Free Monster (A Cassidy Edwards Novel - Book 1) by Carmen Caine Page B

back of the villa.
    Whirling on my heel, I collided directly into Lucian.
    I choked back an expletive.
    He’d followed me.
    I hit his sculpted chest hard, and he grunted, unprepared for the impact. Instinctively, his hands lifted to grip my shoulders.
    There it was again—the crackle of energy leaping up between us in a fraction of a second. The rush of heat. Pressed against him, I dimly noted his sudden, rapid breath even as I wondered what he did to get such rock-hard abs.
    The intense moment hung between us before we both stepped back at the same time.
    Lucian muttered an oath of his own and, peering down at me, his silvery pale eyes blazed. “What are you doing? Did you lose him?” he asked, getting directly to the point.
    He was obviously a volcano on the verge of exploding. Tell him that Ricky was sneaking around with his own agenda? Not going there.
    Instead, I rolled my eyes.
    “Please!” I protested in mock annoyance, shrugging out of his grasp. I pointed towards the back of the villa. “He’s over there.”
    Shoving him aside—and enjoying it just a little too much—I shook my head to clear it and refocus on Ricky’s scent. Suddenly, I was downright eager to have a few choice words with my assigned puff-of-smoke as soon as I caught him.
    I quickly followed Ricky’s trail with Lucian hot on my heels, and of all places, I ended up in the kitchen. As I burst through the door, I mentally crossed my fingers that he wouldn’t be too hard to find.
    Apparently, simply imagining to cross your fingers works, because the elusive imp was the first thing I saw. Splayed out with his feet comfortably propped up on a banana, the pesky puff was snoring on the kitchen island, right in the very center of the room.
    “He’s drunk.” Lucian’s baritone breathed down my neck. He sounded angry. “Is this the technique you use to control an imp?”
    Sweeping past me, he strode up to the island and picked up an empty spice bottle near Ricky’s head.
    “Turmeric, of course,” Lucian cursed, slamming the bottle down with a thud. It was lucky that it didn’t break.
    Apparently, turmeric and imps spelled trouble.
    I eyed a bit of plastic curled up next to the banana. It looked like the remnants of a seal. Evidently, the turmeric bottle had been unopened before Ricky had gotten his little smoke-fingers on it. Well, it was empty now and clean as a whistle. I didn’t know how potent turmeric was for an imp, but judging by his rolling eyes and the yellow drool dribbling out of his mouth, he’d consumed a staggering amount for a creature of his size.
    “He’ll be drunk for days,” Lucian rounded on me, furious.
    So, my imp was a turmeric addict. How was I supposed to know  that ?
    “Hey, it’s  his  lack of control, not mine,” I said in my defense.
    Lucian clenched his jaw. “As a spell-finder, it’s your responsibility to control your imp. And now, when we have the greatest need of him, he is useless, and it’s your fault.”
    His eyes narrowed in suspicion as he continued, “I don’t know if it’s ineptitude or your  willful  intent, but I do know that you’ve practically breached our contract already!”
    It was unfair and I wasn’t one to take it. Facing the irate warlock, I retorted, “If we want to talk about fault, then look at yourself, buddy.  You’re  the one who saddled me with this pest of an imp to begin with. Not  my  fault you’re operating on a shoestring budget.”
    Lucian’s eyes flashed. He moved closer, planting his face practically in mine. For a moment, I wasn’t really sure if he was going to yell at me or kiss me.
    Maybe he wasn’t sure himself.
    After a moment, he expelled an exasperated breath out of his nose, and drawing back sharply, spoke in a somewhat calmer tone. “Bottle him up and bring him along. We’ve wasted enough time here.”
    As he retreated to the kitchen door and braced himself against the doorjamb to watch me, I turned to survey my  problema del minuto