by Ivy Asher
“Hello,” she tells Delta simply, but there’s so much love and happiness packed in that one simple word, and I can see that Delta and Medley feel it too as their eyes well up.
“Hi,” Delta answers, and then she’s being wrapped up in another hug so tight that I feel it from where I’m standing.
“I got you now, sweet girl…I got you now,” Mrs. Bell coos at Delta as she rocks her a little side to side, and it’s one of the most touching moments I’ve ever seen. Delta sniffles and wipes at her eyes as Mrs. Bell pulls back, wiping at her own cheeks before she turns to look at me.
“And there’s Sable,” she announces, and she says it with such relief and joy it’s like my soul just sighs at the feeling of family. She closes the distance, her arms open wide as she wraps me up in a strong hug. As I lean into her, I feel parts of me push back together that I didn’t even know were out of place until her loving arms came around me.
“Hi,” I say nervously, but she just keeps me crushed against her chest, knocking the air right out of me.
“None of that worry, baby girl. You’re ours now, and we’re gonna love you, and spoil you, and show you what it is to be a Bell,” she says in my ear as her hands pat my back in soothing strokes. “I’ve wished every day since I heard about you that I could’ve had you right there on my doorstep along with Medley. I wish I could’ve loved you like you should’ve been loved,” she goes on, and I’m shocked when I feel wetness from her cheek pressed against mine. “But you’re here now, all of you girls together, and you can bet a cloud on a rainy day that we’re gonna make it right.”
She pulls away, and I feel the sting of warmth prickling over my eyes. Mrs. Bell gives me a loving look and pats my face in that same motherly gesture that she did to Delta, and it guts me to feel it. There’s so much that gesture conveys, and I don’t have the words to express what it means to me to be so openly and freely brought into the fold.
She pinches my cheek and then boops my nose playfully, making me smile. “Honey girl, we have got to get some food in you!” she exclaims before looking over at my mates and eyeing Toreon. “You too, June Bug. Good thing I’ve been cookin’ and cleanin’ all night, gettin’ things ready for you. I have my work cut out for me. Better stay a whole week, I think,” she says with a decisive nod as my mates watch her in amusement.
Medley groans. “Mama, you can’t just invite yourself to stay here for a week. They’re just movin’ in!”
“Well, I know that,” Mrs. Bell admonishes. “Which is why they need their family to help them out.” She moves her assessing eyes over to Vudu, and a delighted smile spreads across her face. “You.” She points at him. “Oh, I’m gonna have a good time feedin’ you.”
Vudu blinks down at her as she admires his size. “Um. Thanks?” he grunts out.
“C’mere, honey girl,” I hear Mr. Bell say as Medley’s father hugs her. “Your mama and I missed you.”
“I missed you too, Daddy.”
“She’s been runnin’ the imps ragged,” he tells her in a mock-whisper.
Mrs. Bell whirls around. “’Scuse me, Teddy Bell, don’t be tellin’ untruths behind my back. Those imps are repentin’ souls aimin’ to do some good works to clear the sins from their spirits. If they’re up to scrubbin’ the floors clean, you just let them be.”
Mr. Bell gives her a sidelong grin. “Yes, ma’am.”
I chuckle, my heart feeling so full I’m going to need another one to help carry all the happiness I feel roosting in there.
Mrs. Bell claps once loudly and then turns back to us. “Well, let’s give you the tour of your new place,” she says brightly.
I look to my mates. “Sounds great,” I answer her.
She smiles and threads her arm through mine. “Good. Then after we eat, we can talk about what y’all wanna change and what y’all wanna keep. I went down to the fabric store and picked out some options for curtains, and Mr. Bell already started on a bed for you. He went a little bigger, and it creeped in on the sittin’ area I thought would be perfect by the window, but lookin’ at your strappin’ fellas over there, I think it’s good he did,” she tells me with a wink.
“What’s that, shug? Did you just say I was right? I’m not sure if I caught that correctly,” Mr. Bell teases from behind us, his arms slung over both Medley’s and Delta’s shoulders as he follows us in.
“Hush now, or I’ll give you somethin’ to catch,” she scolds playfully, and I hear the collection of mates behind us chuckle.
I’m ushered into the house, and I find the whole main floor is completely open. There’s a huge kitchen off to the right and a massive solid wood table in a dining room next to it that could fit all of us for a meal and then some. In the living room to the left, I spot purple wings up on a ladder, and my eyes widen with shock when Nefta turns around, holding an old curtain rod in her hand.
“Hi,” I greet in surprise.
She looks a little sheepish as she steps down and waves to us, my sisters seeming just as taken aback as me.
“Mrs. Bell invited me over to help,” Nefta explains, the curtain rod still in her hand like she isn’t really sure what to do with herself. “I’m taking down old rods and putting up new ones,” she adds like that’s that.
“Thank you,” I answer, a little astonished. “It’s good to see you again,” I offer, and her nerves seem to melt away as she gives me a warm smile.
“This isn’t nearly long enough to reach your entire back,” I hear Tazreel’s voice call, right before tromping footsteps make their way down the stairs at the back of the room. “Does the Mortal Realm not appreciate vanquishing a good back itch?” he asks before turning around and showing us how his new back scratcher doesn’t quite reach where he’s aiming.
I snort out a laugh, which turns into a full-blown giggle, pulling Medley and Delta right into amusement with me.
“That’s a toilet brush, Taz,” Medley squeaks out as we all bust out hysterically.
Within seconds, Tazreel’s face goes from arrogantly annoyed to horrified. He goes to throw the brush, but Mrs. Bell warns him not to defile what she’s spent hours cleaning, so instead, Tazreel stalks through the open back door and out into the yard where he chucks the offending back scratcher and proceeds to move around like he has a bee caught in his pants.
Even our mates start laughing by then.
“I’ll go hose him off,” Delta volunteers when we finally start to get a hold of ourselves again, but the picture of her hosing off the Pride of Hell just sends me right back into another fit of giggles.
I wipe laugh tears from my eyes as I wander through the rest of the house, my guys grinning and giving me all kinds of looks as we check out the gorgeous bed that Mr. Bell made for us. By the time we’re done looking through everything, my cheeks hurt from smiling so much.
Ire pulls me back while everyone else leaves to head back down for lunch. The four of us are alone upstairs, and my mates look at me expectantly. “Well? What do you think?” Ire asks.
“It’s perfect. It’s better than perfect,” I tell them again, and they all puff up with pride and their own excitement.
I wondered a little if Ire would be comfortable here after seeing his palace, but the more I observed him walking through the house, the more I could see that he felt like he fit here too. I found that same sense of comfort in Vudu and Toreon, and I know with absolute certainty that this place isn’t right for just me. It’s right for all of us.
“Are you okay with this? Does it work for you too?” I ask, wanting to double-check that my elation hasn’t caused me to miss anything or overlook any of their feelings.
“I couldn’t dream up anything better,” Toreon announces, while Ire and Vudu both nod and grunt their agreement.
“Okay then, it’s official. We have a home,” I declare, a little squealy with excitement as I toss my arms around them. I can’t reach around all three of them, but their hands come down to my body to hold me, so I lean up on my tiptoes and kiss each of
them, immediately thinking about how much fun we’re going to have christening the rooms of this house. But that will have to wait, because whatever Mrs. Bell has been cooking smells like heaven.
We clomp down the stairs and find everyone else already sitting at the long table. Well, everyone except Delta and Tazreel, that is. Mrs. Bell ushers us over to the table, and she starts setting down dishes that are overflowing with all kinds of food, and we start digging in.
Before I’ve even taken my third bite, I hear Delta scream outside.
There’s a half second of pause that happens with everyone at the table, and then, chaos.
Chairs scrape, people bolt up, Delta’s mates just up and disappear as they shift outside to get to her fastest. My heart pounds in my chest as I scramble with Medley and her parents to run out of the house and out the back door, my hand already opening as I call to my scythe while my sister does the same, just as another one of Delta’s screams peals through the air.
But my racing steps grind to a halt at the sight before me in the open back yard.
Because there’s Delta up in the air, straddling her scythe like it’s a broomstick, and she’s struggling to fly around in a low-to-the-ground circle while a damn alligator chases her.
“What the fuck?” Jerif exclaims.
Taz is off to the side, soaking wet, a wet hose still in his hand. He frowns and tries to shake the hose to get water on the alligator every time they loop back around toward him, as if it’s a naughty kitten and Taz is just gonna spray him away from the couch cushions.
“Fucking help me! I’m being attacked!” Delta yells at everyone, just as the alligator comes up in a very impressive leap that I didn’t even know this animal was capable of, its teeth snapping and nearly snagging her feet.
“AH!” Delta screams again, her wings going all shifty as she tilts to the side, her hands desperately holding onto the scythe as she tries to steer with it.
Beside me, Medley pinches the bridge of her nose and then shoots her father a glare. “Daddy! Please tell me you did not make those imps shift in Todd?” she demands.
Mr. Bell fidgets on his feet. “He wanted to come, honey girl.”
“Oh my good Lord,” she exclaims before she goes stomping over there. Flint is cracking up so hard that he has his hands braced on his knees while he struggles to breathe between laughs.
“Todd! You stop chasin’ my sister right this second, you overgrown gecko!” Medley calls, and to my great surprise, the alligator actually stops and turns to her.
“What is happening?” I ask in disbelief.
Alder grins over at me, looking as cool as a cucumber, not at all worried that his mate is marching over to the massive reptile. “Todd is the Bells’s pet gator.”
I blink in surprise, my gaze swinging back over to Medley, but instead of her getting things under control, now it’s she who’s squealing, because Todd jumps up and snaps his huge jaw right onto her scythe and darts away before Medley can snatch it back.
“Todd, you scaled little shit! Get back here right now!” Medley calls, trying to race after him, but I’ll say this for him, he is quick.
“Medley Bell, you know I don’t like that swearin’ in front of guests!” Mrs. Bell calls, and now it’s my mates who start to lose it.
“Mama!” Medley calls back, exasperated. “I’m a grown ass woman!”
With Medley now distracting Todd, Delta makes a break for it and flies as fast as her shaky wings can take her until she lands between Crux and Echo, while Jerif and Rafferty move to go in front of her. “Why didn’t you just Annulus-dome yourself?” Jerif asks teasingly.
Delta glares and points the tip of her scythe at him. “Don’t make fun of me. Alligators freak me the fuck out. It was just there, running at me. I panicked.”
Echo’s lips twitch, his shadows coming up to wrap around her waist. “We saw.” She grumbles but hides behind Crux when Todd comes bounding closer to us. “You can face the Ophidian and an army of demons, but alligators are too much for you, huh?”
Delta pinches him on the side until he laughs and backs away.
“Daddy!” Medley exclaims, bringing my attention back to her. She’s panting now, her hands on her hips as she glares at the alligator that still has her scythe in his mouth, and I swear, its tail is wagging.
“He just wants to play, honey girl!” Mr. Bell calls, looking at Todd like the alligator is some adorable puppy.
“How many times do I have to tell you? My scythe is a very dangerous Hell weapon, not a toy!” Medley tells him. “You’re lucky it ain’t activated, or he could do some serious harm!”
With complete serendipity at that moment, Todd suddenly hurtles forward, and the blades pop out on the scythe. My eyes widen when I see the squirrel he’s charging for, and quick as a whip, he turns his head, like he’s gone full Alligator-Annulus, and dusts it. Just like that. Poof.
Everyone stares in shock.
“Oh. My. God,” Medley gasps in complete horror as we all gape at the tiny pile of ash which confirms that we’re not imagining it, her scythe is, in fact, activated.
“Well...that ain’t good,” Mr. Bell says in the understatement of the year before he scratches his bushy chin in thought. “Hmm. I wondered why I saw that pile of ash next to the mailbox back at the trailer…”
I gape at him as he shoots off a quick, sharp whistle. Todd immediately whips his head around and comes bounding over to him like a Labrador bringing the stick to its owner to throw. All of my sisters’ and my mates practically book it back inside the house, shoving and pushing each other to get through first, not a single one of them risking being accidentally scythed by the alligator that’s just trying to play.
“Drop it,” Mr. Bell orders, and Todd instantly listens, letting the staff fall from his mouth as he looks up at him expectantly, light pink tongue flopping over razor sharp teeth. Wasting no time, Mr. Bell digs in his pocket and pulls out a loose piece of jerky and tosses it to him. Todd catches it effortlessly and starts munching on it while Medley sprints over and snatches her scythe up.
She grimaces at the staff before she rubs it over her cutoffs to get off whatever gator germs could possibly be on it. Delta, Medley, and I all just stare at each other for a beat, and then we crack up laughing, because we probably have a skewed sense of humor.
“Let’s...let’s not talk about this. Like, ever again,” Delta says as our laughter tapers off.
We quickly nod. “Yeah, that’s probably for the best,” Medley agrees.
The three of us tip our scythes together in an Annuli salute and raise our wings in our little triplet huddle. With our faces slightly purple from the sun shining through our feathers, Delta looks between us with a smile. “Huh. Look at that. We all got a happy ending.”
“Yep, and all we had to do was single-handedly save Hell,” I say with a wry grin.
“Hey, you had help!” Tazreel calls indignantly, and we look over to see him still dripping wet and scowling as he tries to stomp into the house. Mrs. Bell very quickly sends Pride right back out so that he can’t track mud and water all over the floors, and surprisingly, he listens.
“Come on, I’ll get you a plate and then show you how to fix a toaster,” Mr. Bell says to Taz, who nods and sits down as he impatiently waits for food, grumbling the whole time.
My sisters and I break into another fit of laughter and turn to start heading back into the house, and I pinch myself, just to be sure that this is all real as I face some realizations.
One, this is not a dream.
Two, this is not something I will ever let slip away.
Three, angels and demons really do exist.
Four, they’re shaping up to be the best family I could have ever hoped for.
And five, I’m going to enjoy my happy for as long as I live.
Because I’m whole and I’m home.
The End
Also by Ivy Asher & Raven Kennedy
Shifter Romantic Comedy Standalone
&nb
sp; Conveniently Convicted
Dystopian Romantic Comedy Standalone
April’s Fools
Paranormal Romance
Grave Mistakes
Grave Consequences
Grave Decisions
Grave Signs
Also by Ivy Asher
The Sentinel World
The Lost Sentinel
The Lost and the Chosen
Awakened and Betrayed
The Marked and the Broken
Found and Forged
Shadowed Wings
The Hidden
The Avowed
The Reclamation
More in the Sentinel World coming soon.
Romantic Comedy Standalone
Conveniently Convicted
April’s Fools
Also by Raven Kennedy
Paranormal Shifter Romance:
Addie: Pack of Misfits Book 1
Reese: Pack of Misfits Book 2
Jetta: Pack of Misfits Book 3
Fantasy Reverse Harem Romantic Comedy:
Signs of Cupidity: Book 1
Bonds of Cupidity: Book 2
Crimes of Cupidity: Book 3
For the Love of Cupidity: Book 4
Cupidity Box Set
Romantic Comedy Stand-Alone:
Can’t Fix Cupid
April’s Fools
Conveniently Convicted
Dark Contemporary Romance:
The Girl Who Cries Colors
Cruel: Savannah Heirs Book 1
Tame: Savannah Heirs Book 2
Wild: Savannah Heirs Book 3
Dark Paranormal Romance:
Void
Wicked Webs
Ivy Asher
