Wicked Lovely (Wicked Lovely 1)

He really can’t see me.

She ran her fingers over his arm, pausing on his biceps.

“Is it easier to be aggressive when you’re like that?” He looked right at her.

She yanked her hand away. “What? How…”

“The stuff in Donia’s recipe. You’re all shadowy, like the faeries outside, but I still see you.” He didn’t move, staying exactly as he had been when she walked into the room. “I don’t mind, you know.”

“I’m already as bad as them.”

“No.” He rolled onto his hip so there was room on the sofa for her too. “You weren’t touching some stranger on the street. It’s me.”

She sat down on the far end of the sofa. He wrapped his legs around her—one behind her back, the other resting on her lap.

“Keenan is convinced I’m the Summer Queen.”

“The what?”

“The one who can give him back the powers he lost. If he doesn’t find his queen, it’ll just keep getting colder. He says everyone, humans too, will die. That’s what this is all about. He thinks I’m her, this queen who’ll change it all.” She leaned forward just a little so Boomer didn’t get tangled in her hair as he made his way across the back of the sofa. “They made me a faery. I’m one of them.”

“I got that when you did the invisible thing.”

“They did this to me, changed me, and I’m…I don’t want to be their freaking queen.”

He nodded.

“I think I am, though…. I don’t know what to do. I met the other one tonight—the Winter Queen.” She shivered, thinking of the terrible cold, the ache of it. “She’s awful. She just walked up and attacked Keenan, and I wanted to hurt her. I wanted to bring her to her knees.”

She told him about the ice that Beira left in her wake, the hags, the kiss that made everyone so convinced that she was their queen. Then she added, “I don’t want this.”

“So we find a way to undo it.” He used his legs to pull her toward him so she was lying on his chest. “Or we figure out how to deal with it.”

“What if I can’t?” she whispered.

Seth didn’t answer; he didn’t promise it would be all right. He just kissed her.

She felt herself warming up, like a small gl

ow starting somewhere near her stomach, but she didn’t think anything of it until Seth pulled back and stared at her.

“You taste like sunshine. More and more every day,” he whispered. He ran his fingertip over her lips.

She walked away, wanting to weep. “Is that why things changed with us? Me becoming something else?”

“No.” He was calm, slow, like approaching a frightened animal.

“Seven months, Ash. For seven months, I’ve been waiting for you to see me. This”—he picked up her hand, which glowed like Keenan had earlier—“is not why. I fell in love with you before this.”

“How was I to know?” She twisted the edge of the stupid blouse Donia had given her. “You didn’t say anything.”

“I said lots of things,” he corrected gently. “You just didn’t hear them.”

“So, why now? If it’s not this, why?”

“I waited.” He undid the bow on her blouse, twirling the ribbon around his finger. “You kept treating me like a friend.”

“You were my friend.”