Living with three supernatural men was like having front-row seats to the world’s most chaotic improv show.
Sometimes it was unexpectedly dangerous. Like Koa sharpening all the butter knives into scalpels. Sometimes it was surprisingly sweet. Like Casimir color-coding my closet in the middle of the night because the “disorganization was causing physical pain.” And sometimes it was devastatingly hilarious. Like Zane asking if inserting a tampon caused me to orgasm, which earned him a head smack from Koa and an hour-long educational lecture from Casimir.
But it was never,everboring.
As I crept down the hallway toward the security room where the voices originated, I heard a third voice join the fray.
“Both of you need to calm down,” Zane growled. “This isn’t helping.”
“Oh, that’s rich coming from Mr. ‘Let Me Punch Through A Wall Instead Of Using The Door’ Cimmerian,” Casimir shot back.
“That was one time, and there was anactualemergency.”
“You were late for breakfast!”
“Waffles are serious business.”
I stifled a laugh as I peeked inside the partially open door. Three broad, tense shoulders blocked most of my view, but just as I was about to announce my presence, Koa threw his hands up in exasperation.
“Cruor!” he roared, the word exploding from him and rattling things in the room. “Why are you so stubborn?!”
Deciding my presence was needed, I pushed the door open and strolled in.
“What does ‘cruor’ mean, anyway?” I asked, leaning against the doorframe with what I hoped was nonchalance.
Three heads whipped toward me faster than Brumous inhaled stolen cookies. Koa’s expression morphed from anger to amusement in the blink of an eye. Zane’s mouth dropped open in what looked like horror mingled with delight. And Casimir actually flushed.
I’d been making a concentrated effort to learn the language and customs of my three husbands. So far, I’d decided that ‘moon-damned’ and ‘fang-rotted’ were adjectives. ‘Dark take it,’ ‘bat’s bones,’ ‘bleeding night, and ‘night’s teeth’ were interjections. Oh, and Casimir’s favorite, ‘damnation.’ There were some Latin phrases, too, but I hadn’t made the effort yet to translate any of them.
‘Cruor,’ however, was one they all used in nearly any situation. I’d even heard their eldest brother, Prince Sebastian, say it.
“Seri.” Clearing his throat, Casimir straightened his shoulders and fidgeted with his cuffs. “I didn’t realize you were there.”
“Clearly,” I said, fighting a smile. “So. Cruor?”
Zane collapsed into the nearest chair, spinning it to face me with a wicked grin.
“Oh, this should be good. Cas, you want to field this one? Since you’re the vocabulary expert and all.”
Casimir’s eyes shot daggers at his brother, but he turned to me with his usual composure.
“It’s a clinical term,” he began, his tone shifting into what I’d come to think of as his Professor Voice. And yes, with capital letters. “It specifically refers to coagulated blood or blood clots. In medical contexts, it describes the process of hemostasis, which is the stoppageof bleeding, where platelets aggregate with fibrin to form a semi-solid mass that—”
“By the eternal night!” Zane literally melted off of his chair onto the floor in theatrical agony. “He’s killing her with science!”
I blinked, trying to keep up with Casimir’s explanation as it spiraled into increasingly specific details about blood viscosity and something called “von Willebrand factor.”
“—which is distinct from serum in that cruor contains the cellular components that have—”
“Okay, okay,” Zane jumped to his feet, waving his hands frantically. “Ignore Dr. Morbid over there. It’s basically what happens when a vamp tries to drink a bloodshake and—”
“Bloodshake isnota word,” Casimir interrupted, pinching the bridge of his nose.
“—and there’s a clot,” Zane continued, undeterred. “A chunky bit. Like when you’re enjoying a milkshake and a piece of fruit gets stuck halfway up the straw.”
“What?” I felt my face scrunch in disgust.
“You have to either suck harder or give up entirely, right?” Zane mimed the action, making a horrible slurping noise as his cheeks suctioned inward. “You’re trying to get it through, but it won’t budge.”
