“Thank you, Hadley,” said Marjory, still studying my mother. “You look young,” she told Emma.
Mom shrugged. “I died young. You look old. What’s that like?”
“Not fun in the least,” Marjory said through a wan smile. “Your daughter is an interesting individual. She stole my son’s heart with a single bat of her eyelashes.”
“Hey,” I shouted. “I never bat my eyelashes.”
“She stole my heart with her mouth,” Galen countered. “She was fiery from the first moment I met her. I knew she was the one.”
Speaking of fiery, Lilac had lifted her hands into the air and was unloading fire magic in every direction. She was focused on what was to come. The rest of us? Not so much.
“So cute,” I teased. “It’s a load of crap, but it’s cute.”
“It’s not,” Galen countered. “You were it from our first meeting.”
“It’s true,” Booker interjected. “He tracked me down that day to warn me against making a move on you.”
I cast Galen a sidelong look. “That was kind of alpha.”
“I was protecting you. Booker is not good with women. I didn’t want you to get hurt.”
“Yes,thatwas why,” Aurora sneered.
“I wasn’t even interested in Hadley and he still practically peed on me to mark his territory,” Booker complained.
“Don’t pretend you didn’t goad him,” Lilac fired back. Her hair was still a mass of red flames but there was a smile on her face as she waited for the dhampirs to come calling. “You might not have been interested in pursuing a relationship with Hadley, but you wanted to torture Galen.”
“Well, that’s a given,” Booker conceded. “He was pretty funny when he warned me away.” He smiled at the memory. “I asked him if he liked you and he said no, but it was obvious he was lying.”
“I can’t believe you warned him,” I said to Galen. “I’m not property.”
Galen didn’t look as if he felt guilty. “I’m not sorry. I got everything I wanted.” His eyes flicked to my mother. “Tell me what we need to get you and May back over.”
“The door has to be strong enough for a floating soul to penetrate,” she replied. “It’s not there yet.”
“How did May get here if the doors aren’t strong enough?”
“She hitchhiked with my father,” Mom replied. “Plus, the doorthat was created to bring Hadley was strong. But it’s only a one-way portal.”
That pinged something in my brain. Before I could ask a question, however, Mom cocked her head and looked Galen up and down.
“Why do you care about getting me back across?” she asked.
“I want Hadley to have everything she could possibly want,” he replied. “She’s wanted you her entire life. I’m going to make sure she gets to keep you because it’s what she needs, and I’m here to provide what she needs for the rest of our lives.”
Mom’s eyebrows hopped. “That was quite the declaration.”
“I told you they were gross,” May said. Her eyes sparked with mischief despite her words. “They’re kind of cute sometimes.”
“We need to focus,” I said. “We can be cute later. Over crab legs.”
Galen shook his head. “Oh, no. You’re not eating so much you make yourself sick. Not tonight.”
I ignored him. We both knew I was going to get my way on this one. “Who created the door that brought me over?”
Mom looked confused by the question. “What do you mean?”
“It was created on our side,” I said. “The symbol was burned into Wesley’s field. That had to happen on our side.”
