Page 26 of Traitor Witch

He doesn’t answer and I swiftly decide it isn’t worth breaking up this dream massage.

“You’re lither than most warriors I’ve met,” he notes several minutes later.

I moan as he reaches a particularly tight knot. “I’m not a warrior. I’m the Shadow of the Moon, the Goddess’s assassin.”

“Apologies, I’ve not met a witch before.”

“Well, I’ve not met a siren before.” His hands move down to the base of my spine and I sigh in pleasure. “Hey, Klaus, not that this isn’t nice, but why are you in my dream?”

“You’ve touched the sea recently, haven’t you?” he says, instead of answering.

I remember the freezing water flowing into my boots and shudder. “Not intentionally.”

“Sirens meet their mates through dreams when they touch the sea at the same time,” he explains. “My sister, Cassie, told me you were coming just this morning. I swam all day, hoping we’d meet.”

I stiffen under his hands, pulling away and into a sitting position just out of his reach. “Witches don’t have mates, Klaus. We have harems of humans.”

Klaus shrugs. “Then I will happily join your harem, if you’ll have me.”

I shake my head in confusion. “No, you don’t understand. I don’t have a harem either. My High Priestess said that the Goddess hadn’t picked one for me. I’m happier alone.”

He looks at me with large, puppyish eyes and I instantly feel like the world’s most awful bitch.

“It’s not you, okay. This just isn’t the right time. I’m wanted by two covens and trying to prove my innocence whilst faking being a Solar. I’m… I’m not good mate material.”

Klaus dismisses my words as soon as I’ve said them. “But you still have to sleep. And since you’ll be in my dreams until we mate fully, anyway, I might as well give you massages when you’re here.”

“You’re not going to convince me into mating with you with just your talented hands alone.”

His grin is quick and full of charm. “Who says my only weapon is my hands?”

I squeeze the bridge of my nose. This is not the sort of conversation I want to be having whilst naked. In fact, it’s not a conversation I want to be having, period.

“I’m going to close my eyes and go back to sleep,” I whisper to myself. “This is all just the product of stress and a year of celibacy.”

“It’s real.” His blue eyes are so earnest, his voice so hypnotic, I want to believe him.

The feeling is so intense I have to shake my head to clear it. “I’m just…shocked. Okay? Like I said, witches don’t usually have mates and two high priestesses died today, both in front of me.”

He shifts closer, “I’m sorry. Will it help if you tell me about them?”

I consider it, then sigh. “Can I have some clothes first?” Something about being emotionally and physically vulnerable at the same time seems too intimate for two strangers.

The softness of silk caresses me and I look down to see myself wrapped in a black wraparound dress.

Before I can thank him, or say anything at all, Klaus’s head whips towards the sea.

I’m ripped from the dream so sharply that I wake with a piercing headache.

I spring upwards in bed, clutching the sheet to my front.

For a moment, with the sound of the ocean coming through the window matching the sound of the ocean in my dreams, reality blurs.

That was too real to be a dream.

I was too open with Klaus. How could I have let my guard down around a male who claimed I was his mate? This level of carelessness isn't like me.

Mates or not, I don’t trust this one bit.