“Take it up with the manufacturers.”
“Who invited them again?” Kris asked.
“They’re part of the team,” Jay said from his spot on the floor, connecting up the toy train I’d bought.
“And we can hear you,” Kiran added with a smile.
The whole team was here, except Killion. Jay said the hellhound was taking his annual vacation. Apparently, he always went away this time of year. He’d be gone for three weeks, and then he’d be back patrolling the grounds as if he’d never left. In the meantime, Emmett kept an eye on the grounds using a state-of-the-art security system Lark had installed a couple of years ago, a system that rarely got utilized because why rely on tech when you had a hellhound?
Bres was staring at the tree in wonder. “It’s … beautiful.”
He was wearing clothes. A tee and joggers. It was weird not seeing his bare, inked skin, and if not for his pale red irises, he’d pass for a regular guy. A dangerously good-looking regular guy.
The soft amber lights caressed his skin, and whoa, I needed to stop ogling?
“Do you have anything similar in Fomoria?” Kris asked Bres.
“No. Nothing like this.”
Emmett entered carrying a tray of eggnog and passed it round.
Jay raised his glass. “I want to make a toast to us. To the team, and to many more years of working successfully together, because whatever comes our way, I’m confident we can beat it.” He paused. “Together.”
“Hear, hear.” Lark raised his glass.
We all drank, and then music began to play, festive and light, and God, it would be so easy to forget all the crap hovering on the horizon. Just for a little while.
Stress could take a backseat, and worry could join it.
Kris swept Mai into his arms and began to dance around the room in a jaunty manner that had us all laughing. All except Lark, who looked like someone had gut-punched him.
I guess telling someone to move on and watching it happen were two different things.
Candy grabbed hold of Lark. “Come on, handsome, let’s show them how it’s done.”
The music picked up, and then Jay was offering Kiran his hand.
She shrugged. “Sod it.”
That left just me, Bres, and Tris. Wait … where was Tris? I spotted her by the fire waltzing with a panicked-looking Emmett.
“You want to dance, raspberry girl?” Bres asked.
Dancing with Bres would mean getting close. Be still my galloping pulse. “Sure.”
He slid his arm around my waist and gently pulled me to him. The music slowed as if on cue, and then we were swaying together. My head came up to his pecs, which was a nice spot to lean against. How could dancing feel so good?
He held me, one hand on my hip, the other palm splayed across my lower back. I rested my hands on his chest, resisting the urge to stroke him because that might be pushing it.
My stomach was filled with moths and my heart with butterflies. It was that feeling, the giddy one that precluded the fall. In the past, falling in love hadn’t bothered me. So what if I had to marry a Nightblood? I could love who I wanted in the interim, right? I could give up my lover when the time to settle down arrived. Pfft. Easy.
But this time, a stab of fear accompanied the tingly happy feeling because the thought of having Bres and then giving him up terrified me.
Tris was right. I was playing with fire. I needed to put away the matches and back away from the flames. I pushed at Bres’s chest, and he released me, his face expressionless as I stepped away.
“I need to get some air.”
“Liar,” he mouthed.
I strode out of the room and into the cool, crisp night. The snow was falling again, a fresh blanket to obscure the tracks we’d made in the driveway. The bushes and trees were heavy with the white stuff, and my breath plumed prettily in front of me.
At least the outside world was calm.
The door opened, and I turned, expecting to find Bres, and yes, my treacherous heart did drop a little at the sight of my gargoyle companion.
Tris joined me on the porch. “You okay, chickie?”
“No.”
“Bres?”
“Yep.”
“It scares you, doesn’t it? Love?”
I looked down at her. “I’ve never been scared of love before.”
“That’s because you’ve never truly been in love.”
“Yes, I have. There was Brandon, and Ethan, then the moonkissed dude … Er …”
“Yeah, you really must have loved him,” she said sarcastically.
That earned her a sharp look.
“I’ve been in love, okay. Several times … And Henri … I loved Henri.”
“Loved?”
Oh, crap.
Tris patted my calf. “Just go with it, chickie. First time’s the charm. First time can be wonderful and painful and glorious.”
“I’m not a virgin.”
“I know that. I’m talking about your first true love.”
To argue or not to argue. Had I loved the other guys? I thought I did, but Bres … It was different. New. Scary as fuck, but … “There’s no future. I’m a Nightblood, and he’s a fomorian. You know the law.”
“You’re also part demon, and goodness knows what else, and you have a shit load of ammunition against the council, so fuck ‘em. If you want Bres, you should have Bres. Heck, you deserve some decent cock.”
Hell, she was right. About the Bres stuff, but maybe not the cock stuff, although when I thought about it, sod it, she was right about that too. I had loopholes. So many loopholes.
“So, how about we head on inside?” Tris said. “It’s cold as balls out here.”
“Cold as balls?”
“Goyle males have icy balls, but it’s a sensory delight when they get in and—”
“Nope. Na-uh. Do not need to know.”
I pushed open the door and ushered her back into the foyer. My phone buzzed in my pocket.
Unknown number.
“Hello?”
“Miss Justice?”
“Speaking.”
“This is Marigold from Honey Lodge Care Home. Your grandfather gave us your number. I’m afraid it’s time.”
Time? What did she mean? Oh … Shit. “I’m on my way.”
Chapter Seventeen
It was almost ten p.m. when Bres and I drove up to Honey Lodge. Gramps had said the place was in the middle of the countryside, but he could have warned me it was also in the middle of nowhere. A nowhere that was made ominous and creepy by the lack of streetlights and the abundance of woodland.
We’d gotten lost twice, even with the GPS giving us monotone direction. Bres had finally turned off the annoyingly calm mechanical voice and consulted a paper map. He’d gotten us here eventually, driving down pitch-black tracks navigable only because of my Nightblood vision.
Did I miss Henri and his inbuilt GPS? Hell, yes!
The car doors slamming broke the country silence with a crack. I winced. Why was it that everything sounded louder in the country?
Honey Lodge waited for us. A stately home, Edwardian, if I had my architectural eras right. Multi-paneled sash windows stared back at us like amber eyes as we crunched up the drive that had been salted to melt the snow but had since frosted over. I stepped through one of the three arches that opened out onto the porch and stood facing the huge double doors.
Shit, what if we were too late? Did I want to be late? My stomach churned with the sick feeling that precluded shitty news. Ironic, since I’d already had it.
“You ready?” Bres asked.
I nodded, and he knocked.
I shoved my hands deep into my jacket pockets and waited.
The doors swung open a moment later, and a kind-looking woman with a sad smile greeted us. “Miss Justice?”
“Yeah.”
She ushered us in. “I hope you found us okay?”
No point telling her it had been a bitch to get here. “Sur
e.”
She glanced at Bres. “Are you family?”
Panic grabbed my throat. “He stays with me.”
She inclined her head. “Very well. Please, follow me.”
She led us around the staircase and down a long marigold corridor lined with wooden doors. She stopped outside one and knocked softly.
“Come in,” a familiar male voice called out.
Gramps?
The woman pushed open the door and stepped back to allow us to enter. Oh, shit. This was it. Time to watch my mother die.
Bres’s hand settled on the small of my back. “You can do this.”
My gramps looked up as I entered. His eyes were red-rimmed and puffy. He’d been crying.
“Kat.” He stood and held out his arms.
Don’t look at the bed. Don’t.
I stepped into his embrace and closed my eyes. He felt thinner. Boney. Had he been eating? I’d left him to deal with my mother’s deterioration alone, of course he hadn’t been taking care of himself. I should have been checking on him in person.
Fuck, I was such a bitch. “I’m sorry.”
He pulled away to look at me. “Whatever for?”
For being a shit daughter. For being a crappy granddaughter. For being a coward.
“Everything.” My eyes pricked. “I should have come sooner.”
His smile was gentle. “You’re here now.” He looked across at the bed. “In time to say goodbye.”
In time.
I looked down at the woman sleeping in the bed. Golden hair so like mine spilled across the pillow. I’d brushed that hair once. The memory hit me hard in the chest. Where had it come from?
“Gramps … did I brush her hair?”
He nodded. “Before Tris, when you were small. You used to like to sit with her and brush her hair. You called her your dolly.”
A fist squeezed my heart. “Yes … I feel it.”
There were dark smudges beneath her eyes, but aside from that, she looked as if she could wake at any minute. The machines she was hooked up to beeped softly as if counting down the seconds.
This is what I’d been running from. Avoiding. Now that I was here, the guilt at not coming sooner was a bitter taste on my tongue.
“Are you sure?” I studied her healthy face. “She looks … well.”
“I know,” Gramps said, “but her vitals are deteriorating rapidly.” He patted my shoulder. “I’ll give you a minute.” He looked at Bres. “They have very good tea here …”
“I do enjoy a good cup of tea.” Bres looked at me. “Kat?”
I nodded. “I got this.”
The door closed softly, and I was alone with my mother for the first time in forever. Could she hear me? Did she know what was happening to her body? I perched by her hip and carefully took her hand in mine. Her skin was soft and warm.
Alive.
What to say? Gosh. Thoughts swirled around in my head. “I know what you did for me. I know you saved me from the shimmer man. Did this happen to you because of him? Did he trap you, or did you stay to keep me safe?” Once I started, the words spilled from my lips, falling over each other in their eagerness to be voiced. “I have so many questions, but most of all, I’m so sorry for not coming sooner.” I reached up to stroke her hair. Silken strands slipped through my fingers. Yes, I remembered that feeling. A knot formed in my throat, pinching tight for a moment. I swallowed the lump. “I told myself I didn’t feel anything, that I didn’t know you, so it didn’t matter, but it does.” My eyes pricked and burned. “Because there’s a part of me that does know you. I wish … I wish I could remember. I wish I could remember how it felt to be loved by you, even if it was only in a dream.”
My vision blurred with tears, and I wiped at my eyes with the back of my hand. Shit, I needed to hold it together. I—Wait … I looked down at my hand to find her fingers curled around mine. She was holding my hand. How was she holding my hand? My gaze flew to her face.
She was staring at me. Eyes open. Looking right at me.
Hope erupted in my chest, potent and hot. “Mum?”
“Kat.” Her voice was a dry croak.
“Oh, fuck. Mum!” I stood up, but she gripped my hand tighter. “Gramps!” I couldn’t tear my eyes from her. “Gramps!”
She squeezed my fingers way too hard for someone who’d been in a supernatural coma for over two decades. “No time.” Her eyes were wide with urgency. “Listen. No time. Don’t come. Don’t come for me.”
“What? What are you talking about?”
“Love y—” Her eyes rolled back in her head, and her hand slipped from mine.
The monitors fell into a long flat tone. She was gone.
The door burst open behind me, but my attention was fixed on her forehead, where red lines were appearing and connecting.
“What the fuck?” Bres said from beside me.
Gramps made a choked sound.
I stared at the word the lines had made.
MINE
* * *
I paced the lodge kitchen. “He has her. The shimmer man has her.”
“And what did she say to you?” Gramps asked.
It was a rhetorical question because he knew the answer. I’d already relayed what happened.
Gah. “I have to do something.”
“There is nothing you can do,” Gramps said. “She sacrificed herself to keep you safe, to keep this world safe, and you will not let her sacrifice be in vain.”
“You want me to leave her to rot?” I threw up my hands. “There has to be a way to get to her. A way into Somnium.”
“Somnium?”
“That’s where she is. I know it.” I filled my gramps in on what Luther’s book had said.
He sat back in his seat and ran a hand over his face. “He has her soul.”
“Yes! And he can’t keep it. I won’t let him. I have to free her.”
For a moment, I thought he’d agree with me because he was slipping into his I’m-about-to-cave face, but then his expression hardened.
Fluttering my lashes would not get me what I wanted this time.
“No. You won’t do anything,” he said firmly. “You’ll do what your mother wants and stay away.” His tone brooked no argument. “She came back just to deliver one message. Her final wish, and you will respect it.”
“Your gramps is right,” Bres said. “This shimmer man is goading you, and your mother just warned you to stay away. She obviously didn’t want you falling for his crap. We have no idea if he has her soul or not. It could be a trick. Your mother could be free. She may have returned simply to warn you not to fall into the trap.”
What to do? What to think? My head hurt.
“Take her back to Scorchwood,” Gramps said to Bres. “Take care of her.”
“Hey, I can take care of myself.”
“Humor an old man,” Gramps said. “I’ll arrange the funeral and let you know the details.”
He was sending me away? “No. Let me stay and help.”
He shook his head. “I’d like to do this alone.”
Once again, he used the do-not-argue-with-me tone. My gramps may have given way to me many times, but he also knew how to put his foot down, and I’d learned when not to push my luck.
“Fine. But I don’t like this. I don’t like it one bit.”
I dialed Karishma as we walked to the car. There was no answer. Fuck!
“You’re not going to let this go, are you?” Bres asked.
I lifted my chin and met his gaze. “Hell, no.”
He nodded. “I wouldn’t either.”
The tightness in my chest subsided at his words. “Thank you.”
“Don’t thank me, raspberry girl. I have a feeling whatever we find, it’s going to be a bumpy ride.”
Chapter Eighteen
Four calls to Karishma and no response later, I was ready to throw my mobile across the room, but it was expensive, and I didn’t want to break it, so I settled for glaring accusingly at it.
It didn’t look like I’d be speaking to my weaver friend anytime soon. I pulled off my clothes and hit the shower. Tris found me a half-hour later just sitting on the bed, wrapped in my fluffy robe, feet encased in my favorite pink unicorn slipper socks.
“I’m sorry, chickie. Bres told me what happened.”
“I was going to come find you, I just needed a minute.”
“You should sleep. You’ll feel better for it.”
Sleep … dreams … The bastard who had ruined my life. “I’m going to find a way to kill him, Tris. I’m going to make him pay for what he did to my mother. I may not remember it, but I know enough. I know he’s to blame for my growing up without her. I know he’s to blame for my never being able to dream.”
“And for bringing me into your life?”
Huh? “Tris …”
She smiled gently. “I’m not trying to make this about me, but I just want to remind you that your life hasn’t been all bad, that some good things have happened despite the wanker’s intervention.”
Henri, Tris, my gramps, and now the Scorchwood team. I’d never had issues getting on with people, heck it was one of my strengths, but here, at Scorchwood, I’d finally been able to share my secret and make real connections based on trust and honesty. I loved these people. Would I have found them if my mother had been conscious? Would I even have joined the Watch?
“Speculating is pointless,” Tris said. “Get some rest, and we can try calling Karishma tomorrow.”
I flopped back onto my bed. “What would I do without you?”
“Be clueless about the benefits of finding a man with great abs and a huge c—”
“I get it.”
“Want me to read to you?”
“Sure.”
She climbed up onto the bed beside me with her latest paperback. “By the way. We might need to make another trip to Luther’s soon.”
I bit back a smile. She was a fast reader but not that fast. She just wanted to give me a reason to get out of bed tomorrow.
I turned my head to look at her. “I’m going to be fine.”
She nodded but looked far from convinced.
“Read to me.”
I closed my eyes and drifted off to heaving bosoms and steel-hard cocks.
Ghost at the Feast: The Nightwatch Book 3 Page 11
