Page 78 of Bitten By the Basilisk

“Well, you can rest assured that I don’t love him anymore. Our friend groups didn’t overlap, so I only saw him once after that, at graduation. We never spoke again.”

No wonder she hadn’t wanted anything more than a fling when he’d taken her out on his motorcycle. If she let her heart settle on him, she would always worry that a red thread tying him to someone else could someday appear.

The kite string became taut as the wind picked up, and the cobra began spinning as a result. Alice carefully reeled it in closer, until it reached a calmer height.

“How about this,” he mused, “in the highly unlikely event you see a red thread linking me to someone else, inform Nic. He’ll get rid of them, and I’ll be none the wiser.”

Alice half scoffed, half laughed as she twisted her torso to look at him over her shoulder. “Is Nic an assassin, too?”

Silas gave her an arch look as he moved to stand next to her and save her neck the strain. “When did I say he’d kill them? I wouldn’t have thought you were that violent, kitten.”

She was shocked for an instant, then burst out laughing.

“Then again, you did mace Brett. And you delivered your knee to his balls.”

“You were the one who threw him!” she shot back, still laughing.

“Yes, but any ribs I may have broken are likely already healed. I doubt I can say the same for his ego.”

She shook her head in amusement, her smile wide and bright.

Later, when he thought back on this moment—the way her wind-tossed hair floated around her sweet face as they snickered over beating up a vampire—he would realize his heart truly became hers in that instant.

But the wind suddenly shifted, sending the kite swinging. Alice let out a gasp and attempted to pull it into the next gust, but the wind direction was too chaotic, and the kite began plunging toward the ground.

“Oh no!” she cried out, panic-laughing and grabbing desperately at the kite string to shorten it and slow the kite’s crash landing.

Silas darted forward to catch it before it smashed against the boardwalk, his coattail flying behind him. Though he was moving at an inhuman speed without the town wards’ magical concealment, the prospect of Alice being disappointed was too unbearable to go any slower.

Even at full speed, he barely got to it in time, both arms extended in a catch position. The kite fell right into them, and he carefully clutched it to his chest.

As he skidded to a stop, Alice’s elated cheer made him feel as if he could take on ten of Lance. He strutted the whole way back, his chin lifted.

“I can’t believe you caught it!” she exclaimed. “You were like a bullet!”

“I’ll probably be hungry again in an hour, but the delight on your face is more than worth it.”

Her smile grew even more. Nearby, one of the boardwalk’s streetlamps lit up, drawing their attention. The sun was setting.

“I guess we should stop soon,” Alice said, holding a mess of red string. “Just give me a minute to spool all this up.”

“Shall I do it?”

She declined with a shake of her head. “I’ve been knitting lately, so I’m used to it. Just hold on to the kite for me.”

As she spooled, her fingers deftly pulling apart the occasional loose snarl, he thought again about her reaction when she first saw the color of the string.

“Think it’s a sign?” he asked, lifting his end on the side of his finger.

Alice looked up from her task. While she watched, he twirled the red string around his fingertip, in case his meaning could be made any clearer.

She sent him a guarded glance, her throat tightening with a swallow, then dropped her gaze to resume spooling. “Your guess is as good as mine,” she replied a bit too casually, shrugging her shoulder.

Smirking, he twirled his finger in the opposite direction to free it.

“All done,” she announced with relief a moment later as she handed him the completed spool. “That was fun, thanks. Think we can find a flower shop before Mom’s show? I want to get her a congratulatory bouquet.”

He nodded as he tucked the spool into his pocket, the kite itself in his other hand. “There’s one not far from the community center. The Witching Flower, run by a warlock and his wife. And just as a heads-up—the owner has an odd verbal tic, so his wife tends to help any new faces who come in.”