“You see, Fury? It never gets boring around here.” He tightened the black elastic he’d tied around his hair, then fiddled with the button on his blue dress shirt, as though supremely uncomfortable.
“I see that.” Ness was studying me, that one eye of hers lingering on the split lip I’d brightened with gloss. “How are you feeling?”
Because she didn’t strike me as a person who was after a generic answer, I gave her question actual thought.
“Happy,” I ended up saying.
Happy to be alive.
To be here tonight.
To have all my limbs attached and operational.
I’d heard I owed Liam my life. Heard he’d been the one to reach me and swim me back to shore at a velocity that rivaled Bea’s, to administer CPR, purging my saturated lungs.
I hadn’t even thanked him yet.
I would.
Eventually.
The door opened, and a dozen shifters breezed in, most in fancy attire—cocktail dresses for women, button-downs over jeans for men. My heart quickened as I scanned their faces. I didn’t find the one I was looking for.
Why was I looking for it again?
Oh, right. . . To say thank you for rescuing me from a frozen lake.
I returned my attention to Ness and Lucas. “Can I get you guys something to drink?”
Ness, who’d turned toward the newcomers, redirected her attention to me. “I’d love some sparkling water.”
I poured her a glass. “Lucas?”
“Another one of those for my baby mama—no ice—and a beer for me.”
After sliding both over, he stood. “I told him to get his dick out of his ass BTW.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Um . . . what?”
“When he got to Boulder. Before, you know, the whole Nikkinapping incident, I told Liam to get his dick out of his ass and catch up to Little Destroyer, who’s decidedly the more astute of the two Kolanes.”
My pulse tripped. I knew they were like brothers, yet couldn’t imagine Liam discussing our failed relationship with Lucas. With anyone, for that matter.
“His head, Lucas.” Ness sipped her drink. “Not his dick. His head.”
Lucas shot us a crooked grin. “I like my expression better.”
“I don’t doubt it.” Ness popped her elbow on the bar and propped her chin on her closed fist. “To think you’re going to have a daughter soon. You think her first word will be dick or ass, Nikki?”
I managed a half-smile even though my mind was still stuck on what he’d said, about Storm being astute.
“Not funny, Fury.” Lucas scrubbed a hand across his forehead as though he were mopping off perspiration. “My daughter willneverspeak the words dick and ass.Never. She won’t even know what the former means until the ripe old age of forty.”
“Uh-huh.” Ness crunched on an ice cube. “Let’s revisit that when she hits puberty.”
Lucas scowled at her before taking his drinks and walking over to Sarah.
Ness’s eyes were so shiny they rivaled the fairy lights strung up between the row of naked bulbs illuminating the bar. “His hair’s going to go gray fast.”
