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  “I was interested. I am interested. Yes, I was lucky that it was you, but that doesn’t change what has happened since then.” It was unraveling right in front of him. Okay, it’d been a plan. More of a loosely-structured plan once he’d actually found Chandra. Up until then, it’d been life or death. Courting her—that was spontaneous—well, it was mostly spontaneous.

  She clenched her hands in her hair. “Why do I keep falling for this? You’d think I could meet a guy who wanted me for me, but, no… I’m a means to an end. Again. No wonder you kept blowing hot and cold. This wasn’t some deep emotional connection. You weren’t falling in love with me. You’ve even explained away the way I feel. Kinetic energy and stagnating.”

  Aster should have anticipated that “stagnating” description coming back to bite him. “That’s just a part of what you feel and being calmed is just part of what I feel. I feel more than just relaxed.”

  She laughed, not a good laugh, nowhere near a good laugh. There was a hysterical furious edge to it. “Being in the same room with me gave you everything you needed. The rest must have seemed like a lot of extra work. I thought maybe you were giving me space because you cared and wanted to take it slow.”

  He shook his head, even though she wasn’t looking at him. If he could get her to look at him… Aster reached for her hands, but Chandra stepped back, out of reach.

  “I was giving you space,” he said. “I thought you needed time to adjust, but I am interested to you. Hell, you could feel that I’m attracted to you. Don’t make this sound so bloodless… like it was this… this campaign and you were just a goal. It was nothing like that.”

  Then, finally, finally, her eyes met his and the utter despair in her beautiful, watery, brown eyes killed something inside him. “I should have seen it. It’s stupidly obvious. Given the choice between me and incinerating from your powers, you’ll take me and the sex is just a bonus. That’s it, isn’t it? Between Death and death, you’ll take the one more likely to get you laid.” With a sob, she turned and ran from his apartment.

  Shock kept Aster still for a few heartbeats. By the time he’d chased her, her apartment’s door slammed right in his face. As Aster put his hand against it, the deadbolt slid into place.

  “Chandra, I swear, it wasn’t like that at all. I’m not him. I’m crazy about you. I care about you. This relationship is good for both of us.” She had to see that. They needed each other. They were good for each other.

  “I could have been anyone,” she said, the tears obvious in her words. Then, her footsteps retreated.

  Tipping forward, he laid his forehead against her door. She was wrong. Given the choice between hurting her and going up in flames—he’d take death. He could hear her crying. Aster had courted Death and really, really screwed up.

  Chapter Five

  There was no reason for her to be upset. They’d known each other days. Days. It wasn’t even a relationship. It was barely dating. Besides, the whole thing was so surreal it was practically fiction. Demigod of death? Please.

  Chandra poured half a bottle of chocolate syrup into her milk. It was more syrup than milk. Stirring it in, the clink of the spoon on the sides of the glass made her eyelid twitch. Picking up the glass, she pressed it against her temple. She’d cried her eyes out yesterday.

  There was a knock on her door followed by Aster’s door opening and closing.

  Chandra glared at her door and kept her glass pressed against her skin. There’d been knocks yesterday too. It’d started with a flower delivery. She’d gleefully intended to use her powers for evil to wilt the hell out of them and then she’d discovered they were silk. He’d even ruined that. But she hadn’t opened the note with them—not yet.

  Then, there was the Thai food—which, okay, she’d eaten that. Chandra was feeling vengeful, but it was still wrong to waste food.

  What was it going to be this morning? He’d delivered it personally this time. That was different.

  She didn’t care.

  At all.

  So, Chandra waited a full fifteen seconds just to prove she didn’t care before pushing to her feet and going to the door. Looking out her peephole, there was only an empty hallway. Leaving the chain on, she opened the door. A sack. She inhaled. Mmm. Donuts from Pike Place. Opening her door just wide enough, she snagged the bag and pulled it inside. Stapled to the top was a note, which she’d have to pull off in order to get to the donuts. Sneaky.

  Chandra—

  I was stupid, a jerk, a moron—the list goes on. Please give me a second chance. I swear that after we met, you being my match was the bonus, not the other way around. This is real. This thing between us could be amazing if you’ll let it. I’m right next door and I’m not going anywhere.

  Aster

  The donuts were still warm. Dropping the note on the table, she slumped in the chair in front of it and ate a donut. Then, another one. And another. She had a right to be angry and to feel betrayed.

  When the donuts were nothing more than crumbs and a pleasantly full stomach, she tried to get some work done. It didn’t go well. All of her designs had a certain aggressive bleakness to them, despite the sun shining through the window. Giving up, she changed into shorts and a tank top and grabbed a book. Just because Aster had ruined everything—was no reason that she couldn’t go enjoy the afternoon on her balcony. Opening the door as quietly as she could, Chandra picked the lounger facing away from the overgrown monstrosity that was her neighbor’s balcony and relaxed in it. Rather than read, she closed her eyes and let the warmth of the sun heat her skin.

  Up until Aster had moved in, she’d never been warm. She’d assumed it was a problem with poor circulation. Never in a million years would she have guessed it was related to being the demigod of death. Because who would? That was ridiculous.

  Behind her, Aster’s back door opened and closed.

  Chandra sighed.

  “You don’t have to talk to me—just listen.”

  “Why should I?”

  “Because you’re killing me.”

  Stilling, she swallowed. “I thought living beside me would be enough.” As angry as she was with him, killing both of them was… the tiniest bit drastic.

  “It is. Probably. I didn’t mean in that way. I never meant to hurt you. It’s just the way I think. I’m used to solving problems as I come across them.”

  “I’m a problem or a solution? Either way isn’t very flattering.”

  “No, my problem was that I needed to find my match. So, I saw my way of doing it as similar to online dating.”

  “I didn’t exactly sign up for Demigod Dating dot com.”

  “You didn’t know about it. If our situations had been reversed, you’d have been looking for me… probably in the same way.”

  Okay, she couldn’t disagree with that.

  “I told you what was going on as soon as I thought you’d believe me. Plus, you’ve felt better ever since I moved in. I won’t apologize for that. You looked unwell when I moved in.”

  That was true too. But to find out that you were chosen solely based on something you had no control over…

  “And…” His phone rang. “Sorry, it’s…” He swore. “Hello.” His answer was abrupt and choked. “Please tell me he hasn’t…”

  She turned to look at him. He was staring out over the city with an anguished look on his face.

  “You’ve checked around? The morgues? No, of course you have. I… No, I spoke to him yesterday morning, and he said he was running out of time. He wouldn’t let me push it back. Hang on.” Aster pulled his phone from his ear and searched for something by tapping on its surface while frowning before putting it back to his ear. “I can be on a plane in a couple hours. I know he had a bolthole somewhere near Mount Charleston that he’d planned to switch to when it got bad. He might have gone there. Have you called the place that employed him to find his last bounty? He was picking someone up when I talked to him… said he was some sort of sexual deviant. Okay. Okay. I’ll m
eet you at his apartment this afternoon. Text me when you get in.” He hung up.

  “Your cousin?” she asked quietly.

  He turned to her, blinking, seeming surprised that she was still there. “Yeah. Corbin isn’t answering his phone. His stepdad had the landlord check on him and the apartment is empty.”

  “Do you think…?”

  Aster shrugged. “I guess I’ll find out when I get there.” He cleared his throat. “I’ll, uhh, be back when I can.” Nodding, he went inside.

  The sun was still out. Not a cloud in the sky, but it might as well have been overcast and gloomy. She was sitting at her table again when she heard his door open and close. Biting her lip she listened to his steps going down the hall. She couldn’t let him leave like this, not without telling him it’d be okay between them. Jumping to her feet, Chandra ran to the door and flung it open. Stepping out, she saw the last inch of the elevator as the doors shut. With a whoosh, it was gone.

  Crap.

  The first day he was gone, she changed her mind every couple minutes. He’d been wrong. So wrong.

  Well, from his perspective, the way he’d behaved made a certain amount of sense.

  But he hadn’t exactly said he was falling in love with her during his big declaration.

  Not that she had either. She was. But she hadn’t said it.

  He drove her crazy.

  In a good and a bad way.

  And she couldn’t live without him.

  The second day, she buckled down and actually got a lot done—right up until the dizzy spells started. Keeping busy was good. It took her mind off things. Like the fact that his cousin might have died because he hadn’t found his match, but Chandra was pushing the perfect guy away just because he’d found her. Meant to be was meant to be, and that didn’t exclude them living happily ever after.

  The third day started off with a variety of over-the-counter medicine. Her body ached. It’d been so long since she’d felt like this. Impossible to believe that she could get used to the way Aster made her feel so quickly. This felt worse because she’d actually felt better. Or something like that.

  Staring into the fridge, Chandra tried to imagine something that she actually wanted to eat. The last few things she’d eaten had tasted like sawdust. Was Aster going through this? What if going to find his cousin killed him too? How could she live with that? Actually, if he didn’t come back, maybe she wouldn’t.

  She tried pushing the sadness out of her—the depression away. It felt like she was managing a small pulse of energy, but it didn’t ease this creeping feeling of death. She tried again and again, but it didn’t seem to do anything. She was Death, but it sure felt like her end was coming.

  Fourth day. She was out of food. Aster hadn’t called—hadn’t contacted her. Maybe grocery shopping would take her mind off of why that might be.

  The aisles blurred and Chandra ended up with three boxes of cereal, a box of instant oatmeal, and Oreos. Anything else required too much thought. Her body ached. Each beat of her heart was almost a conscious struggle. Her pulse was a drowning beat that overwhelmed her with the energy it took. The cashier had to tell her three times what her total was and she noticed the woman surreptitiously applying hand sanitizer as Chandra was leaving. Hell, she must look terrible. She felt terrible. It wasn’t until she was leaving the elevator on her floor that Chandra realized she was out of milk.

  The key skipped around the lock but refused to go in. Even when she managed to get it close, it wouldn’t budge. Stupid, stupid key. Leaning her head against the door, she sighed. Maybe if she put her bags down first. They dropped to the carpet. Black spots danced in front of her eyes. She should sit down and rest. Just for a moment. Sliding down to the floor, Chandra sighed and closed her eyes, leaning her head back against the wall.

  So much work to breathe.

  Too much work.

  She exhaled, and the hallway went black and rushed up to envelope her in the cold. She loved him. She loved Aster and she never got to tell him or show him. She loved him. It seemed so obvious. But it was too late. What happened when Death died?

  The color in her cheeks was slowly returning, but his breath still stuttered as he stroked her hair. It was difficult to hold her loosely, rather than crushing her and willing heat back into her body. She’d been so cold when he’d picked her up.

  Her eyelids fluttered and then opened. Her brown eyes stared into his solemnly. Then, a smile drifted across her lips, building little by little.

  “Hey,” she said, the word more a breath than anything.

  “Hey yourself. You scared me to death.”

  “Death,” she repeated, laughing softly, “That’s funny.”

  Aster wanted to shake her, but just tightened his clasp on her instead. “It’s not funny. I thought I’d lost you. Why didn’t you call me?”

  She swallowed and her mouth pursed. “I didn’t have your phone number and your work wouldn’t give it to me.”

  “It was in the card that came with the flowers.”

  “Ohhhh. I never read it.” Her head tipped and she stared at their shared wall. “I think it’s still in the flowers. You know, I put them in water before I realized they were silk. They’re still in water. It was my revenge. I was ruining them very slowly. It wasn’t a very good revenge.”

  “No, you came up with a much better one. Your revenge was me coming home to you on my doorstep, passed out, gray as your walls.”

  She shook her head. “I was on my doorstep.”

  “No. You were on mine.”

  Her mouth dropped open. “Ohhh, that’s why my key wouldn’t work.” Her eyes examined the room. “I’m in your apartment.” They focused on his face. “On your lap.”

  He had her slim body cradled against his, absorbing his energy. “Yes. We haven’t been together long enough for us to be apart that long I suppose.”

  “I think I might have forgotten to eat a few times.” Chandra’s nose wrinkled. “I couldn’t seem to concentrate.” She shrugged off what she viewed as a small concern—but actually wasn’t. At all. “How is your cousin?”

  “Chandra…”

  Her eyes widened. “Oh no, something bad happened to him?”

  “No. He’s okay. He’s fine. We got a hold of him shortly after we arrived, but our connection kept cutting out because he was out of range. His stepdad was best friends with my uncle who went supernova, so he wanted to stick around to confirm Corbin was okay. I thought giving you space might help you cool down enough to accept my apology so I went along with it, waiting for your call… which never came.”

  “I would have called if I’d thought to look in my flowers.” She tilted her head. “In retrospect that was pretty dumb, but I wasn’t thinking logically. Is your cousin still in bad shape?”

  “I don’t know. I think he may have found a healer.”

  “A healer?”

  “He needed a demigod of healing and I think he found one. He sounded better from what I could hear. I’ll ask him when he calls again. But forget that. We’re done with that subject. You scared me. Do you know what it was like, finding you on my doorstep? I thought I was too late.

  Lifting her hand, she brushed his hair back behind his ear, her fingers circling it as soft as a feather. “Did I look like Death?”

  He raised his eyebrows. Not funny. Okay, a little funny.

  “You’d think a demigod of death would be more badass than to pass out on your doorstep.”

  Aster sighed. “Are you feeling better?”

  She looked better. Not one hundred percent, by any means, but better. “I tried to catch you—that day when you left, but the elevator closed too fast.”

  Ducking, he kissed her forehead. “I thought I saw you, but I figured it was wishful thinking, especially when you never called.” The separation had been hell. He kept willing his phone to ring.

  “I shouldn’t need you this much,” she whispered. Her fingers skimmed along his jaw to brush his lips.

  “I n
eed you just as much. Maybe more.”

  Chandra squinted. “You look okay. Are you not okay?”

  Reaching up, Aster grabbed her hand and pressed her palm flat against his chest. “It’s in here. I swear it just quit beating a few times, and I had to talk it into restarting.”

  She smiled again. “It’s a good thing you specialize in fertility. You’d make a lousy heart surgeon.” Wriggling, she sat up and then considered him from only inches away.

  “I should probably hold you a little longer.”

  “Because you have to?”

  “Because I want to and I need to. You’ll be lucky if I ever let you loose.” Lifting his hands, he cradled her cheeks. “Punish me for the next few centuries however you want—other than keeping us apart. I didn’t settle for you. You’re not just anyone. You could never be just anyone. You’re the woman I love. I know it’s fast, but… just don’t keep us apart.”

  Her eyes widened. “Oh.”

  Aster grinned. “Oh?” He touched his lips briefly against hers.

  “Mmm,” she said, opening her eyes slowly. She wiggled again before getting up and then resettling astride him. Blinking, she frowned over his shoulder before her gaze swept his apartment again. “I killed all your plants.”

  “You did. I don’t know if it was intentional or you just weren’t aware if you focused energy you could be this lethal. I’m glad there’s a laundry room below you and the place across the hall is vacant. We need to tame your powers and teach you to control them as well as you can.” That’d entail spending a lot of time together—which was in the plan—his new plan. Since his new plan involved loving her and keeping her healthy and as perfect as she already was, she might not hate it as much. Reaching out, he touched a nearby fern. Green flowed out from his fingertips with a tingling sensation and the plant shuddered back to life.