Chapter 1

The hotel, with all its gleam and glam, was just that: gleam and glam. There were so many fabulous people walking about and the overwhelming shock and awe laced through every wall and trim sort of distracted me from any and all sensitive clairvoyant feelings.

Thus, I had little to report to Naru as he drove us in Lin's car to the airport, where we were to be picking up his parents. They would be staying with him and Lin for the two week visit. I almost shouted at Naru again for the short warning when he informed me that, while his mother spoke excellent Japanese (she had wanted to know what him and Gene were muttering to each other all the time, after all), his father had never been able to catch on. While brilliant in the areas of paranormal psychology and psychic research, languages weren't his forte.

I could have practiced my English. Gah, I suck at English. Reading and writing it is fine, but saying those words? Ugh, they're all in the front of the mouth till you feel like your howling all the time. And then the pronunciation rules? There were no rules! Kind of came in the realm of having French words mixed and shaken with German grammar. Stupid Germans having their stupid affair with stupid France and making stupid English.

Before I was ready—damn Naru—I was standing in an airport terminal, not unlike the one I had bowled into to catch a Gene-possessed-Naru, and facing two very English looking strangers. It didn't help that Naru's mother even had the big blue eyes and blond hair. On the other hand, his father was all dark and corners, complete with a furry, bearded face and black eyes like glittering stones beneath bushy eyebrows.

Naru cleared his throat. "Mai, let me intro—"

"Oliver!" shrieked his mother in complete ecstasy, attracting more than several stares in the airport. Before Naru could react she flung herself onto his neck and started showering him with loud kisses. It would have been less funny if Naru didn't stay completely taciturn and solid beneath the onslaught, as though she were doing no more than shaking his hand.

"How dare you spend so long in Japan without even a visit! Have you no idea what you did to my poor mommy nerves?"

"I visited for a whole month last summer."

"Last summer! At least now I know you were torturing me for a good reason." She paused in her glomping of Naru's head to zoom in on me.

I instinctually seized up. For a brief, horrifying minute I thought she was about to scold me for snickering.

But just as quickly as she had come upon Naru, she was before me, taking up my hands and gazing into my eyes.

"You're Mai, right? Little Mai-chan?"

Did he call me that to his mom? No way. "Uh…yes?"

Her face broke into sunshine. "Oh my gosh, you're adorable!"

And then I was being squeezed too. Fortunately for me, she must have had some sense for personal space, as she quickly let go and gave me some distance. The smile wilted a bit with a touch of solemnity, and for the first time she appeared the forty or odd some years she was.

"Will you be mine?"

For a moment, I just stared at her, stunned by the sudden embrace and exuberance. A thought in my head worried that she would be the type to love anyone and then forget about them as she bounced to the next, but the sudden, painful apprehension in her eyes that brought the lines to her face and mouth banished that idea. Instead I saw a woman who had had the heart to adopt to very strange boys, and who had recently had to bury one.

My eyes filled up with tears.

Naru and his father turned alarmed and reached out for his mother, who suddenly looked devastated.

"Oh, I'm so sorry!" she said.

"Mother—" started Naru.

"Can I?"

They all stopped. His mother had her hands to her mouth.

Suddenly feeling very silly and very dramatic, I blinked hard to rid the water from my eyes and tried to laugh it off, which, of course, came out nervous and stupid sounding. I wanted to melt into the floor—turn into puddy, or even better, be chopped up by an axe and made into mud so I'd disappear entirely. Aw gosh, my first meeting with Naru's parents, and I'd put them all on end suddenly tearing up like that and acting like a complete sensitive weirdo—

Her hands wrapped about mine, dry but soft as a baby's blanket and warm.

"In that case, I'm sorry, but you're not going anywhere. You have to marry my Noll. No escapes."

Hot in the face, but jittery and light, I peeked up to meet her smiling blue eyes and couldn't help but smile as well.

"Well," Naru took back his hands, looking a bit flushed himself. "Guess that works. And if you haven't noticed him, this is my father."

His mother practically flew from me to push forward Mr. Davis, who smiled awkwardly and stood before me like the big rectangle man he was in his grey suit and beard. But, as I shook his hand, I got the impression that he was just as nervous as I was. He probably was afraid of scaring away the girl Naru had finally found that would put up with him.

Even though it was seven in the evening by the time we made it out to the car, Naru's mother insisted on dropping by one of those late-night ramen shops, where she bounced between embarrassing displays of affection for Naru (kisses, hugging his arm, ruffling his hair, gushing about how cute he was, all of which he bore with the same straight faced dignity), slurping the ramen, and asking me questions on everything from my favorite food to my shoe size.

When I mentioned I loved mysteries and the show Sherlock, she let loose a girlish squeal.

"Benedict is a comely man, but then he gets into the role and starts talking—oh, Oliver, dear, why can't you talk like that? You are some sort of detective, right?"

I had to laugh at that. Like copy and paste, she had wondered the same thing I did almost word for word.

By the time she finally let Naru go to take me home, I was half-asleep, though deliriously pleased with my day. I didn't even notice I had dozed off until the summer air brushed past my face with the creaking night noises and Naru's arms slipped under my knees and around my shoulders. I almost woke up then to insist I could walk, but then he lifted me to his warm chest and I got a great lungful of his tea and sage smell. If there was anything in the world that had been out of place before then, the smell of my boy put it right. Nothing could be wrong when he held me so close.

Course, my locked door had to put a stop to that, and he nudged me enough out of my sleepy doze to wriggle my key into the doorknob and push it open. He made to leave once the door was open, but my arms (probably drugged by the wonderful haven they had been in while being carried), drunkenly winded themselves about his arm. Too sleepy to come up with a good excuse for what I had done, or even what to do now that I had a Naru's arm captive, I just slumped into him and nuzzled my face against his neck.

"I love you," I mumbled. "I loveayou loveayou. Mmmph."

His breath ghosted across my forehead and I received the pleasure of hearing his quiet laugh—one of his real, happy laughs, which were as rare as blue moons.

"You're going to need to let go of my arm to go to bed."

"But I wanna taaaalk."

He didn't point out that I had barely the consciousness to do that, as he usually would. Instead, he said, "About what?"

"Your mom and dad." I gave a happy sigh. "They're so nice."

I could feel his smile against my hair as he pushed open the door to my apartment and led me in.

"Trust me, my mom isn't like that towards everyone. She's actually pretty non-touchy—with anything that's not her husband or children…or like unto it. I think if my father hadn't been there to remind her of her limits she might have adopted the whole orphanage. I'm pretty sure she saw you as another one of those children, eighteen or not."

"That's a gift," I mumbled, and it was. Not everyone could love a child that wasn't their own so unconditionally. My Naru arm was trying to escape my grasp, but I didn't let it. It was dark in my house. He sighed, and I thought he'd push me off, but then I heard the slide of my closet and knew my futon was nigh. Within minutes he had it out and I had my lure to let go of his captive arm. I barely had the mind to kick off my shoes before curling up in the softness.

"I love you," I mumbled again. "You're so cool."

"Good to hear you're seeing the light."

I vaguely slapped in the direction I thought he would be. "Shuddup. We all know you have self-esteem issues."

"Only you. Confidential. Never to be opened." I could smell his musk again and felt the heat of his lips against my forehead. "I love you too."

I think he left then, or maybe I fell asleep first, but his warm hand on mine lingered even after I had given in to the darkness.

Turns out one of my clients canceled on me...so before I find another job to take his place (or bump up my word count for the one I got), I'm going to binge write a whole bunch on 'Holy.' ^.^ I hope you like it!

Also, for those of you who enjoyed my first book, "Out of Duat," my second book is coming out soon. ^.^ Interested? No, it's not a sequel to Duat, but a stand alone YA romance about a girl with an anxiety disorder falling in love with her teacher. Then there's a creepy child molesting teacher and her best friend being blackmailed, her mom being blackmailed, let's just black mail everyone-oh, and the fact that there's no way she can have a relationship with her teacher legally...when it rains, it pours. But she overcomes it all in the end by learning what it means to care for your loved ones by caring for yourself.

Let me know what you think!