Page 35 of Take You Home

What’s the point of being alive for fifteen thousand years if shit like this can still surprise him?

“Yeah,” Obie says, unceremoniously shoving Chester off his lap. Chester makes a disgruntled noise of protest. “Yeah, I’m good. Just figured I should let Kyle have one of the desserts he so kindly bought for us. And that I should let Desi get back to her perch.”

“Hooray!” Desi cheers, and she immediately starts climbing up Chester’s torso, almost kneeing him in the face in the process.

“Don’t encourage her, Obie!” JJ says, exasperated.

Desi settles herself contentedly on Chester’s shoulders again. Chester holds on to her ankle with one hand and reaches for a plate of pavlova with the other. “Anyway,” he says, pointedly turning away from Obie and back to his human friends, “that’s a pretty wild story. Roma, can yours and Ez’s even top that?”

Roma scoffs, leaning forward. “Oh, just you wait,” she says, and as she launches into trying to one-up her own dramatized version of JJ and Cass’s love story while JJ and Cass protest in the background, Obie looks at Chester’s tense shoulders and has the sinking feeling that this just got a whole lot more complicated.

12

So what do we think?”

Chester scowls down at his hands, his shoulders hunched. After what was probably the longest two hours of his life, he and Obie are finally back in Chester’s bedroom, Obie sitting in his usual spot on Chester’s desk chair and Chester sitting on his bed.

Two hours ago, he thought he’d be spending most of the evening cursing Obie out for the fake boyfriend situation. He wishes that was still their biggest problem. “I don’t know,” he admits, glancing up to meet Obie’s eyes. “I‍—I never planned on this. I wasn’t trying to bind ustogether,so I didn’t even research the possibility.”

Obie’s jaw twitches. “Yeah, I know. You were just trying to bind me.”

Irritation‍—and a little bit of guilt‍—roils through Chester. “Yeah, I was,” he bites out, leaning forward. “I want my friends back, Smith. I didn’t see another way to make that happen.”

“Your friends arefine,as you just saw,” Obie snaps back.

Chester glares down at his hands again. “Yeah,” he says reluctantly. “Yeah, they seemed… good.”

More than good, actually. JJ and Roma seemedhappy.JJ’s smile was warmer and easier than Chester has ever seen it, and Roma’s shoulders were relaxed in a way they never were in the Sanctum, and they just looked…

Content.

Part of Chester is happy for them‍—really, he is‍—but a much larger part is even more bitter that they had to leave him and Bryant behind to get there.

And their demonic partners weren’t nearly as bad as anticipated, either. Cass‍—because, by the end of the day, Chesterwascalling the demon who accidentally started World War I by a nickname in his head‍—was friendly and attentive, always asking “Kyle” for his opinions and listening closely whenever he contributed to the conversation. Ez was more intense, but in a good way‍—the kind of way that had Chester choking on laughter more than once‍—and she always seemed determined to hear Chester’s thoughts and make him feel at home.

Desi was unambiguously a sweetheart. Chester can readily concede that his original theory about her manipulating JJ was probably unfounded, because‍—demon or not‍—she obviously had the temperament and intellect of a human four-year-old.

She was just a little girl. Chester can understand why JJ went to such great lengths to protect her.

And, most importantly, Cass and Ez were clearly attached to JJ and Roma. They moved to keep their human partners in eyeshot and pulled them into conversations and teased them like they’d known each other for years, not just months.

They all seemed to genuinely care about each other. The thoughtmakes Chester’s chest hurt. “Regardless,” he says brusquely, “I’ve never heard of a binding spell creating a telepathic connection. I’ve got nothing.”

Eventually, Obie looks away. “Me, neither,” he says quietly. “The last time I was under a binding spell, it wasn’t anything like this. It was a less refined version of the spell that summoners use on neophyte demons nowadays, so it was obviously unidirectional‍—and controlling.”

A tendril of curiosity snakes through Chester’s mind. “The one from fifteen thousand years ago, you mean? With the first hunters?”

Abruptly, Obie’s face shuts down. “Yes,” he says shortly.

The researcher in Chester wants to press him for more details, but Obie’s frosty expression convinces him to drop it. “All right,” he says instead. “Then howdowe figure out what’s going on? If the binding spell can create a literal telepathic link between us, then it might have even more side effects we haven’t discovered yet.”

Obie lets out a slow breath. “Well, we could always investigate it the old-fashioned way.”

Chester squints at him. “Meaning…?”

“Meaning we test it.” Obie pushes himself to his feet, closes the distance between them, and stretches out a hand. “Here. Let’s figure out the limits of the telepathy first.”

Grimacing, Chester wraps his fingers around Obie’s palm. The tingling sensation next to his right eye comes back, and he cautiously presses into it.Obie? Can you hear me?