“But you said you wouldn’t be a stepfather to anyone,” I press.
“That was before I had everything I ever wanted,” he replies. “If you think this is going to make me leave you, then you really don’t know who you are dealing with.”
“Oh, CK,” I say and crush my mouth against his. He kisses me back and I push him to the bed, intending to show him how much I love him, when he pushes me off.
“Later,” he mumbles. “We need a plan of action. You cannot just arrive in the Dragon Realms and demand to take her.”
“No, I know. V.A. was on Her way there in a rage-induced, rash decision when I booted Her out,” I say, chewing my lip. “Although, the portal wouldn’t open. It was like it was locked.”
“Why are you speaking about yourself in the third person?” he inquires.
“Because that is how it feels to me. They are separate to me now. I am Aefre and they are…” I wave my hand around my head trying to show him what I mean. “I told you this already.”
“I didn’t realize it was quite so bad,” he says almost to himself. Then his eyes snap to mine. “If this is true, that you already have a daughter, why does Rem, uh he, keep coming back for you?” he demands.
I purse my lips. “I’m not sure,” I say with a frown. That’s a pretty good question. He keeps saying that we must try again.
“Oh, I am,” CK says in a huff and stands up abruptly, causing me to fall off the bed. Man, I miss those Vampire reactions. It doesn’t seem like my other ones are all that good.
“Sorry,” he murmurs and helps me up.
“No worries,” I say, in a huff myself now. “Elaborate.”
“He wants you to go to him and be with him and your daughter. He wants you to be a family. The only way he can get you back there is under pretense, and mark my words, Aefre, once you get there, he won’t let you go.”
I stare at him, open-mouthed. I close it when it occurs to me that it is quite possibly true. “Dracul said he would help me once I get there. He will help me leave,” I say confidently. I believe now that it was Dracul that came to me. If it was Remiel he would gain nothing by screwing around with me this way, in fact quite the opposite.
CK narrows his eyes at me. “Would you take her to the Dark Fae Kingdom?” he asks.
I look up at him, startled. I hadn’t even thought that far ahead. But he raises a good question. If I bring her back here, there is nothing stopping Tiamat and Remiel from just coming here and taking her back from me. If she is in the D.F.K. they can’t get to her. “What if she can’t pass through?” I ask.
“She is yours, she wi
ll be part Faerie,” CK says and I can see the toll this knowledge and conversation is having on him. He is devastated but trying desperately not to show it.
“Hey,” I say and take his hands.
He looks down at me with those perfect, amber-flecked eyes, and he lets me see his fear. It makes me love him even more and I wrap my arms around him. “This changes nothing, my love. We will still have our own.”
“It changes everything,” he says so quietly I can barely hear him. He fists his hands into my hair, and we stand tangled around each other for a while.
I struggle to think of something to say to reassure him, but then he sighs and lets me go.
“We need to come up with a plan,” he says.
“I already have one,” I say carefully. He isn’t going to want to hear this any more than he did about my child.
“Of course you do,” he says with a soft smile. “And I think I know what it is.”
I raise a questioning eyebrow and he hesitates, probably not wanting to give me ideas if we haven’t come up with the same one already.
I let him off the hook and say, “I am going to call him to me and tell him I am ready to go back with him and try again. Once I am there, I will get to my daughter and get her out. But I need to speak to my father first.”
He nods, having come up with the same plan. “It will work,” he says stiffly.
“It will, only if I get him to tell me about her.” It is pissing me off that I don’t even know her name.
“There is only one way that I can see he would do that,” CK says with a heavy sigh and he slumps to the bed.