Carter pushed through the glass doors of Whitmore & Associates at 5:17, three minutes early because Linda from accounts receivable had finally figured out how to find her minimized Outlook window and didn't need him to walk her through it a fourth time. Small victories.
The December air hit him immediately, sharp enough to make him zip his jacket to his chin. Asheville had been hovering in that uncomfortable zone all week: cold enough to be annoying, not cold enough to justify staying inside. The Christmas lights strung between the lampposts were already on, red and green LEDs blinking in patterns that probably meant something festive but mostly just reminded him the city had sprung for the cheap ones again.
He turned left on Patton Avenue, settling into the familiar rhythm of his walk home. Past the coffee shop where a small latte cost more than his lunch. Past the used bookstore with the hand-lettered sign in the window advertising a holiday sale he'd been meaning to check out for three weeks now. Past the antique store that always smelled like dust and regret whenever he walked by with the door open.
Friday. Finally.
His mind drifted to dinner options. He had eggs. Half a bag of frozen vegetables he kept meaning to use. Maybe some rice left over from Tuesday. Nothing inspiring, but nothing that required leaving the apartment again either. That counted as a win.
Gaming was the bigger question. His guild had been running the new raid content all week, but the thought of sitting in Discord for four hours listening to Marcus argue about optimal DPS rotations made his shoulders tense just thinking about it. Maybe he'd just mess around in single-player stuff. Or read. Or stare at his phone until he fell asleep on the couch like a responsible adult.
The usual nothing-thoughts of a Friday wind-down.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. He fished it out, squinting at the screen.
CONGRATULATIONS! You've been selected for an exclusive opportunity to…..
He swiped it away without reading the rest. Spam. Always spam. He really needed to figure out how to get off whatever list his number had ended up on.
When he looked up from dismissing it, there was a shop on the corner that hadn't been there yesterday.
Carter stopped.
He blinked.
The building was old. Brick facade weathered in a way that suggested decades, not months. Moss crept up the lower courses where the mortar had crumbled, and the window frames had that particular shade of peeling white paint that only came from years of neglect followed by years of character. A faded sign hung above the entrance, "Curious Volumes" spelled out in gold leaf that had mostly given up the ghost, leaving behind ghost-letters you had to squint to read.
He'd walked this route for two years. Every weekday morning, every weekday evening. Sometimes weekends when he needed coffee or groceries or just an excuse to leave his apartment.
There had never been anything here but a vacant lot with a chain-link fence. He remembered the fence specifically because someone had zip-tied a stuffed elephant to it last spring, and it had stayed there for weeks, getting progressively sadder in the rain until the city finally took it down.
Carter checked his phone. Half-expecting to see he'd wandered onto the wrong street somehow, gotten turned around thinking about dinner and taken a right instead of going straight.
He hadn't. The blue dot on his map showed exactly where he should be. Corner of Patton and Lexington. The same corner he'd passed hundreds of times.
The shop had a bay window displaying stacked books, their spines too faded to read from the sidewalk. Leather bindings, mostly. The kind of old hardcovers that showed up in estate sales and smelled like someone's grandfather. A small handwritten sign in the glass said "OPEN" in careful cursive, the letters slightly uneven in a way that suggested an actual human hand rather than a printer.
Carter wasn't the type to investigate mysterious appearances. He was the type to shrug and keep walking, to file weird things under "not my problem" and forget about them by the time he got home. Life was easier that way. Simpler.
But something about the warm light spilling from inside, amber and soft in a way that modern bulbs never quite managed. The way it looked like it belonged here despite being impossible. Like the building had always been waiting and he'd just never noticed.
His hand moved before he'd consciously decided anything.
The door swung inward before he touched it, and the smell of old paper and dust rolled over him like a welcome.
The door swung shut behind him with a soft click, and Carter found himself in a space that shouldn't have fit inside the building he'd seen from outside.
Cramped was the wrong word. Narrow maybe. The shop stretched upward more than outward, shelves climbing toward a ceiling lost somewhere in shadow above the reach of the amber lamps scattered along the walls. Books filled every surface, stacked horizontally when vertical space ran out, piled on the floor in towers that leaned at angles suggesting either careful engineering or complete disregard for gravity.
No organization. None that Carter could see, anyway. A fat volume of Kant's Critique of Pure Reason sat spine-to-spine with something called Highland Hearts: A Scottish Romance. Next to that, what looked like a handwritten cookbook from 1890, its cover spotted with ancient stains that might have been flour or blood or both. Philosophy, fiction, recipes for things he'd never heard of. All jammed together like someone had dumped a library into a blender and shelved the results alphabetically by chaos.
The register sat on a counter near the door. Brass and ornate, the kind of antique cash register that belonged behind velvet rope in a museum, not in an actual functioning shop. The drawer was closed. The stool behind it, empty.
No shopkeeper.
Carter waited. Cleared his throat. The sound died immediately, swallowed by the paper and dust and whatever else filled this place.
"Hello?"
Nothing.
No other customers either. No footsteps from a back room. No radio playing softly somewhere. Just the creak of floorboards under his feet as he shifted his weight, and even that seemed muted, absorbed into the shelves like the books themselves were listening.
He should leave. This was weird. The whole thing was weird, from the building appearing out of nowhere to the impossible interior to the complete absence of anyone who might actually work here. Normal people left situations like this. Normal people went home and made eggs and watched something mindless on their laptops until they fell asleep.
Carter moved deeper into the shop instead.
He didn't know why. Couldn't have explained it if someone asked. His feet just... went. Down the narrow aisle between shelves, past stacks of books that smelled like attics and basements and the back corners of estate sales. His fingers trailed along spines as he walked, feeling cracked leather and cloth and the occasional smooth modern paperback that seemed embarrassed to be here among its elders.
Titles caught his eye as he passed. The Compleat Angler, a fishing manual he vaguely recognized as famous for some reason. Erta's Guide to Poisonous Mushrooms, complete with hand-drawn illustrations visible through a gap where the cover had warped. Seventeen Ways to Leave Your Body, which had no author listed and a spine so worn the gold lettering had almost vanished entirely.
He pulled that one out, flipped it open. The pages were blank.
All of them. Every single page, nothing but cream-colored paper and the faint smell of age.
Carter put it back.
The shop went on longer than it should have. He'd been walking for what felt like minutes, the entrance now lost behind turns he didn't remember taking. The shelves pressed closer here, the light dimmer, the titles stranger. Books in languages he didn't recognize. Books with symbols instead of words. A thin volume bound in what looked disturbingly like snakeskin.
He was about to turn around. Find his way back to the door, back to the street, back to his apartment and his eggs and his normal, explainable Friday evening.
Then his hand stopped.
He hadn't meant to reach out. Hadn't been looking at anything in particular. But his fingers were resting on a book shelved at eye level, and they wouldn't move.
Leather-bound. Deep burgundy, almost black in the dim light but catching something richer when he tilted his head. No title on the spine. No author. No markings at all.
It was warm under his fingers.
Not room-temperature warm. Not the residual heat of a building with old radiators.
Warm. Like something alive. Like blood moving under skin.
Carter's breath caught.
He should pull his hand back. He should turn around and leave and never think about this place again.
He pulled it from the shelf, and the cover read "The Book of Fantasy" in silver letters that caught light that wasn't there.
Carter opened to the first page.
The paper was thick under his fingers, cream-colored and slightly textured in a way that suggested handmade rather than factory-pressed. The kind of paper that cost real money, the kind people used for wedding invitations or letters they actually wanted someone to keep.
Blank, except for a short paragraph centered in the middle of the page. Elegant typeset, the letters crisp and black despite the book's apparent age.
The Book of Fantasy, presented by The Company. Within these pages, write the name of any you desire, and they shall appear to fulfill your wishes and wants. All that is imagined can be made real. All that is longed for can be granted.
No author. No copyright. No publication date. No fine print explaining the terms and conditions, no website to visit for more information, no QR code linking to some viral marketing campaign.
Just the promise, sitting there on the page like it was the most reasonable thing in the world.
Carter read it twice. Three times. The words didn't change.
He flipped through the rest. Page after page after page, all of them empty. Hundreds of them, the book thicker than it had any right to be, the paper whispering against itself as he riffled through. Waiting. That was the word that came to mind. The pages looked like they were waiting for something.
For someone.
A laugh built in his chest, but it didn't quite make it out. This was ridiculous. A gag gift, maybe. Something someone's weird aunt had picked up at a Renaissance faire and regifted until it ended up here among the genuine antiques and forgotten texts. A diary for the delusional. A prop from a fantasy movie that had gone straight to streaming and been forgotten within a week.
He should put it back.
His hands didn't move toward the shelf.
Instead, Carter found himself checking the inside cover. Front, then back. Looking for a price tag, a penciled number, anything that would tell him what this thing was supposed to cost. There wasn't one. No sticker, no stamp, no handwritten figure in the corner. Nothing.
He stood there for a moment, the book warm against his palms, the shop silent around him.
Then he started walking back toward the entrance.
The return trip took less time than it should have. The turns he didn't remember taking straightened themselves out, the narrow aisles widening just enough to let him pass without brushing the shelves. The light grew warmer as he went, amber pooling around the antique register like it had been waiting for him to come back.
The stool was still empty.
Carter set the book on the counter. Waited. Shifted his weight from one foot to the other while the floorboards creaked beneath him.
"Hello?"
His voice echoed once, softly, then died. Swallowed by paper and dust and silence.
Nobody came.
He waited another minute. Two. Called out again, louder this time, the word bouncing off shelves and losing itself somewhere in the shadows above.
Nothing.
Carter pulled out his wallet. He had a fifty, two twenties, and some ones crumpled in the back from change he'd forgotten to spend. He smoothed out two of the twenties, folded them once, and set them on the counter next to the register.
Forty dollars felt like the right amount. Probably too much for a blank journal with delusions of grandeur, but the leather was nice, and the paper was obviously quality, and he'd feel weird about just taking it even if there was no one here to stop him.
He picked up the book. Tucked it under his arm. Walked to the door.
The handle turned easily under his hand, and the December air rushed in to meet him, sharp and clean after the dusty warmth of the shop.
When he stepped back onto the street, book tucked under his arm, he didn't look back to see if the shop was still there.
Carter's apartment occupied the third floor of a building old enough to have character but maintained well enough to have functioning heat. One bedroom, a bathroom with a shower that took forty-five seconds to get hot, and a living space that served as kitchen, dining room, and everything else. He'd lived here for two years and it looked like someone actually lived in it, which put him ahead of most guys his age.
He dropped his keys in the ceramic bowl by the door. The bowl had been a housewarming gift from his mother, glazed in blues that didn't match anything else he owned, and he used it every single day because it was easier than losing his keys. The book went on his desk, set down carefully beside his keyboard like it might bite if he handled it wrong.
Then he stood there for a moment, coat still on, looking at it.
Just a book. Leather cover. Silver letters. Probably some kind of novelty item, the sort of thing that showed up in airport gift shops next to dream journals and adult coloring books about swear words.
Carter hung up his coat and went to take a shower.
The bathroom was small but functional. White tile, a mirror he kept meaning to replace because the corner had a crack that caught the light wrong, a shower curtain covered in geometric patterns his ex had picked out three years ago and he'd never bothered to swap for something less aggressively modern. The water took its usual forty-five seconds. He stood under the spray longer than necessary, letting the heat work into muscles that had been tense since he'd walked into that shop.
That shop that hadn't existed yesterday.
He turned the water hotter and didn't think about it.
Leftover pasta from Wednesday. Penne with marinara, nothing fancy, reheated in the microwave because he was too tired to bother with the stove. He ate on the couch with his laptop balanced on the arm, half-watching something on Netflix that he'd started three days ago and still couldn't remember the premise of. Crime drama, maybe. Or thriller. There was a detective and someone was dead and the detective seemed very concerned about it.
His eyes kept drifting to the desk.
The book sat exactly where he'd left it. Burgundy leather catching the lamp light, silver letters too far away to read from here but somehow still visible. Still drawing his attention every few minutes like a conversation he could hear but not quite make out.
It wasn't doing anything. Books didn't do things. They sat there and waited to be read, and if this one felt like it was watching him back, that was his imagination filling in gaps that didn't exist.
Carter finished his pasta. Washed the plate and fork, dried them, put them away. Wiped down the counter because he was already standing there and it needed it anyway. Checked his phone. Three texts in the guild chat about tomorrow's raid schedule, two emails that could wait until Monday, one notification from an app he didn't remember downloading and immediately deleted.
9:47 PM.
He turned off the TV he hadn't been watching. Crossed to his desk. Sat down in the chair that had cost too much but was worth every penny for the lumbar support, and pulled the book toward him.
The leather was still warm under his hands. Body temperature, almost. Like someone had been holding it just before he picked it up.
He opened to the first page again.
The Book of Fantasy, presented by The Company.
The same words. The same elegant typeset, the same cream-colored paper, the same promise sitting there like it expected him to take it seriously.
Within these pages, write the name of any you desire, and they shall appear to fulfill your wishes and wants.
Carter read it a fourth time. A fifth. Waiting for the catch, the punchline, the small print that would explain this was all a joke or a game or some elaborate marketing scheme for a product he'd never heard of.
Nothing changed.
He flipped through the empty pages again. Hundreds of them, whispering against each other, waiting.
The silver letters still caught light wrong, and the leather was still warm, and Carter told himself that didn't mean anything.
Carter pushed the book aside and reached for his laptop.
The familiar glow of the screen felt grounding. Normal. Something that made sense in a way burgundy leather and impossible promises didn't. He opened YouTube, clicked on whatever the algorithm suggested first, and let himself sink into the mindless rhythm of autoplay.
A video about some guy restoring a vintage motorcycle he'd never ride. Then a cooking video where someone made pasta more complicated than it needed to be. Then a breakdown of a video game he'd never played, narrated by someone who talked too fast and used too many jump cuts.
He wasn't really watching. Just letting the noise fill the apartment, letting his eyes track movement while his brain went pleasantly blank. The pasta sat heavy in his stomach. The shower had loosened something in his shoulders. If he could just stay in this groove for another hour, he'd fall asleep on the couch and that would be fine. That would be a perfectly acceptable Friday night.
The video ended. An ad started.
Marvel Rivals.
Carter had played it a few times. Free-to-play hero shooter, nothing revolutionary, but the matches were quick and he didn't have to talk to anyone. He'd meant to get back into it eventually, whenever the mood struck.
The ad cycled through heroes. Spider-Man swinging. Iron Man blasting. The usual suspects doing the usual things.
Then Emma Frost walked onto the screen.
Carter's brain stopped working for approximately three seconds.
He'd seen her in-game. Vaguely remembered fighting against her once or twice, maybe using her in the training mode to test abilities. But he hadn't really looked. Hadn't paid attention to the character design in the way the ad was now forcing him to pay attention.
She strode through a battlefield like she owned it. Like she owned everything. White costume that covered technically enough to keep a T-rating while leaving absolutely nothing to imagination. The neckline plunged past reasonable. The cut at her hips rose past decent. Her thighs. God, her thighs. Thick and powerful and completely bare, catching light in a way that made him forget this was computer-generated.
Blue lipstick. Who had blue lipstick? She did. And somehow it worked. Somehow it made her look colder and hotter at the same time, like she knew exactly what she was doing to anyone watching and found it beneath her notice.
The camera lingered on her diamond form. Crystalline skin, geometric and impossible, but still somehow showing every curve. Still somehow making his mouth go dry.
Carter realized he'd stopped breathing.
The ad ended. Some streamer's face appeared, talking about tier lists, and Carter clicked the tab closed harder than necessary.
His apartment was quiet. His laptop screen glowed. His reflection stared back at him from the dark edges of the monitor, looking like someone who'd just been caught doing something embarrassing.
He was alone. Who cared if he'd spent thirty seconds hypnotized by a video game character? Everyone did that. That was why character designers made them look like that. It was calculated. He was just responding to stimuli like any other mammal with functioning eyes.
His gaze drifted to the book.
It sat where he'd pushed it, burgundy leather catching the lamplight. Silver letters visible even from here. The promise on the first page floated back to him, absurd and impossible and somehow still present in his mind like it had been waiting for exactly this moment.
Write the name of any you desire, and they shall appear.
Carter laughed. The sound came out weird in the empty apartment, too sharp, too short.
This was stupid. He was being stupid. A mysterious book from a shop that shouldn't exist, and his first instinct was to write down the name of a fictional woman whose thighs had melted his higher brain functions? That was pathetic. That was the kind of thing sad, lonely men did before they ended up featured in documentaries about how the internet had ruined a generation.
He wasn't going to do it.
He reached for the book anyway.
The leather was still warm. Still impossible. Still waiting in a way that made his skin prickle.
Carter flipped to the first blank page. Cream-colored paper, thick and textured, catching the light like it was made of something other than wood pulp and good intentions.
He found a pen. Black ballpoint, nothing special, the kind that came in packs of twelve from the office supply closet.
His hand hovered over the page.
This was ridiculous. Nothing was going to happen. He'd write a name, feel like an idiot, and then close the book and go to bed and never think about any of this again. The shop would probably be gone tomorrow. The book would probably turn out to be some kind of elaborate prank. He'd tell the story at parties someday, if he ever went to parties, about the time he found a magic book and tried to summon a video game character like a complete loser.
The pen touched paper.
"Emma Frost (Marvel Rivals)," he wrote, feeling like an idiot, and the ink dried silver on the cream-colored page.
Nothing happened.
Carter stared at the page. The name sat there in silver ink, drying slowly, looking exactly like what it was: words on paper. No flash of light. No thunder rolling through his apartment. No shimmer in the air, no crack of reality splitting open, no statuesque blonde materializing in his living room to demand an explanation for why she'd been summoned by a twenty-six-year-old IT support specialist who couldn't even cook himself a real dinner.
Just silence. Just the hum of his refrigerator. Just the distant sound of traffic three floors down and the even more distant sound of his upstairs neighbor's television playing something with a laugh track.
He waited. Thirty seconds. A minute. Two.
The book sat open in his hands, warm leather and cream-colored paper and absolutely nothing else.
Carter laughed.
It came out louder this time, sharper, bouncing off the walls of his empty apartment. The kind of laugh that happened when tension broke and left nothing but the absurdity of the situation behind. He'd written a fictional character's name in a mysterious book from a shop that shouldn't exist, and he'd actually waited to see if something would happen. Like a child. Like someone who still believed in birthday candles and shooting stars and the idea that wanting something badly enough could make it real.
Pathetic.
He closed the book. The cover made a soft sound against itself, leather on leather, and the silver letters caught the lamplight one more time before he shoved the whole thing into his desk drawer. Out of sight. Where it belonged. Where he could forget about it and pretend this entire evening had been a weird fever dream brought on by too much screen time and not enough human contact.
His reflection stared at him from the dark window. Just a guy in an apartment. Just another Friday night alone.
Carter pushed back from the desk and headed for the bathroom.
The toothbrush was where he'd left it. The toothpaste was almost empty, and he made a mental note to add it to his shopping list before forgetting immediately. The water ran cold for a few seconds before warming up, and he scrubbed at his teeth with the mechanical efficiency of someone who'd done this thousands of times and would do it thousands more.
The crack in the mirror caught his eye. He really did need to replace that thing.
He spat, rinsed, wiped his mouth on the hand towel. His reflection looked tired. His reflection always looked tired on Friday nights, but tonight there was something else there too. Something that might have been disappointment if he let himself examine it closely enough.
He didn't.
Boxers and nothing else. The apartment was warm enough, the radiator doing its job for once, and he'd never been the type to wear pajamas anyway. Too much fabric. Too much fuss. His bed was a queen that took up most of his bedroom, sheets that needed washing but weren't quite dirty enough to justify the effort, and a comforter that had been a gift from his mother two Christmases ago.
The sheets were cool when he slid between them. The kind of cool that felt good against skin still warm from the shower, the kind that would turn comfortable in a few minutes once his body heat spread through the fabric.
Carter stared at the ceiling.
The apartment was quiet. The refrigerator hummed its constant low note. His upstairs neighbor had finally turned off the television, leaving nothing but the occasional creak of old building settling into itself. Outside, Asheville continued doing whatever Asheville did on Friday nights. Bars filling up. Restaurants serving overpriced food to tourists. People living their lives in all the messy, complicated ways people lived their lives.
He thought about the shop.
Curious Volumes. The brick facade that had appeared from nowhere. The impossible interior stretching up into shadows. The books that didn't organize themselves by anything as mundane as genre or author. The empty register, the empty stool, the forty dollars he'd left on the counter for a purchase no one had witnessed.
Would it be there tomorrow? If he walked down Patton Avenue in the morning, would he find the same weathered brick and peeling paint and hand-lettered sign? Or would it be gone, replaced by the vacant lot and chain-link fence he remembered, leaving him to wonder if he'd imagined the whole thing?
He thought about the book.
The warmth of the leather under his hands. The way the pages had whispered against each other, waiting. The promise printed on the first page in elegant typeset, sitting there like it expected to be believed.
Write the name of any you desire, and they shall appear to fulfill your wishes and wants.
He'd written a name. Nothing had appeared. The book was just a book, the shop was just a shop, and he was just a guy who'd let a Friday night get away from him in weird directions.
Embarrassing. That was the word. The whole thing was embarrassing, from the moment he'd walked through that door to the moment he'd put pen to paper like a horny teenager making a wish on a star. Like wanting something could make it real. Like the universe gave a damn about what Carter Davis desired.
He'd forget about it by morning. The shop would be a story he told himself sometimes, late at night when sleep wouldn't come. The book would stay in his desk drawer until he eventually threw it out or donated it to Goodwill or just left it there when he moved apartments someday. The name he'd written would fade from the page the same way it would fade from his memory.
None of it mattered.
Carter closed his eyes. His breathing slowed. The sheets warmed around him, comfortable and familiar, and the darkness behind his eyelids was soft and welcoming in the way it always was when he'd decided something didn't deserve his attention anymore.
Sleep came easy. The way it always did when he'd made up his mind.
His last thought before unconsciousness was that Emma Frost would probably find him boring anyway.
Morning came the way it always did in December: gray light filtering through curtains he'd forgotten to close all the way, the radiator clicking as it cycled on, the distant sound of traffic already building on the street below. Carter woke slowly, drifting up through layers of sleep like swimming toward a surface he wasn't entirely sure he wanted to reach.
He was warm. Comfortable in a way that felt different than usual. Better, somehow. Deeper. The kind of warmth that made him want to burrow further into the blankets and let the world handle itself for another hour.
There was weight against his side.
His sleep-fogged brain supplied a lazy explanation. He'd left the heating on too high. Bunched up the blankets in some weird configuration during the night. Maybe he'd pulled the comforter into a pile beside him, the way he sometimes did when he was cold and half-asleep and operating on pure animal instinct.
Then the weight shifted.
Breathed.
Something silky brushed his thigh. Cool fabric, maybe. Or...
A hand, cool and deliberate, settled on his chest.
Carter's eyes snapped open.
The ceiling was the same ceiling he'd stared at a thousand times. Off-white with that water stain in the corner he kept meaning to report to maintenance. The morning light was the same pale gray it always was this time of year. His bedroom smelled like his bedroom: laundry detergent and the faint mustiness of sheets that needed washing and the even fainter trace of the body wash he'd used last night.
Everything was exactly the same.
Except for the woman lying next to him.
She was propped on one elbow, watching him with pale blue eyes that caught the weak light and held it. Short blonde hair, asymmetrical and sharp, fell across her forehead in a way that looked deliberate rather than disheveled. Her skin was fair, porcelain-smooth, with the kind of cool undertone that suggested she'd never seen a tan in her life. High cheekbones. Angular jaw. A face that belonged on a magazine cover, or a runway, or the kind of movie where beautiful people did terrible things to each other in expensive locations.
Blue lipstick.
Who wore blue lipstick to bed? Who wore lipstick to bed at all?
She did. And it looked perfect. Like she'd applied it moments before he opened his eyes, waiting for exactly this reaction.
Her expression was one of fond amusement. Like she'd been lying there for some time, watching him sleep, and found the wait entertaining rather than tedious. Like his confusion was exactly what she'd expected and she was savoring every second of it.
Carter's brain refused to process what he was seeing.
This wasn't real. Couldn't be real. He was still asleep, obviously. Still dreaming, his subconscious serving up images from that ad last night, from the name he'd written in that ridiculous book, from the embarrassment he'd felt before falling asleep. His mind was punishing him. Or rewarding him. He couldn't tell which.
But dreams didn't feel like this.
Dreams didn't have weight. Didn't have texture. Didn't have the specific coolness of fingertips against his bare chest, pressing just firmly enough to feel real. Didn't have the faint scent of something expensive and floral, like white flowers and frost.
Dreams didn't smile at him with blue lips and say: "Good morning, darling."
Her voice was low. Smooth. The kind of voice that expected attention and received it, that made statements instead of requests. A hint of an accent he couldn't quite place. Something that spoke of money, of education, of a world where people said "darling" and meant it as both endearment and dismissal.
Carter opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
She smiled, blue lips curving.
"Good Morning."
Carter's brain crashed and rebooted in the span of two seconds.
The woman was real. She was solid and warm and wearing silk pajamas that probably cost more than his rent. Short shorts that showcased thighs exactly as thick as the game model. A camisole straining against a chest that defied physics. White and cream silk catching the gray morning light like it had been designed specifically for this moment, for lying in his bed, for watching him wake up with eyes that knew exactly what they were doing.
Blue lipstick. Even now. Even in bed.
His gaze caught on movement at the edge of his vision. On his dresser, folded neatly like she'd been here for hours, was a white costume he recognized instantly. The plunging neckline. The high-cut hips. Crystalline shoulder pauldrons catching light that shouldn't exist in his bedroom. Emma Frost's Marvel Rivals outfit, real and tangible and three feet away from him.
His mouth opened. Nothing came out.
She tilted her head, still smiling, and the motion sent her short blonde hair shifting across her forehead. "I was wondering how long you'd stare before you said something."
Her voice was smooth. Cultured. British-adjacent in a way that suggested old money and older expectations. And deeply, thoroughly amused.
Carter's fight-or-flight response finally kicked in.
Flight won.
Carter scrambled backward so fast he forgot where the edge of the bed was.
His shoulder hit air first. Then his hip. Then all of him, tumbling off the mattress in a graceless flail of limbs and panic that would have been embarrassing if his brain had any capacity left for embarrassment. His elbow cracked against the hardwood. The pain was sharp and immediate and very, very real.
He lay there on the cold floor, boxers twisted, breathing hard, staring up at the ceiling he'd stared at a thousand times before. The water stain in the corner. The hairline crack that had been there since he moved in. Everything the same. Everything exactly as it should be.
Except for the woman in his bed.
The mattress creaked above him. Springs shifting. Silk rustling. The soft sound of someone moving closer to the edge.
A face appeared over the side of the bed.
Emma Frost. Still there. Still real. Still impossibly beautiful in a way that made his chest hurt and his brain stutter. Her short blonde hair fell toward him, catching the gray morning light. Her blue eyes looked down at him with an expression of such fond amusement that he felt like a puppy who'd done something accidentally charming.
She propped her chin on one hand. The motion was elegant, deliberate, like she'd practiced it in front of mirrors until it became second nature. Her other arm draped over the edge of the mattress, fingers dangling in empty air.
"Are you alright, darling?"
Her tone suggested she already knew the answer. Her smile suggested she found it delightful.
Carter's elbow throbbed. His hip ached where it had hit the floor. His shoulder was going to bruise. His boxers were twisted in a way that was definitely uncomfortable, and he was lying on his back staring up at a fictional character who was waiting for him to say something coherent.
He opened his mouth.
"Ow," Carter said to the ceiling.
Emma Frost laughed. The sound was warm and genuine, nothing like the cold superiority he would have expected. It filled his small bedroom like she belonged there, like this was exactly how she'd wanted her first morning to begin. Like Quote ReplyReport Reactions:Krivlad, CrazyMike, Bga20 and 365 others
hardwood. The ceiling stared down at him. A face appeared over the edge of the mattress.
Blonde hair. Blue painted lips. Eyes the color of winter sky.
His brain stuttered through explanations like a car failing to start. Intruder. Burglar. Some kind of elaborate prank by someone he didn't know, targeting someone who had nothing worth stealing. Maybe he was still asleep. Maybe he'd had a stroke in the night and this was what dying felt like. A beautiful woman in silk pajamas, watching him with mild concern.
He scrambled backward, feet tangling in the sheets that had followed him down. His shoulder blade caught the corner of his nightstand. Pain shot through him, sharp and real.
Not a dream, then.
"Who are you?" His voice came out higher than he wanted. He found his feet, backing toward the door, hands raised in front of him like that would help. "How did you get in here?"
She didn't move. Didn't flinch. Just watched him with the kind of patient amusement you'd show a puppy chasing its own tail.
"Should I call the police?" He fumbled for his phone on the nightstand, nearly knocking over a half-empty water glass. "I'm going to call the police."
"Darling." The word rolled off her tongue like honey over ice. "If you want to explain to Asheville's finest how a woman materialized in your bedroom overnight, be my guest. I'm certain that conversation will go splendidly for you."
Carter's thumb hovered over the screen. She had a point. A deeply irritating point.
Morning light spilled through the gap in his curtains, catching the silk of her pajamas. They were white, expensive looking, the kind of thing he'd seen in department store windows and immediately looked away from because he couldn't afford to even want them. The fabric draped over curves that his brain refused to process. She was propped on one elbow, casual as anything, like waking up in a stranger's bed was just another Tuesday for her.
His eyes caught on her costume. Folded neatly on his dresser. White and silver with blue accents, exactly like the game. Exactly like the ad.
"You're..." He couldn't finish the sentence. It was too stupid.
"Emma Frost." She tilted her head, a strand of blonde hair falling across her cheek. "You summoned me. Last night. With a book." Her lips curved. "Your own handwriting was quite legible, if a bit hesitant."
"That's insane." The words tumbled out before he could stop them. "Magic books aren't real. That's not how anything works."
Emma's smile sharpened. Something glinted in those pale eyes, like she'd been waiting for him to say exactly that.
"Prove it."
The words came out steadier than he felt. Carter's hand still gripped his phone, knuckles white around the case. His heart hammered against his ribs. His shoulder throbbed where he'd clipped the nightstand. None of this was real. Couldn't be real. But if she was going to sit there in his bed claiming to be a fictional character, she could damn well back it up.
"If you're really Emma Frost. If any of this is actually happening." He swallowed hard. "Prove it."
She tilted her head. Considered him. The motion was unhurried, elegant, like he'd asked her to solve a particularly simple equation and she was deciding whether to show her work.
"Very well."
Her lips didn't move.
The words appeared in his head anyway.
Good morning again, darling.
Not sound. Not exactly. More like thoughts that weren't his, placed there. A presence settling into the space behind his eyes, warm and amused and utterly foreign. Her mental voice carried the same cultured tone as her spoken one, but there was something else beneath it. Something vast. Like hearing a whisper and knowing the speaker could scream if she wanted.
Your mind is remarkably orderly for someone in the middle of a panic attack. I'm almost impressed.
Carter's back hit the wall.
He didn't remember moving. Didn't remember crossing the room. But he was there now, pressed against the paint, as far from the bed as his small bedroom allowed. His hands were shaking. His phone slipped from nerveless fingers and clattered to the floor.
That was inside his head.
She was inside his head.
The presence withdrew, gentle as a tide pulling back from shore. But he could still feel where it had been. Like fingerprints on glass. Like perfume lingering in an empty room.
Emma watched him from the bed. Patient. Amused. Completely at ease, like she hadn't just reached into his skull and rearranged his understanding of reality.
Carter's legs gave out.
He slid down the wall, back scraping against paint, until he was sitting on the cold hardwood with his knees drawn up. His eyes stayed locked on her. Wide. Unblinking. Any remaining denial crumbling to dust.
Carter sat on the floor, back against the wall, processing.
It's real.
The book is real.
He summoned a person. A whole entire person who exists now because he wrote her name down like a horny idiot after watching a video game ad. Because her thighs had done something to his brain and he'd thought, what's the harm, and now there was a telepath in his bed who could reach into his skull whenever she wanted.
His voice came out strangled when he finally spoke.
"I didn't think it was real."
Emma raised an eyebrow but didn't interrupt.
"I was just. Messing around." The words felt inadequate. Pathetic. "There was this shop, and it wasn't there before, and the book was warm, and I thought it was some kind of novelty thing. A joke. I didn't mean to…."
His brain caught up to the implications.
Horror flooded his face.
"Oh god." He pressed his palms against his eyes, like that would help. "Am I a slaver now? Do I own you? Are you here against your will because I wrote your name in a magic book while I was half-asleep and horny?"
The words tumbled out panicked and guilt-stricken, running over each other in their rush to escape. His hands dropped from his face so he could look at her, really look at her, searching for signs of... what? Chains? Resentment? Some indication that he'd done something monstrous without meaning to?
"Did I just commit a crime? A metaphysical crime? Is that a thing? Because I didn't consent to being a person who does crimes, and you definitely didn't consent to being summoned by some random guy who can't even cook himself a real dinner, and this is so fucked up, I am so sorry, I..."
Emma's expression had shifted.
The amusement was still there, but layered beneath it was something softer. Something that might have been surprise. Her head tilted slightly, studying him like he'd done something unexpected.
"You're genuinely distressed about this," she said. Not a question.
"Of course I'm distressed about this!" Carter's voice cracked. "I might have just enslaved someone! That's distressing! That's extremely distressing!"
Her lips curved, but it wasn't the sharp smile from before. This one reached her eyes.
"Most people, given the opportunity to summon someone to fulfill their wishes and wants..." She let the sentence hang there, loaded with implication. "Their first concern is not typically whether they've violated my autonomy."
"Most people are assholes." Carter was already looking around for the book, scanning his bedroom with wild eyes. "Where did I put it? The drawer. I put it in the drawer."
He pushed himself up from the floor, legs unsteady, and crossed to his desk.
"I have to fix this. I have to undo it somehow."
Carter spotted the desk drawer where he'd shoved the book last night.
He lunged for it, nearly tripping over his own feet, yanking the drawer open with enough force to send pens and paperclips scattering across the floor. The burgundy leather sat there exactly where he'd left it, innocent and warm and waiting. His hands closed around it, fingers digging into the cover, and he pulled it free with the kind of desperation usually reserved for drowning men and life preservers.
He was going to destroy it.
Rip it apart. Tear out the pages. Burn the whole thing if he had to. Set it on fire in his bathroom sink and watch the leather curl and blacken until whatever fucked-up binding he'd accidentally created snapped like a rubber band. Whatever it took. Whatever the cost. He'd figure out the smoke detector situation later.
His fingers found the edge of the cover. Started to bend.
Emma was there.
She moved faster than he'd expected. Faster than anyone in silk pajamas should be able to move. One moment she was on the bed, watching him with that unreadable expression. The next she was at his side, her hand closing over his wrist with surprising strength. Cool fingers wrapped around his arm like a vise, not painful but absolutely unyielding.
"Stop."
Her voice was different now. The honey-over-ice smoothness was gone, replaced by something urgent. Something that sounded almost like fear.
"Wait. This isn't what you think."
Carter tried to pull away. Her grip didn't budge.
"Let go." His voice cracked. "I have to fix this. I have to undo whatever I did to you."
"Destroying the book won't free me." Her pale eyes held his, deadly serious. No amusement left. No fond condescension. Just intensity and something that might have been desperation. "It will leave me stranded. Trapped here with no way back to…well wherever i am made from, no anchor, no connection to anything. I'm not a slave, Carter. But I need you to listen to me before you do something we both regret."
Carter froze, the book half-raised, Emma's grip firm on his wrist and her blue eyes deadly serious.
"The book created me," Emma said, words coming fast, her grip still firm on his wrist. "A manifestation. A copy, if you want to be clinical about it. Drawn from every version of me that exists across fiction. Comics. Games. Films. Every interpretation, every iteration, every writer's vision consolidated into something coherent."
Carter's hand trembled around the book. "That doesn't make sense."
"Very little about this makes sense." Her thumb pressed against his pulse point, and he wondered if she could feel how fast his heart was racing. "But I know what I am. I have memories. Knowledge. Abilities." Her lips curved, but there was no humor in it. "I can still reach into your mind and rearrange your thoughts like furniture if I choose. The power is real. I am real."
She released his wrist.
The sudden absence of her touch left his skin cold. Carter didn't lower the book, but he didn't tear it either. Just stood there, caught between action and uncertainty, watching her face for any sign of deception.
Emma stepped back. Gave him space. The motion was deliberate, controlled, like she was trying not to spook a wild animal.
"Cogito ergo sum," she said. Something almost defiant flickered in those pale eyes. "I think, therefore I am. Descartes had the right of it, even if he was insufferably smug about everything else. I exist. I'm standing here. I have thoughts and preferences and the capacity to be genuinely annoyed by your panic, which I assure you is happening right now."
Carter's grip on the book loosened slightly. "But you said you're bound to me."
"Yes."
"That sounds like slavery with extra steps."
Emma's jaw tightened. "It isn't."
"Then what is it?"
She was quiet for a moment. Considering her words with the kind of care that suggested she wasn't used to explaining herself. When she spoke again, her voice had lost some of its edge.
"The binding isn't chains. It's... preference. Priority." She gestured vaguely, searching for the right analogy. "You matter to me because the book made you matter. Your wellbeing. Your desires. Your happiness. These things carry weight in my mind that they wouldn't carry otherwise."
Carter's brow furrowed. "So you're programmed to care about me."
"If you want to be reductive about it, yes." Her tone sharpened. "But I can still think. Still choose. Still refuse. If you asked me to do something I found genuinely repugnant, I would tell you no. Possibly with force, depending on the request."
"But you'd want to say yes."
"I'd be inclined to say yes. There's a difference."
Carter stared at her. The book hung heavy in his hands, leather warm against his palms. She looked sincere. Sounded sincere. But how was he supposed to know? How was anyone supposed to know anything about a situation this fundamentally insane?
"How do I know you're not just saying what the book wants you to say?"
The question came out harder than he intended. More accusatory. But he couldn't help it. The possibility gnawed at him. That this whole explanation was just another layer of the trap. That she believed every word because the book had made her believe it, and he was supposed to accept her assurances when those assurances might be manufactured specifically to make him accept them.
Emma went very still.
"I beg your pardon?"
"The book made you. The book bound you to me. The book gave you memories and knowledge and..." He waved his free hand vaguely. "Everything. So how am I supposed to trust anything you tell me about the book? Maybe you think you have free will. Maybe you think you can refuse. But if the book designed you to think that, you'd never know the difference."
Her expression didn't change. Not exactly. But something behind her eyes went cold.
"You're suggesting I'm incapable of knowing my own mind."
"I'm suggesting neither of us can be sure." Carter's voice cracked slightly. "And one of us is a telepath who could theoretically make me believe anything she wanted, so forgive me if I'm having trouble taking your word for it."
Emma's eyes flashed with the first hint of genuine irritation, and Carter realized he might have touched a nerve.
Emma released his wrist and stepped back, arms crossing under her considerable chest in a way that was probably unconscious but still distracting. Carter's eyes flickered down for half a second before he forced them back to her face. She noticed. Of course she noticed.
"I'm not some mind-slave puppet," she said flatly. The cultured smoothness was gone from her voice, replaced by something harder. "I have opinions. I have preferences. I find your panic endearing, but your assumption that I can't think for myself is insulting."
She drew herself up to her full height. Even barefoot, in silk pajamas, she was nearly as tall as him. The effect was intimidating in a way that had nothing to do with her powers.
"I'm Emma Frost. I've led corporations. Manipulated world leaders. Stood against gods and come out the other side with my mind intact." Her pale eyes held his, cold and certain. "The idea that a book could reduce me to a wind-up doll is frankly offensive."
Carter held up his hands defensively. "Okay. Okay, point taken. I'm sorry."
But he didn't lower the book. Couldn't quite make himself let go of it yet.
"It's just..." He ran his free hand through his hair, tugging at it in frustration. "Look at you. Look at me. You're..." He gestured vaguely at all of her. The cheekbones. The curves. The way she carried herself like the room existed for her convenience. "And I'm a guy who works IT support and eats leftover pasta for dinner. I know myself. There's no version of reality where someone like you would be remotely interested in someone like me."
Emma's expression flickered. Something complicated passed behind her eyes.
"This has to be the book," Carter continued, the words spilling out faster now. "All of this. The binding, the... the inclination you mentioned. Despite everything you're saying about being able to refuse, about having choices..." He swallowed hard. "I don't believe you actually can."
Her jaw tightened.
"Can you?" He pressed forward, needing to know. Dreading the answer. "Can you actually say no to me? If I asked you to do something you didn't want to do, could you actually refuse?"
Emma went silent, her gaze sliding away from his, and Carter's stomach dropped.
The silence stretched between them like a held breath.
Emma's jaw tightened. Her arms stayed crossed, but some of the rigid certainty had drained from her posture. When she finally spoke, her voice was quieter. Less certain.
"I don't know."
The admission seemed to cost her something. Carter watched her struggle with it, watched the imperious mask slip just enough to show something human underneath.
"If you gave me a direct command..." She paused, choosing her words carefully. "I don't know if I could outright refuse. The binding is... strong. Stronger than I'd like to admit." Her gaze dropped to the floor. "But I could argue. Negotiate. Make my displeasure extremely clear if you tried to force me into something I hated. I'm not a robot following programming. I'm a person who happens to have a very strong preference for your happiness."
She looked back at him.
Something vulnerable flickered in her expression. Something that didn't match the imperious woman from moments ago, the one who'd talked about manipulating world leaders and standing against gods. This was someone uncertain. Someone exposed. Someone who'd just admitted a weakness she clearly despised having.
"I read your mind the moment I came into existence."
Carter's stomach lurched. "You what?"
"I'm a telepath, darling. It's what I do." The endearment sounded different now. Softer. "I know who you are. I know what you think of yourself. I know about the stories you've heard from female friends about men who hurt them, and how those stories made you build walls. I know you would rather have your head chopped off than own a person."
She took a step toward him. Just one. Careful. Like approaching something fragile.
"You're not the type to abuse this. That's not who you are." Her pale eyes held his, steady and certain despite everything else she'd just admitted being uncertain about. "That's why I'm not afraid."
Carter absorbed this.
His grip on the book loosened slightly. The leather was still warm under his palms, still impossible, still the source of everything wrong with this morning. But her words settled into him like stones into water, sinking through the panic to land somewhere deeper.
She'd seen inside his head. Seen the parts of himself he didn't show anyone. The fear of becoming something he despised. The careful, deliberate choice to be decent even when no one was watching.
She wasn't afraid because she knew him better than anyone alive.
And that...
That almost made it worse.
"That's not good enough," Carter said.
Emma's expression flickered. "What?"
"'Probably won't abuse it' isn't the same as 'can't.'" His voice came out steadier than he felt. "You're asking me to trust myself. To believe I'll never have a bad day, never get angry, never say something in a moment I'd regret forever. You're asking me to bet your entire existence on my self-control."
His hands tightened on the book again.
"I'm not that confident in myself. I'm really, really not."
Emma's eyes widened. "Carter, wait..."
His fingers found the edge of the cover. Started to pull.
Emma moved.
One moment she was standing across from him, arms crossed, watching his fingers find the cover's edge. The next her hands were on his face, palms cool against his cheeks, and the world tilted.
Soft. Warm. The scent of expensive perfume flooding his senses, white florals and something cool underneath. Silk against his skin. His face pressed into something yielding and impossible, his nose buried in fabric that cost more than his rent.
Carter's brain short-circuited.
She'd pulled him directly into her chest. Into her very large, very soft, silk-covered chest. His mouth opened to protest and got a mouthful of camisole for his trouble. The sound that came out was less "objection" and more "mmmphhh."
"There we are." Her voice came from somewhere above him, smooth and insufferably smug. Her fingers threaded through his hair, holding the back of his head with surprising strength. Not painful. Just absolutely, completely immovable. "Much better."
Carter's hands flailed. The book was still in his grip, leather warm against his palm, but he couldn't get leverage. Couldn't pull away. Couldn't do anything but stand there with his face buried in the most distracting prison cell imaginable.
He tried to speak. The words came out muffled, incomprehensible, lost somewhere in the valley between her breasts.
"What was that, darling?" Emma's thumb traced a lazy circle against his scalp. "I'm afraid I couldn't quite make that out."
More muffled protests. His hands found her waist, pushed. She didn't budge. He might as well have been pushing against a wall. A warm, silk-covered, impossibly soft wall that smelled like heaven and was currently suffocating him in the most confusing way possible.
"I'll release you when you calm down." Her tone was the verbal equivalent of a cat that had knocked something off a shelf and felt no remorse whatsoever. "Until then, you can stay right there and think about what you're doing."
Carter made another sound. It might have been an argument. It might have been a surrender. He honestly couldn't tell anymore.
His lungs burned. Not from lack of oxygen, exactly. She wasn't actually suffocating him. There was air, technically, filtering in around the edges. But every breath brought more of her scent, more awareness of exactly where his face was, more of his higher brain functions shutting down one by one like lights going out in an office building at closing time.
He could feel her heartbeat. Steady and calm, completely unruffled, while his own hammered against his ribs like it was trying to escape. The silk was impossibly smooth against his cheek. Warm from her body heat. He was going to die here. He was going to die with his face in Emma Frost's cleavage and his obituary was going to be deeply, profoundly embarrassing.
"Your heart rate is still elevated." Her fingers kept up that maddening pattern against his scalp. "Deep breaths, darling. In through the nose. Well. As best you can manage given the circumstances."
A noise escaped him. Somewhere between a groan and a whimper.
"Better. You're learning."
The fight drained out of him in stages. First his arms stopped pushing. Then his shoulders dropped. Then his grip on the book loosened, fingers going slack around the leather binding.
Emma's hand left his hair. He felt her reach down, felt the book slide free from his unresisting grip, and couldn't even bring himself to protest.
"There's a good boy."
Emma kept him there for another few seconds. Just long enough to make her point. Long enough for the fight to drain completely out of his limbs, for his breathing to slow, for the panic to recede into something more manageable. Then her grip loosened, and she released him.
Carter stumbled backward. His shoulder blades hit the wall. His lungs burned as he gasped for air that didn't smell like expensive perfume and warm skin, that didn't carry traces of her with every inhale. His face felt like it was on fire. He could still feel the phantom pressure of silk against his cheeks, the impossible softness, the steady rhythm of her heartbeat.
Emma stood across from him, the book tucked against her side like a clutch purse. Her expression was serene. Satisfied. The kind of look a chess player wore after a particularly elegant checkmate.
"Better?" she asked.
Carter opened his mouth. Closed it. Opened it again.
"You..." He couldn't finish the sentence. His brain was still rebooting, scattered across too many conflicting signals to form coherent thought.
"Smothered you with my bosom, yes." She said it like she was confirming the weather. Partly cloudy with a chance of suffocation. "An effective technique for interrupting self-destructive spirals. I've found it works on most people."
"Most people?"
"The ones attracted to women, certainly." Her lips curved. "And a surprising number who aren't. Context is everything."
Carter's hand went to his chest, pressing against his sternum like he could slow his heartbeat through sheer force of will. His skin still tingled where she'd touched him. His scalp remembered her fingers threading through his hair, the gentle pressure, the way she'd held him in place without effort.
He was standing in his bedroom in his boxers, face flushed, hair disheveled, having just been forcibly calmed down by a fictional character's cleavage.
This was his life now.
Emma smoothed a nonexistent wrinkle from her camisole. The motion drew his eyes to her chest again before he could stop himself. She noticed. Of course she noticed. Her smile sharpened.
"We're going to have a civilized conversation about this," she said. Not a suggestion. A statement of fact. "No destroying ancient magical artifacts in a panic. No ethical spirals before breakfast." She tilted her head, studying him with those blue eyes. "I'm here. I'm real. I'm not going anywhere."
She let that sink in for a moment. Then her expression softened slightly, some of the imperious edge giving way to something almost warm.
"The least you can do is offer me coffee before we discuss the metaphysical implications of my existence."
Carter stared at her.
His bedroom was small. Ten feet by twelve, maybe. Barely enough room for the bed, the dresser, the desk where he'd shoved the book last night thinking it was a joke. Morning light filtered through the curtains, gray and ordinary, illuminating a scene that was anything but.
Emma Frost stood in his bedroom. Holding a magic book. Wearing silk pajamas. Asking for coffee.
His brain tried to process this. Failed. Tried again.
"Coffee," he repeated.
"Yes. The caffeinated beverage. I assume you have some?" Her nose wrinkled slightly. "Or is that beyond the capabilities of someone who eats leftover pasta for dinner?"
The jab landed, but without real heat. Almost teasing. Like she was testing the waters, seeing how much she could push before he pushed back.
Carter's mouth worked soundlessly for a moment.
"I have coffee," he managed.
"Wonderful." Emma smiled, blue lips curving in a way that did complicated things to his nervous system. "Then let's adjourn to wherever you keep it, and you can tell me everything you know about that shop you found. Because I have questions, darling, and I suspect you have very few answers."
She swept past him toward the door, silk whispering against her thighs, the book tucked securely under her arm. She moved like she owned the apartment. Like she owned everything. Like his small bedroom was just another space that existed for her convenience.
Carter watched her go.
His legs didn't want to follow. His brain didn't want to engage with any of this. But his feet moved anyway, carrying him after her, out of the bedroom and into the short hallway that led to his living space.
She paused at the threshold, surveying his apartment with the kind of expression usually reserved for real estate agents assessing a fixer-upper. The couch where he'd eaten his pasta last night. The laptop on the coffee table, still open to whatever video he'd fallen asleep to. The kitchen area with its modest appliances and the ceramic bowl by the door where his keys sat, blue glaze catching the morning light.
"Cozy," she said.
It wasn't a compliment.
Carter wondered, somewhat hysterically, how his Saturday had gone from leftover pasta plans to being smothered by a telepathic supermodel before he'd even brushed his teeth. Like Quote ReplyReport Reactions:Krivlad, Cerevox, crystalwatcher and 325 others