Total pages in book: 121
Estimated words: 113319 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 453(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 113319 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 567(@200wpm)___ 453(@250wpm)___ 378(@300wpm)
“What’s the status for tomorrow?” Tristan asked as I grabbed some lip gloss. “Christmas, right?”
“Yes. We’re missing dinner at my parents’ house tonight, but they’ll come over here for Christmas Day. Tomorrow morning, Austin wants to see my favorite place to think, and then we’ll come back and cook and open presents and do all that stuff. It’ll just be immediate family and our people.” I looked over his wings. “I wish there was a way to disguise those so we didn’t have to come up with reasons why you all have superhero complexes.”
I grabbed my small sequined clutch, utterly laughable, and put in the lip gloss while surveying him.
“I wonder if I can do…something…” I reached out to touch one of them, wondering if a salve would work, or some sort of magical oil, maybe.
He snatched my wrist out of the air.
“No,” he said. “My wings are a lot more sensitive than a normal gargoyle’s.” He paused. “In ways you wouldn’t want to stimulate.”
I grimaced at him, taking my hand back. “Yikes. I didn’t realize.” Flustered and not sure why, I grabbed the encrypted phone from the shelf in the closet.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Asking the mages if they have any ideas. They haven’t responded to a single message, but they did send that brooch for Cyra, so they must be getting them.” I made sure there was no sadness in my voice when I added, “Maybe they’re just…really busy.”
“Can’t you find that information about hiding our wings on your own?” he asked.
I scoffed. “Given how quickly Sebastian always found solutions, you’d think it was easy, wouldn’t you? It’s not. Like…at all. I have a crapload of books in Ivy House about magic, but the spells are very broad. This is for killing. This is for defending. There are nuances, sure, but Sebastian does truly out-of-the-box thinking. He has a talent for creation, for taking eight spells and making one spell from their roots. In Jane terms, he’s a brilliant engineer. I’m just a powerful user. I have no idea what he was doing with me.”
“Whoa, whoa.” He pulled me into another hug. “I sense lots of emotions bubbling up in there, waiting to come out of your eyes and ruin your makeup. Now is not the time. Niamh isn’t here, and Mr. Tom is getting Jimmy something to eat before we go. They aren’t available to fix you up, and I am not good at that stuff.”
“I could fix myself— Wait, where is Niamh?” I pushed away from him, not actually about to cry. I wasn’t feeling sorry for myself. Not really. I just legit didn’t know what a genius was doing working with someone who was basically a Jane. Didn’t mean I wanted him to stay away, though. I was lost without him.
I felt Niamh’s distance, only cluing in now because I’d expected everyone to be downstairs.
“She went to a posh wine bar where she’s heard rumors of mages hanging out,” Tristan said as I started for the door. “She wants to see if anyone shows, and if so, if they know anything about the dinner.”
“That woman really gets around.” We left the room and walked toward the stairs.
“Yes. Speaking of geniuses, I always wonder why she bothers trying to teach me how to hang around the pubs and extract information. She’s as good as Patty when she’s in her element. I don’t have the knack to get on her level.”
“She really is good at reading people.”
“What’s the story for the day after Christmas? Are you still going to the in-laws’?”
“Ex-in-laws, and yes. The mages in O’Briens can wait in their cells just a little longer. I want to show up at that party like a rockstar. Given Matt hasn’t called to tell me not to come, even though I added a couple of people to the guest list, he probably thinks his mother can cut me down a peg. She is a real piece of work.” I lifted my dress to take the stairs. “I will definitely wear something different than a Cinderella ball gown.”
“Good for you. Give ’em hell.”
The dress barely fit between the banister and the wall of the stairs. I nearly stumbled and fell…twice. Once at the bottom, I had a look around and just kinda…sighed in defeat.
“Really?” I said to Austin, who waited by the door in his expensive suit, looking for all the world like the rich investor we’d said he was. “You get to look good, and I have to look like Cinderella?”
His handsome smirk made me grumpier.
I took in Edgar’s tightfitting suit with the bumblebee brooch, a crotch not made for someone with a package, and the sleeves obviously too short and purposely sewn that way.
Dave lounged on the couch with a few leaves stuck in his hair, braids in strange places, wearing Phil’s kilt and construction vest.