Piper swallowed thickly, but her grip relented on the blanket. “Believe it or not, I went to therapy about the whole thing—we all did, when Mom died—but this time of year all the big feelings come back.”
Kol’s jaw tightened. “Have you thought about taking a break from this time of year?”
“That’s what got me into this mess.” When she laughed then, it was a sad, weary sound.
He hummed. “That and your boyfriend.”
“Well, ex-boyfriend, obviously. We met at college, but I left to help out here when I finally realized what was going on with Mom. Long distance was hard, and then I got pretty sad when mom died.”
“No shit you got sad.”
She shrugged against her pillow. “Well, sad people aren’t any fun, and he only liked me when I was fun. But whatever—he was growing out a stupid-looking chinstrap beard thing, and I’m pretty sure he was seeing someone else before he dumped me anyway.”
Of all the things she should have actually cared about, the flippancy with which she told him made his blood absolutely boil, but he bit back the anger, not wanting it to become infectious.
Piper lay there, and it was clear she was burdened. Moonlight outlined her features, and he wanted to place his hands on either side of her face and tell her to stop thinking, if only for a few moments.
“Kol?”
His stomach tightened at the timbre of her voice. “Yes?”
“Am I keeping you from your family?” She finally turned to him, eyes wide. “You’ll miss Christmas with them if you’re stuck here with me.”
“Elves don’t celebrate Christmas,” he said quickly. “I don’t want to get into a whole theological discussion that I barely understand myself, but there’s nothing to miss.”
“But what about other winter holidays?”
He laid himself back, staring up at the skylight, the brightness of the stars telling him the winter solstice was coming soon. “Elves don’t usually celebrate anything annually—that’s way too frequent when you can live into the quadruple digits.”
Piper made a strangled, shocked sound and sat straight up.
Kol smirked. “Yeah, so I know what you’re getting at, but you don’t have to worry about me missing my mother’s last Christmas anytime soon. Even if she did celebrate, she’s got, like, six hundred more ahead of her.”
“Six hundred?” The blanket was suddenly lifted, and Piper stuck her head under it. “How the hell old areyou?”
Surprised at her sudden boldness, he was only a little disappointed to be wearing his own pajamas that covered him fully. “Care to hazard a guess?”
Piper popped back out from under the cover, lips pressed together. “You said you were only half.”
“And half of one thousand is?”
He could see her face blanch even in the low light. “Don’t tell me I’ve been sharing a bed with someone who could be my great, great, great, gr—uh, grandfather.”
“What’s it matter? We’re just lying here.”
“Yeah, but I—” Piper cut herself off, scrunching up her features, and Kol’s confidence melted away. Even if he just meant to have a little fun, it wasn’t worth her being disgusted by whatever thought she was having.
“There are very few of us cross-bloods, and none of the others inherited an elven lifespan. At best, I might get an extra decade on human men, and so far I’ve been aging just like one, much to my elven family’s bewilderment.”
She slowly processed what he told her, then tipped her head. “But after you’re gone, your mother’s going to keep on living for…for a long time?”
“Yeah, but she’ll be fine,” Kol assured her, wanting to take away the shaky strain to her voice, and it was true anyway: elucidai elves were some of the most stoic beings in existence on this plane or any other. “Elves usually have just one child, but I assume she’ll have another in a century or two to replace me. A real one.”
“Oh, that must be…weird for you.”
Yes, very. He swallowed that down and shrugged again, folding his hands behind his head. “Nah.”
“What about your dad?”
