Chapter 20

James stayed in Sebastian's bed that night. He figured he'd sleep soundly until at least nine after the long day and the best sex he'd ever had, but something woke him while it was still dark.

He blinked up at the ceiling. The fire's glow had died down, allowing deeper shadows to overtake the room. He smiled. How could he be in such a dire situation and still grin like a fool? Well, Sebastian, that was how.

He'd had a crush on Sebastian before, had been seduced by the mystery of the man and enticed by the temptation he offered, but the Sebastian he'd gotten to know was someone he could fall in love with. The more he learned about Sebastian, the harder he fell for him. James couldn't pretend his feelings were surface-level attraction, not when he loved spending time with Sebastian in the kitchen or garden as much as he enjoyed their time in bed.

James wouldn't have been open to tumbling down such a love-sick path under normal circumstances. He had reasons for avoiding these kinds of attachments, but stuck at Storm House, it felt like he and Sebastian existed in a bubble where the rest of his troubles didn't matter. He didn't have to worry about Sebastian leaving. He didn't have to worry about their lives not fitting together or growing apart and losing another person he loved.

If they never escaped Storm House, they would always have each other, and while James didn't want to be trapped, he was glad it canceled out some of his fears of abandonment and made Sebastian easier to reach for.

Maybe James was being reckless, and this would all blow up in his face. There were still a million ways he could get hurt, but it was hard to care while lying naked in bed with Sebastian. He refused to regret letting his feelings grow, no matter what happened.

Beside him, Sebastian stirred. "James?" His name came out in a barely audible whisper, delicate, and not just through an effort to be quiet, almost like Sebastian hoped it would go unheard but couldn't help calling out.

"I'm here," James murmured back, rolling onto his side to see Sebastian looking at the ceiling.

His gaze flicked to James and then away. "Sorry, didn't mean to wake you."

"It's okay." James scooted closer, reaching out and putting an arm around Sebastian.

Sebastian stiffened on contact, then melted into James's embrace, snuggling tighter against him. James pulled Sebastian in, positioning him as the little spoon.

Neither of them said anything. James could have asked Sebastian if he was okay, but honestly, how could he be? Sebastian had been alone for years. He had to be touch starved. Hell, he had to be starved for any affection or companionship. There was no way what was happening between them wasn't overwhelming for Sebastian on some level.

It was overwhelming for James, and he hadn't been cut off from the world. Even if he thought he understood, he didn't want to push Sebastian to talk. They had a lot to deal with, and James needed to allow Sebastian space, even if he suspected Sebastian's whisper in the dark might have been a request for comfort.

James could give comfort just like this. He held Sebastian close, kissed his neck below his ear, and ran his hands up and down Sebastian's arms. James could make Sebastian feel cared for and treasured even if he wasn't ready to voice his growing feelings.

"I like this," Sebastian whispered after a while, again sounding soft and worlds away from the cocky man who'd declared he'd seduce James as if it were a sport.

"I like it too," James whispered back, and they fell asleep tangled together.

They woke up to pouring rain and clouds dark enough for shades to be peering in the bathroom window after the sun had risen.

"We won't be in the garden today," Sebastian said as they shaved together at the sink.

James rinsed his borrowed razor. "I wish they'd stop looking in on us. Makes me wonder what they're thinking."

The shade at the window swooped to the skylight to get a different perspective on the scene in the bathroom. It tapped the glass.

"I think they're just bitter they can't get inside." Sebastian patted his face dry. He stretched, naked aside from the towel slung low on his hips. "Oh yeah, I can feel it."

"Feel what?" James eyed him through the mirror, knowing he was doomed when an evil look blossomed on Sebastian's fine-featured face.

"How well you fucked me last night."

"Ah." James cleared his throat and looked down, rinsing his already clean razor and trying to hide his satisfied smile.

Sebastian slapped his ass, the sound muffled by the towel James wore. "Hurry up, we need to feed the chickens. You've made their breakfast late and should probably apologize."

James borrowed underwear from Sebastian, and they got dressed. He'd have grabbed a T-shirt too, but the skin-tight look wasn't his thing, so he ducked back to his room for a dated button-up.

In the hall, Sebastian took James's face in his hands and kissed him. He ran a delicate finger over James's bruised nose. "Does it still hurt?"

"Not so much." His black eye was looking better too.

"Good." Sebastian trailed a finger along James's brow. "We'll have to be more careful with you." Sebastian released him and turned toward the stairs, leaving James to follow, his heart aching at Sebastian's tenderness.

He wasn't quite comfortable with the feeling.

James looked after everyone. It was who he was. His urge to protect and care was especially strong with Sebastian, but he always resisted letting others take care of him in return. Accepting that kind of support only meant it hurt more when those people were taken from his life. James hadn't let himself lean on anyone since his grandmother had died, and he was fine taking care of himself. It wasn't something he was looking to change. He wanted to be there for Sebastian, not pass off his troubles to a man already suffering from years alone.

After feeding the chickens and opening the barn for Miss Moo, Sebastian started the fire in the kitchen. Apparently, it was time to make more bread, so he got going on that while James made coffee, the two of them seamlessly working around each other.

James couldn't help reaching out and touching Sebastian's lower back as he maneuvered behind him or brushing their arms together when they were near. Sebastian returned each brush of affection with one of his own, almost like he'd been waiting for James to give him permission to touch him more. It was different from the way Sebastian had steered James around the kitchen the day before. That had been playful but purposeful. This was indulgent. Small, barely-there connections rather than bold moves full of wicked promises.

It was something James could get used to.

Once the dough was set aside for its first round of proofing, Sebastian disappeared, returning with a battered notebook.

"Here." He handed it to James, who was sitting at the table with a second coffee and an apple. "It's my notes on the transfer spell. Start at the bookmark, but please don't read anything else in there, okay?"

"Of course." James set the book beside his coffee. "I had a journal too. I wouldn't want anyone looking at it."

Sebastian crossed his arms like he was uncomfortable but trying to hide it. "You had a journal?"

"I started it when my parents died." The grief counselor had suggested it. Writing out his thoughts had helped at the time, but James had no desire to ever look back at them.

Sebastian squeezed James's shoulder, a tender look softening his features. Then he turned away to stoke the fire. James cleared his throat, pushing away a strange wave of emotion with a hearty sip of coffee, and opened the notebook.

There was no date at the top of the passage. The messy writing went straight into an incantation with no context. Some of the words had been crossed out and replaced with others, like Sebastian hadn't been sure of the exact phrases used. Even so, it was more detailed than James had imagined.

The spell required blood from the cursed person and the one who was meant to take over. It wasn't phrased that way since Sebastian hadn't known what the spell was doing, but hindsight made it clear. Kira's blood had been taken first, then Sebastian's had been mixed with it as a spell was cast to shift magic from Kira's blood to her brother's. The mixed blood was then used to write symbols on Sebastian's forehead—which he'd drawn in the notebook—before a second incantation was used while bleeding Sebastian again to allow the transferred magic to enter his body.

At the conclusion of the incantation, Sebastian wrote there was a surge of power and a loud blast that knocked everyone to the ground and made his ears ring. James imagined the ordeal would have been horrifying for a twelve-year-old.

The last thing Sebastian had written was a question. Why did they have to give some of Kira's magic to me but not the other way around? I never get anything she doesn't.

James clenched a fist. Sebastian's mother had a lot to answer for regarding her son, but that wasn't for him to deal with, at least not before getting away from Storm House.

The account was good but not perfect. The wording wasn't inconsequential, and using the wrong phrases could screw the whole thing up. The power surge was concerning as well. It seemed dangerous. James wasn't sure if he'd agree to try the spell without Selma's proper instructions. Though he might if he got desperate enough.

He'd only been here a few days. What would he be willing to do when he'd been stuck at the house for a month? A year? He couldn't think about it. At the thought of his imprisonment never ending, anxiety like he hadn't felt since walking into the invisible barrier gripped his chest.

"It's hard to tell how much power we'll need for this," James said, pushing his fear away and getting himself under control.

Sebastian had been sipping his coffee at the counter, watching James as he read with more distance between them than they'd had all day. He set his cup aside. "I don't think Mom and Stephen had any more power than you and I do combined. Stephen's power was on par with mine, and Mom is good, but not off the charts or anything."

It sounded promising. At least both Storms hadn't been exceptionally powerful. James closed Sebastian's notebook. "I'd still like to double-check the amount of energy needed through theory, using the concepts the transfer is based around. Unless you don't have those kind of books here?"

"No, I do." Sebastian retrieved his notebook from the table. "Let's head up to the library. Then we might as well search the study."

It was a long day. James researched magical theory while Sebastian started searching the study. After a few hours of reading, James was confident they'd have the energy needed for the spell. It didn't require much more than the unbinding had. Someone with an ability like Parker's could have pulled it off on their own.

With that in mind, the energy surge Sebastian described in his journal didn't quite fit. A blast like that sounded like more power than the transfer spell used, so where had it come from, and why had it reacted explosively? At least it had done nothing more than knock everyone over. Maybe it hadn't been as intense as the young Sebastian's account made it seem.

James joined Sebastian in the study, where he received a briefing on what had already been searched. He settled into the desk chair as directed, trying to ignore the shade knocking on the window.

"I'm surprised Eli hasn't come back yet," James said after he'd relayed what he'd learned.

Sebastian didn't look up from the folders he was searching through. "Yeah, sometimes you think people will come back, and then they don't."

James's gut twisted. Whenever he thought he understood how lonely Sebastian must have been here, he was hit with something that made him realize he had no clue. He could have compassion for Sebastian's circumstances but would never know what it had been like, not even close.

James wondered if Sebastian would be as interested in him if he hadn't been the first person to spend time with Sebastian in six years. He wanted to say yes, of course, Sebastian liked him for who he was, for more than his body, but he wasn't sure. How different would things be if they weren't in an isolated situation? Would Sebastian have chosen to sleep with James if he had other options? Did he want James specifically, or was he just desperate for companionship? After so long, Sebastian seizing whatever came within reach was understandable, and James wouldn't hold it against him.

James might never know how the truth shook out and wasn't sure it mattered if they ended up trapped together forever. He'd only find out if they got free.

Would Sebastian want to stay with him in Moonlight Falls and be his boyfriend after they escaped? Or would he leave and not look back?

James hoped Sebastian wouldn't leave him behind. He found himself imagining what the two of them could have if they escaped the house and Sebastian freely chose him. The possibility filled James with enough longing to make his heart burst.

James forced himself to concentrate on the lawyer letters he was looking through. There was never any doubt he wanted to escape Storm House, but now that it felt like the life he'd always wanted—the life with a partner he'd feared reaching for but could never stop dreaming about—was laying just out of reach, he had to get out. He had to know if Sebastian would choose him when all this was behind them.

"Maybe Eli is giving you space," Sebastian said. James had thought they'd moved past his comment but was glad for the reassurance. "If he thinks you're just indulging in a new fling and having a little irresponsible rebellion, he might be trying to give you time to get it out of your system."

James frowned. He hated that Sebastian had referred to himself as a fling. He was so much more than that to James. "None of that is something I would do. Eli should know that."

Sebastian shrugged.

After a while, Sebastian left the study to knead the dough and set it to rise one last time. He disappeared again later to put it in the oven and when it was done, returned with fresh slices for lunch.

Several hours after the bread was eaten, they deemed the study search complete, neither surprised to be emptyhanded.

"Should we look in here?" James gestured to the upstairs sitting room as they headed toward the stairs.

Sebastian had their empty lunch plates and was about to go down to the kitchen. "Might as well." He turned around and followed James through the archway, into the room.

The place was dusty. Everything looked incredibly dated, but not all from the same era. It was like the fifties had crashed into the eighties.

Sebastian set the plates on a mostly empty bookshelf. "I don't come in here much. I prefer the sunroom and the sitting area in my bedroom. This house is too damn big."

James wasn't arguing with that. "Have you searched here before?"

Sebastian picked up a stack of old magazines and began flipping through them. "Just a quick glance in the drawers and on the shelves. I'd given up by then."

They got to it, sneezing from the dust as they methodically picked through every single item in the room.

"I'm going to get some water," James said after a dust-induced coughing fit.

Sebastian waved in acknowledgment, not looking up from a notebook he'd found.

James took his time filling a water bottle in the kitchen, then chugged the contents before having another piece of bread. Eventually, he went back upstairs, bottle refilled to share with Sebastian.

He re-entered the sitting room to find Sebastian standing in the middle of the room, tension pulling every muscle in his body taut as he read an old newspaper. The paper was yellow and discolored unevenly like it had been left folded for years. Sebastian's grip crumpled the edges beneath his fingers.

James took a step closer. "Find anything?"

Sebastian jumped at the question like he hadn't heard James's return. He gave James a wide-eyed stare before his attention drifted back to the newspaper, emotion flashing across his face too quick for James to decipher. "I found this tucked inside." He held out an aged piece of paper covered in tiny writing.

James rushed forward to grab it. A quick scan of the first scribbles was all he needed to see. "You found it!" Intense relief washed over him, making him lightheaded. James's mind raced as his confidence in their plan solidified.

"I can't believe it was here." Sebastian folded the newspaper closed and tucked it into a magazine rack next to the sofa. "It was just left inside the paper, sitting right there with all these nineties cooking magazines."

"What a weird place to put it." James glared at the magazine rack like it had planned this whole debacle itself.

Sebastian didn't comment. James thought he'd be annoyed at his relatives. Tucking the spell into a random newspaper was careless. The paper hadn't been clipped for articles, even though it was a copy of the Apple Valley Times, so it must not have been an important issue. What if it had been thrown out and the spell lost forever!

"When's the paper from?" James asked, reaching for it.

"A few days after Mom and Stephen did the ritual." Sebastian grabbed James's outstretched hand and pulled him close.

James found himself wrapped in a bone-crushing hug. He was bewildered but accepted the affection, embracing Sebastian in return and planting a kiss on his cheek. "This is so great. I can't believe we found it."

"Me either." Sebastian didn't let go. "We can do the spell. We could get out of here."

James pulled back enough to inspect Sebastian. His eyes were framed with fine, sad lines, his lips pressed tight, a slight frown tugging them downward. Maybe he was afraid to hope too much, or maybe it was overwhelming to be this close to a solution after so long.

"This is good," James said again, hoping to reassure Sebastian. "It's the best we could have hoped for." But he found himself longing for so much more, a life where Sebastian chose him, even when he was free and had the world at his fingertips.

James promised himself—if they got out of there—he wouldn't let his fear of losing loved ones come between him and Sebastian. He would take this chance Storm House had given him. He could face anything after this, especially if it gave him a future with a man as strong and wonderful as Sebastian.