Total pages in book: 98
Estimated words: 92559 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92559 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 463(@200wpm)___ 370(@250wpm)___ 309(@300wpm)
There were a lot of things in life that you could fudge. The great, glowing death ball in the sky was not one of them—
“Sire! You must come in!”
At the sound of the voice, he pulled a pivot-and- hustle, zeroing in on the command. And as he shot through the side door of the Colonial and into a homey kitchen, Fritz, butler extraordinaire, started fanning him with a dishtowel like he was already on fire.
“That was a little close,” Tohr said, as the breeze did feel good on his flaming cheeks.
And thanks to the special reflective coating on all the window glass, the harmful rays were mostly blocked. The relief was instantaneous.
“Mistress Autumn has been—”
“You’re here! Oh, thank Lassiter.”
His shellan bolted out of the basement door, and his arms opened without him even thinking about it: Those lovely gray eyes that were usually full of calm warmth were frantic, and her blond hair, which she usually knotted high on her head, was streaming behind her like a halo of anxiety.
“I’m sorry,” he said as he pulled her in close. “It’s been crazy tonight.”
After they reconnected for a minute, his mate pulled back, and touched his face as if reassuring herself he was really alive.
“Too close,” she whispered.
“I’m sorry.” He pressed a kiss to her forehead and felt like an absolute asshole. “I won’t do that again.”
It was a lie, and they both knew this, but he didn’t know what else to say. His job was dangerous, unpredictable, and almost always in the way. There was no getting out for him, though. He was Wrath’s second-in-command, and the Elmer’s glue of the Brotherhood, as Rhage always said.
“Okay,” she murmured with resolve.
“Okay,” he echoed with love.
And that was why he could only ever be mated to her. Of all the people he had met, his Autumn was most like water. She flowed over difficulty, and not weakly. No, never weakly. There was great strength in her calmness and the way she accepted that which could not be changed.
Like his past, and the loss of his first shellan. Like his present, and his job.
She inspired him every night, lifted him every day, loved him like they had an eternity in front of them and only one more second at the same time.
Another hug, he thought as he pulled her in again. She was smiling when they eased apart.
“Butch and V are waiting for you downstairs in our family room.” She glanced pointedly at Fritz, who was worrying at the apron that was tied around his waist. “Where we are all going to enjoy everything that has been so thoughtfully prepared.”
“I can make more?” Fritz’s wrinkly face was pitched like a tent off the tip of his nose, and his clear concern for the adequacy of his efforts made everything seem looser. “Perhaps another dessert?”
There was a “please” dangling in the breeze, as if he needed to work out his anxiety on a flan or something—and Tohr hated that he’d worried the elderly butler, too.
Fuck.
“Absolutely.” He forced a smile at the doggen, as regret soured his stomach. “And you know what I feel like I need? A fresh apple pie.”
“Oh! Sire!” Fritz clapped his hands like someone had offered him a winning scratch-off. “I have the most beautiful Braeburn apples. And I can sweeten them up with some Galas. And if I start now, I shall be able to provide it warm in ninety minutes!”
The butler was already turning away and going for the Crisco. Handmade and flaky as ever was the only way a crust was happening in this, or any Brotherhood, household.
Tohr pressed a quick kiss on Autumn’s mouth.
“Before you say it,” she murmured as they went over to the cellar door, “I’ll be staying for the conversation with Butch and Vishous. And yes, I know you hate it, but I live in your world alongside you. Reality is what it is, and I have a right to know.”
For a split second, Tohr entertained a fantasy that there was another zip code, far, far away from Caldwell, where there was no violence, no need for the Brotherhood’s official duties, no war with Lash and the lessers. In his utopia, he would sequester all those who he loved—
“And I just made some fresh vanilla ice cream,” Fritz announced.
“Thank you,” Autumn said. “That would be lovely.”
The pair of them descended together, and as he held the warm, vital hand of his mate, he was grateful for the here-and-now. And he really was going to try to not burn himself to a crisp in the future.
At the bottom, they hooked up with the Wheel’s outermost ring, and they didn’t have far to go. The next door was their quarters, and he jumped ahead and opened the way in. As Autumn stepped through, he closed his eyes and breathed in. She smelled like a summer night, clean, fresh, tinted by rosebuds.