Free Wings Free with Bonus Material by Aprilynne Pike Page B

skin.
    “Don’t worry,” he said. “I’ll keep my distance from your blossom.” He grinned and she felt like she was missing some in-joke. “I know whose petals I’m allowed to get into and whose I’m not.” He inhaled deeply. “Mmmm. And fabulous as you smell, your petals are off-limits to me.” He raised an eyebrow. “At least for now.”
    He lifted a hand to her face and Laurel couldn’t move. He brushed some leaves out of her hair and glanced quickly up and down her frame. “You seem to be intact. No broken petals or stems.”
    “What are you talking about?” she asked, trying to conceal the petals peeking out from the bottom of her shirt.
    “It’s a little late for that, don’t you think?”
    She glared at him. “What are you doing here?”
    “I live here.”
    “You don’t live here,” she said, confused. “This is my land.”
    “Really?”
    Now she was flustered all over again. “Well, it’s my parents’ land.” She held tight to the tail of her shirt. “And you’re…you’re not welcome here.” How had his eyes gotten so intensely, impossibly green? Contacts, she told herself firmly.
    “Aren’t I?”
    Her eyes widened as he took a step closer. His face was so confident, his smile so contagious, she couldn’t step away. She was sure she’d never met anyone like him before in her life, but a sense of familiarity overwhelmed her.
    “Who are you?” Laurel repeated.
    “I told you; I’m Tamani.”
    She shook her head. “Who are you really?”
    Tamani pressed a finger to her lips. “Shh, all in good time. Come with me.” He took her hand and she didn’t pull away as he led her deeper into the forest. Her other hand gradually forgot what it was doing and she let go of her shirt. The petals slowly rose until they were spread out behind her in all their beautiful glory. Tamani looked back. “There, that feels better, doesn’t it?”
    Laurel could only nod. Her mind felt fuzzy, and although somewhere in the back of her consciousness she suspected she should be bothered by all of this, it somehow didn’t seem important. The only thing that mattered was following this guy with the alluring smile.
    He brought her to a small clearing where the leaves above them parted, allowing a circle of sunlight to filter down through the branches onto a patch of grass dotted with spots of spongy green moss. Tamani sprawled in the grass and gestured for her to sit in the spot across from him.
    Enraptured, Laurel just stared. His green-and-black hair hung in long strands that fell across his forehead, just shy of his eyes. He was dressed in a loose white shirt that looked homemade and similarly styled brown baggy pants that tied just below the knees. They were decidedly old-fashioned, but he made them seem as trendy as the rest of him. His feet were bare, but even the sharp pine needles and broken sticks along the path hadn’t seemed to bother him. He was maybe six inches taller than her and moved with a catlike grace she’d never seen in another boy.
    Laurel folded down into a cross-legged perch and looked over at him expectantly. The strange desire to follow him was slowly starting to fade, and confusion was working its way in.
    “You gave us quite a scare, running off like that.” His voice had a soft lilt—not quite British, not quite Irish.
    “Like what?” Laurel asked, trying to clear her head.
    “Here one day, gone the next. Where have you been? I was starting to panic.”
    “Panic?” She was too bewildered to argue or demand more information.
    “Have you told anyone about that?” he asked, pointing over her shoulder.
    She shook her head. “No—oh, yes. I told my friend David.”
    Tamani’s face snapped into an unreadable slate. “Just a friend?”
    Laurel’s wits slowly began to trickle back in. “Yes…no…I don’t think that’s any of your business.” But she said it quietly.
    Small lines showed at the corner of Tamani’s eyes, and for just an instant, Laurel thought