…no, so primal,” I say.

“Yes, it is ancient… it is animal in its basic simplicity,” Reed replies.

I sigh heavily and avoid eye contact when I ask, “Can we talk about something else?”

“Why?” Reed asks.

“Because, I’m growling at the waitress, Reed. At the very least it’s considered bad manners where I come from and some people would consider it shady. Being part angel sucks sometimes,” I say, taking another sip of my wine, watching Reed’s eyes grow large as he smiles at my comment.

“Evie, why would you say that?” he laughs.

“Because, angels are capable of logic and higher thought, but have limited emotions and highly instinctual attraction,” I don’t even pause to breathe before saying, “and then, there is that whole caste system you have going on that I don’t approve of at all. I mean rank and divisions? Please,” I scoff.

“What could possibly be wrong with everyone having a job to do and an orderly way of accomplishing it?” Reed inquires.

“Nothing, in theory, but when you say that a Seraph wouldn’t fight for a Power, then I don’t like your divine system. I can’t see any reason for someone like me not to want to fight for someone like you,” I reply heatedly. I think I stunned him. He stares at me for several moments, not saying a word.

“No, you don’t, do you. You really can’t see it, can you?” he asks. “To you, we’re all the same. Buns isn’t a Reaper, she’s an angel. Zephyr isn’t a Power he’s an angel. The only division you can see is good and bad. Brownie is good. Alfred is bad.”

“You’re right, except for one other division,” I counter.

“What division is that?” he asks, sounding puzzled.

“
My
angel,” I reply. “That’s you, just in case my growl before didn’t clue you in.”

“You
are
the most dangerous creature I’ve ever met,” he says, sipping his wine, but he seems happy at my words, maybe even flattered.

I roll my eyes at him and say, “You make me sound like I’m the predator and you’re the prey.”

I am startled when Reed abruptly gets up from the table and says, “If you will excuse me for a moment, the waitress is on her way back and I don’t want you to have to protect me from her.”

He strolls away, just as Katie brings out our food. Looking disappointedly at Reed’s empty chair, Katie sets down the food and says halfheartedly, “Enjoy.”

I watch as Reed approaches our table after Katie leaves. It’s impossible for me not to admire the graceful way he moves, like a jungle cat, but I’m not the only one admiring him, I observe as I take a sip of my wine. Several women of varying ages watch as he passes by their tables, their heads turn, marking his progression. Some even stop talking entirely as they lose their train of thought.
No female is immune to him.
When Reed is again seated at the table, I pick up my fork and begin eating my dinner quietly, assessing him.

Reed watches me for a while, then he asks, “Evie, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I say evasively.

“You look upset,” he says as I pick at my food.

I shrug and continue eating. “Please tell me,” Reed asks, and because he’s so compelling when he uses his sexy voice on me, I have to relent and let him in.

“It’s just that I’ve figured a few things out, and now that I have, I can see that I’m doomed,” I say, and watch Reed stop eating, as if alerted to a threat. So I continue quickly, “I figured out that loving someone else is a huge risk. Chances are, that sooner or later, something will happen and it will all end.” When I see his eyes pull together in a frown, I regret saying anything. “Reed, I should’ve protected myself against you, but I didn’t and now you live here, inside of me,” I say, pointing to my heart. “I won’t ever be able to run from the love I have for you. Your name is written on my heart. I can’t hide from it and it will wreck me if something happens to you—like it did to my uncle.”

“Evie, you’re stronger than that. You would survive,” he says tenderly.

“I don’t think so, Reed, but it doesn’t matter—it’s too late. That battle would’ve already had to take place way before now. I already love you, so I’m already lost,” I reply.

“Welcome to my world, Evie,” Reed says, smiling ruefully at me. “You have been living in my head and my heart for as long as I have known you. I can’t stop thinking about you. I’m always wondering what you will do or say next. When you enter the room, I can’t help following you with my eyes, studying everything you do. There is risk for me, too. I have to compete with your soul mate who may still be meant for you,” he says, unsmilingly. “Thinking of the time you almost died gives me an ache in my core that I can’t explain to anyone because it doesn’t even allow for words. Sometimes, I think I have made you up just to torture myself—and there are other times that I know you must be real because I couldn’t have dreamed such perfection.”

It is my turn to be stunned. His risks are greater than mine. How can I have forgotten that? We still don’t know if by helping me he’s aiding the Fallen in some way. He could have walked away in the beginning and probably still should, but he is here with me now. “Russell is like family to me and I will do everything I can to protect him because I do love him. I love him, but it is not with the same… intensity that I love you,” I say, shaking my head. “It’s like you occupy the spaces he can’t ever reach,” I add, trying to make him understand.

I must have succeeded because his face lights up again and he looks perfect: every inch the angel that he is. How could I have not seen it sooner? How did I not realize instantly what he is because the ethereal quality is so transparent to me now and I cannot fathom why everyone can’t see it? How did I inspire such devotion from this celestial being?

“Promise me something, Reed,” I ask him on impulse.

He smiles then and doesn’t hesitate before he responds, “Anything.”

“Never doubt that I love you,” I say. “You can doubt anything else about me, but never doubt that I love you more than anything in this world or the next.”

Reed sits back in his seat, assessing me for a moment. I cannot say why it’s important to me that he make me this promise, it just is. I need him to see what I am saying is true, more than I need anything else.

“How can I doubt it when you are now growling at the waitress for getting too near to me?” he asks, teasing me lightly.

“Reed,” I say breathlessly.

“Why is it important to you that I promise you this?” he asks, suddenly very serious.

I try to think of how I can explain it to him. “You remember when you said that we weren’t in a pond, but a vast ocean and that there were sharks that only a fish like me could attract?” I ask, remembering what he said to me that day at registration.

“Yes,” Reed replies, becoming very still.

“Well, I want you to have something to hold on to, in case the currents shift and drag me from you,” I reply, watching his face pale.

“I promise,” Reed vows.

“Thank you,” I smile at him.

“Has your premonition become any clearer to you?” he asks in a low tone. His face is no longer playful, but dangerous and sharp, missing nothing in my body language or any other subtle signal that I’m giving off.

“It’s just a nightmare,” I say adamantly, trying not to think about the darkness in my latest nightmare. “But, no, I just have a morbid sense of dread and…” I trail off.

“And?” he prompts, his tone indicating he would like to interrogate me on this subject, but he’s trying not to push me.

“And this feeling like I’m starving,” I say, sounding worried.

“Promise me something,” Reed asks.

“Anything,” I reply.

“If the currents do conspire against us, know that I will find you… I will never stop looking for you,” he says.

“I’m counting on it,” I reply honestly. “You’re all I want. Just you and me… forever.” I stare into his eyes and I see what I am hoping to see, the absence of doubt.

“The waitress is coming back. Let’s go before you feel the need to adorn her with cutlery,” Reed says, smiling broadly and tossing money on the table.

Once outside the restaurant, I notice that most of the lifts are shut down for the evening. The well-lit slopes are now shrouded in darkness. Only a couple of the gondolas are still working to take diners and restaurant employees back down the slopes. Impulsively, I turn to Reed and say, “Race you down the hill.” I don’t wait to see what he will do, but bolt through the hard-packed snow toward the cottage.

When I reach the bottom of the hill, I glance over my shoulder to see if I can detect Reed behind me, but I see nothing. With a smug smile, I run toward the trees to where the path leads to the cottage. Just as I am about to pass the first stand of trees, someone steps out in front of me, blocking my way. I can’t stop, so I plow right into Reed who catches me gently around the waist, hugging me to his body and laughing.

“Gotcha,” he smiles and I notice that his chest is bare and his charcoal wings are extended.

“You cheated! You flew!” I accuse him as my arms creep around his neck.

“I told you that I couldn’t catch you on foot, so I had to resort to other methods,” he says, and I can hardly think because nothing compares to seeing him like this. So, I don’t think, I just act. I touch my lips to his, kissing him gently. I don’t care that he’s strong and could hurt me; I’ll welcome the pain because it’ll be a different pain from the one that pushing him away now would produce. But, Reed won’t let this go on; he’s not willing to take the risk. “Evie,” he says as he pulls away from me.

“I know I have to be good, but I really want to be bad,” I whisper in his ear, feeling him squeeze me harder to him.

“We need a distraction,” he says as he bends down, retrieving his sweater and coat he has stashed behind the tree. Handing it to me he asks, “Ready?”

“Uh…for what?” I ask. He just smiles at me and picks me up off of my feet. In seconds, we are shooting straight up to the top of the tree line, avoiding several of the branches by millimeters. A gasp of pure surprise escapes me upon seeing the night sky stretch out above me. Clinging to Reed’s chest, I watch as his wings beat rapidly to maintain the velocity necessary to keep us in the air. The perfection of the night sky, with its dark absolutely infinite depth, couldn’t be improved upon if it had been the Caribbean blue of the sky in daylight.

“Reed, you’re flying… we’re flying! This is so amazing,” I breathe, not being able to really put into words just how incredible it is to be held in Reed’s arms high above the earth. “You can fly,” I say in awe, before I can stop myself.

“Evie, you have known for a while that I can fly,” Reed replies, as if I’ve lost my mind, which I might have because this was so far from reality that I again doubt my own sanity.

“Well, there is knowing and there is
knowing,”
I say, emphasizing the last word as I look down at the tops of the trees speeding by below me like an ocean of green.
We have to be several stories off the ground at this moment,
I think as I tighten my grip on Reed. I listen to the sound of his powerful wings beating the air, allowing us to defy gravity’s pull and stay aloft, and then I listen to the quiet of just the wind blowing by as we glide along the air currents when there is an updraft.

“Why haven’t we done this before now?” I ask him, feeling the wind catch at my hair and stream it behind me as we soar faster.

“To me, it’s just a way of getting from point A to point B. But, you find it fun, don’t you?” he asks as if this thought amuses him, too.

“Yeah…don’t you remember the first time you flew? Weren’t you excited and a little terrified and just filled with—I don’t know—wonder at feeling the wind beneath you and the power and strength you possess to accomplish such an amazing bit of…magic?”

“Is that what this is like for you?” he asks me, as if I’m the mysterious one conjuring tricks. When I nod, he says, “It’s so different looking at things through your eyes. You weren’t raised knowing anything about us, so this is magical,” he surmises with a broad smile. “To me, it was a rite of passage, I guess, is the best way to describe it, but it lacked any magic, since everyone I knew could do it.”

“Oh, that’s too bad, you missed out on the exquisite enchantment of this moment then,” I say as we begin a rapid descent through the trees. I think that there is a chance that we could crash and burn, so I squeeze my eyes closed tight. The smell of pines alerts me to the fact that we have reached the forest. I peek to see trees whipping by at an obnoxious speed. I quickly close them again because the thrill is leaking into scary territory.

Touching down, I don’t want to open my eyes because I don’t want it to be over. My feet are on the ground, but I still have my eyes closed. “Thank you,” I say, hugging Reed.

He gently strokes my back as he say, “You are the magical one, not me. Thank you for showing me what I have been missing,” he replies. Opening my eyes, I’m amazed to find that we’re at the front door of the little cottage in the woods. I want this moment to be preserved in my mind for eternity, so that I can remember the way Reed is looking at me, as if I am flawless.

The door to our little cottage swings open and Buns stands just beyond the threshold. “Oh, there you are, sweetie!” she says brightly, bouncing up and down with enthusiasm. “You’re just in time, we’re almost ready to go for a session.”