A knock at the door halted her spiraling thoughts. She opened it with a smile, her heart skipping a beat. She was expecting Bas, but instead she got the blond from the bar.
“Oh. Hello,” she said.
“Good evening, Bridget the Hawk Girl. I’m Apollo, and I’ve been sent to bring you down for dinner,” he replied with a beaming smile. It didn’t hide his rapid perusal from her scuffed motorcycle boots to her Doctor Strange T-shirt.
“Thanks,” she murmured and then paused. “Should I change? I mean, I only have jeans and T-shirts if I do.”
Apollo’s head tilted to one side. “Why would you need to change, love? The only reason I’m not wearing a bathrobe right now is because Bas is afraid I’ll flash my dick around you by accident.”
Bridget giggled. “Okay, fair enough. This just seems the kind of house where people would dress for dinner. Like Downton Abbey or some shit.”
“Dear gods, no. The house is just old. We are all too busy and, quite frankly, too crazy, to stand on too much ceremony. It’s been a long time since a woman has stayed with us that wasn’t an Ironwood, so we are all on our best behavior.” Apollo offered her his arm, and Bridget found herself taking it.
“You guys don’t seem crazy to me,” she admitted. “Eccentric, maybe, but not crazy.”
“As I said, we are on our best behavior because our dear Basset Bear is quite a vindictive little dick when crossed, and he doesn’t want you to be scared away.”
“Bas? Vindictive? Surely not,” Bridget said, still smiling. She was going to get on well with Apollo, but after seeing him at the bar, he seemed to get along well with everyone.
“The man can go into your mind and rearrange it as he pleases. He can give you nightmares if you decide to piss himoff. He once made me believe a spider had laid eggs in my arm,” Apollo said and shuddered.
“And why would he do that?” Bridget asked because it didn’t sound like the sweet guy she knew.
“I may have tested out a new laughing potion on him and made him laugh so hard, he pissed himself.”
Bridget snorted and then coughed to cover it up. “Sounds to me like you had it coming.”
Apollo grinned. “Of course I did. We were fifteen and thirteen at the time, so were complete assholes.”
“I thought it was weird that you guys were all living at home as grown men, but after seeing the guest room and the library, I understand why,” Bridget replied.
“We are Greatdrakes. We don’t wish to be anywhere but our towers, and with the amount of explosive things I create, what normal house could stand up to the challenge?” Apollo replied with a shrug. “Reeve, the youngest, splits his time here and at the Ironwood mansion and sometimes the castle in England if he and Charlotte are learning magic from the fae. We all kind of live with each other in that way. Family, you know?”
Bridget shook her head. “No, I don’t know. It’s nice for you, though. I have no idea what that would even be like.”
“You have no family at all?” Apollo asked, blond brows drawing together.
“Nope. Not a one. Mother is dead. Never knew my father. I’m not worried. I get by okay,” Bridget said, swallowing the lump in her throat.
Apollo patted her hand that was still over his arm. If anyone else would have tried that shit, Bridget would have let them have it, but she felt strangely comforted when Apollo did it. Maybe his magic was empathy.
“You’re a magician, which means you’re always welcome here, Bridget,” he said.
She really needed to steer the subject away from family. “What is your magic if you are blowing things up all the time?”
“I specialize in alchemy and shenanigans,” Apollo replied. “Hence the laughing potion to make my brother piss himself.”
Bridget was still laughing when they got downstairs, and she got a noseful of something that smelled like fresh bread and melted cheese.
“Oh my god, what is that?” she asked, her stomach growling.
“That’s Bas. He’s a bit of a mother hen when he wants to be. He’s always been like that, but it got worse after Mom died,” Apollo said, his smile dimming just a little. “He makes sure we all eat right and don’t catch scurvy.”
“You’re lucky. I hate cooking for myself.”
Apollo put his arm around her shoulders. “Then you’ll be pleased to know that Bas is taking you under his wings.”
Bridget didn’t get a chance to ask him what he meant by that, or process the image of being under Bas, because Apollo opened the door to the kitchen, and she was faced with all the Greatdrakes men sitting around the scarred pine table drinking wine and talking all at once.
