Completely Smitten by Kristine Grayson Page A

out where he had gone.
    She did a cursory search of the main level of the house. She found another room beside hers, set up with reading lamps and big comfortable chairs. Books were piled everywhere, along with CDs, record albums, and forty-fives. A tiny shelf system with a five-disk changer sat on top of a console stereo from the 1950s. Beside that was an ancient hand-crank record player that looked as if it were still being used.
    The room had no obvious plug-ins, yet all this equipment seemed to be here for someone’s enjoyment. She thought that odd.
    A door beside this room led up a flight of stairs. The house was old enough, then, to have doors that cut off entire sections to preserve heat. Or maybe that remained a convention in this part of Idaho since there was no power up here. No sense heating an entire house when one section would do.
    At first, she had no idea how to get up the stairs. Then she realized she could do it. She would just have to be careful. First, she’d try it with her crutches, and if that didn’t work, she would sit on the steps and pull herself up with her arms.
    She smiled. That would certainly impress Darius.
    As if she expected him to be upstairs. If he was up there, he was hiding from her—and after finding that note, she knew he wasn’t. He was somewhere else. But she might be able to tell where he’d gone from something he’d left upstairs.
    At least, that was what she told herself. Truth be told, she wanted to see where he slept, to know more about him.
    She made her way up the stairs carefully. It was harder than she thought, mostly because the crutches got in her way. When she reached the landing, she tossed them up the remaining stairs, and then, holding the banister, hopped to the second floor.
    The second floor was smaller than the first. In fact, the ceiling slanted on the north and south sides, obviously following the roof lines.
    There was a large room directly across from the stairs, and another large room at the end of a short hallway. Two smaller doors led to under-the-eaves storage, filled with more junk than she had ever seen.
    Darius wasn’t up here at all.
    She couldn’t even tell which room was his. Both had beds in them, and both beds were made. There were no suitcases or anything out of place. Everything was hung in closets. The bedside tables all had books with bookmarks in them.
    The second story smelled faintly of mothballs mixed with the scent of freshly baked bread. She went to the windows and looked out.
    The runway was visible from here. It was long and flat, a scar on the land. Behind it was a huge garage with cars inside that looked as old as the hand-crank record player.
    Otherwise the entire house was surrounded by trees.
    She saw no sign of Darius. None at all.
    For a long time, she stood at the window, staring at the runway. She couldn’t go outside looking for him. She had no idea where he’d gone or how he’d gotten there. She could negotiate stairs with a broken ankle, but not the uneven trail or the cliffside.
    Maybe he’d change his mind. Maybe the circumstances would change and he’d be able to come back.
    Maybe the pilot wouldn’t be able to pick her up.
    Her stomach growled.
    Ariel sighed and made her careful way down the stairs. When she reached the living area, she stopped.
    The eggs were still steaming.
    How in the world had he managed that?
    Darius sat on the hillside where he had been when he first saw Ariel. He probably should have popped himself to Boise or New Delhi, somewhere very far away, so that he wouldn’t be tempted to see her again.
    But he hadn’t. He couldn’t. He didn’t want to be far in case something else went wrong.
    He’d been awake all night thinking about her, about the soft auburn of her hair, the way her cheeks dimpled when she laughed.
    About the evidence of a soul mate he’d seen in her lovely green eyes.
    He wished he were younger, a mage who hadn’t learned his lessons yet, or one who had no