Stolen by You (Fated To Love You)

“Oh goodness,” Lindy hisses, and I feel her stiffen beside me.

“I know it’s a lot,” I whisper, getting too close to her. I know I shouldn’t be this close. From here, I can smell the sweet and intoxicating scent of her, all pretty, flowery, and womanly. Now other things are stiffening, which is not cool because my whole family is here, aside from my mom and auntie, because that would just be completely overwhelming, and they were both busy today anyway. “Just try and get through it.” I don’t know if I’m talking to Lindy or myself anymore. “Maybe someone will have some good advice.”

“Where’s this cake?” Lindy whispers back.

Jesus, now I need a distraction from my mind and body because seriously, how can this woman not be my soulmate?

“Introductions first. Then I’ll take you to the cake.”

“Okay.” She looks at her wrist like she’s wearing a watch, but she isn’t. I get the whole two hairs past a freckle reference because I know I only have two and a half hours. Maybe that’s it. Maybe that’s all I’ll ever get of Lindy.

Why does the thought of that make me feel seriously depressed? I don’t want her in my life. She might be my soulmate, but there’s no real danger if we never see each other again. Soulmates sometimes happen that way, and at times, soulmates aren’t even romantic. The curse can be broken if we go our separate ways because it won’t have any hold over us. That should be what I want. I even made a pact saying that’s what I wanted. I’ve proven to myself over the years, with my lack of commitment and absolute lack of desire for anything relationship-related, that it’s what I want.

I’m confused.

Which is a good time to be distracted.

I lead the way, and Lindy follows, even though I can feel her holding back. She’s probably cringing behind my back because she’s so overwhelmed by the mega wattage of Granny’s grin. Ash and Ellis have silly lovestruck looks on their faces that are remarkably similar to Toren and Luna’s faces. Taylen looks worried, and Leandra looks as skeptical as she always does. I see the way she’s checking out Lindy’s outfit, including her shoes. Leandra always scopes out the clothes first. I can tell she approves, probably more so because Lindy is beautiful and can rock anything than it is because the clothes are designer and expensive since they aren’t. Lindy’s wearing an old T-shirt with a band logo tucked into ripped-up skinny jeans and the same ankle boots she appears to love so much.

She also looks incredible, sans makeup, with her golden copper hair in a messy bun. She’s probably the most beautiful woman in any room, hands down. Always.

Just saying.

What else was I just saying? Right, distraction. That’s what I need because there’s something going on with me.

I’ve had a semi-hard-on for the past, oh, sixteen hours, and I think it might be borderline time to seek medical help for it. Or is that only for a full-on hard-on?

“Hacker lady,” Granny says, beaming away. “I’m so glad you came.” Now I’m the one cringing. “What’s it like coming back to the inside after doing an inside job?” Granny full-on cackles while I full-on cringe for real.

“Granny…” Ash, at least, is trying to stand up for me. “We all know about your meddling. Kirian told all of us what you did to prove to him that his security system sucked.”

“Hey,” I protest. “It didn’t suck.”

“You could have just pointed it out nicely,” Toren says softly, ever the voice of reason. “Or paid her to show up at his workplace to point out the flaws in the system.”

“Or had her hack all the controls, including the heating and cooling setting and the settings for the fridge.” Taylen is more of the practical joker of our bunch. Yeah, of course he’d like to hack my fridge, so all the food spoiled. He would have found it hilarious if I bit into moldy cheese or downed some lumpy sour milk without noticing.

“You could have had her steal all his underwear and hang them from the top of his house like little mini flags,” Leandra adds, and good lord, when did she start topping her brother for horrifying ideas?

“You could have programmed his phone and changed all the contacts to bizarre names, so he didn’t know who was calling. And also messed with the other settings or have his voiceover person call him Your Magical Buttstink,” Taylen goes on, feeding off his sister.

“I could have done much, much worse,” Granny agrees.

I cross my arms. “Guys, this is Lindy. She’s more than just an amazing hacker. She fixed my software, and she—”

“Got your cursed ass necklace to glow,” Ellis cuts in. “That’s awesome!” She stands and holds out her arms like it’s official. “Welcome to the family!”