Magic and Desire by Janine Ashbless

Author:Janine Ashbless
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780753516652
Publisher: Ebury Publishing

6

SITTING UP, LETTING the quilt slide from his shoulders, Robin gazed down at the sleeping woman at his side.

His human fingers tingled with the intense need to touch her again, and in his heart, also temporarily human, emotion surged.

How beautiful she was with her sex-tousled hair and her flushed cheeks. Her body was warm against his, radiating heat and life. He ached to be able to stay and sleep with her in his arms but, even during this special and almost finished month, he could only be the Robin she knew for a limited period. He could only touch, and feel, and experience this depth of passion for a couple of hours, or a little more, after which he was compelled to disassociate.

And he didn’t want to do that in front of Lois.

But just how much would it faze her though?

She was brave, bold and curious. From her thoughts, he knew she was aware that he wasn’t quite what he seemed. Yet still she embraced him and gave herself to him.

And, for that, I love you.

And he loved her even, he sensed, in his discarnate form, where emotions were fainter, rarefied and far less intense. When May was over, he might still feel the ache of loss.

She was compassionate too. His fingertips hovered a centimetre above her lips, her cheek and then her brow. He sensed the sympathy she felt for her surly neighbour, who had not been polite to her. She’d seen through the man’s bluffness to the sad state of his heart.

Would you feel sorry for me?

His ersatz heart twisted with anguish, as he glanced towards her watch on the bedside cabinet, and heard its tick, tick, tick like a giant tolling bell. His sharp vision noted again the date function.

Tomorrow was the last day of May. The last day of his approximate humanity. How he wished that she’d arrived here on the first of the month.

As if affected by the proximity of the month’s end, his form began to waver, so he rose from the bed and gathered his clothes. Not that they would remain if he disassociated. They were part of his illusion. But it seemed important to be as human as he could for as long as he could.

Dressed, he circled the room, wishing there was more he could do for her. When he touched the dark screen of her small computer, he sensed a fault in it and remembered her frustration with it. With a flick of his wrist, he scattered dust across the keyboard and watched as it glittered and sank into the guts of the device, healing the patterns of force as it went.

Well, at least that would bring her some satisfaction in the days to come, and distract her from the loss of her temporary playmate. He knew he could wipe her entire memory of him, just as he could have wiped the laptop’s electronic memory if he’d so wished. But the humanity that gripped him made him selfish.

He didn’t want to be forgotten.

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