“I know.” I scrubbed one hand over my face. “But if something happens while we’re gone, if big evil comes knocking, I want the deadliest bastard we know standing between her and it.”
Zane began to pace, too restless to stay still.
“Sanguine mortis, if hebreathesweird around her—”
“He won’t.” Cas’ tone was sharp. Final. “He didn’t last time. He won’t this time.”
“She said he threatened to have her beheaded for speaking to him in a certain tone!” Z huffed.
“She also said he was teasing her,” I reminded them, “and Sebastian confirmed that. All but gleefully, I might add.”
“All right, all right!” Zane threw up his hands. “But only because there’s no one else who can get here as fast and is actually powerful enough to throw down with nearly anything!”
We all knew it was true, and yet none of us moved.
It was Brummy who broke us out of our paralysis. He leapt up onto the bed and laid against Seri’s side, one paw draped over her arm. The gesture was heartbreakingly similar to how they’d slept together that first day, when they were two surviving pieces of a trauma puzzle.
I guard.Alphas hunt. Alphas burn. Burn all Dark.
“Oh, we will, Agent Fuzznuts.” Zane’s smile turned sharp after he’d shared Brummy’s words.
Leaning down, I brushed my lips against Seri’s forehead.
“Mahalo,” I breathed, closing my eyes for just a moment as I sent up a silent thanks to the?aumakua, to the moon, to whatever forces had helped bring her back to us.
12. With the Monster
Koa
Lucian’s face betrayed nothing as he stood in the bedroom doorway, a book tucked under his arm, but his eyes went straight to Seri, and something in them softened. Just a fraction.
He’d answered Cas’ call on the first ring, agreed to come before we’d even finished telling him why, and had flown here in his private helicopter, landing on the western lawn and racing up to the manor with only an oversized umbrella to shield him from the sun. He hadn’t even brought along any of his royal security detail.
Not that he needed guards, royal or otherwise. Son of a bitch wasn’t known as The Reaper for no reason.
It was late afternoon, and we needed to get going to reach the camp before nightfall. Our nephilim friend, Kerry Harker, had already texted that he and his team were enroute and all systems were go, and yet I struggled to leave our vulnerable beloved with the monster who’d made us into monsters, too.
“I won’t leave her side,” he vowed. “When she wakes, she should see someone she knows.”
“She doesn’t know therealyou,” Zane bit out. “She just wants a replacement papa so bad, she’s willing to takeyou.”
Lucian’s gaze flicked to him, but he didn’t bristle.
“She knows me as well as she needs to.” He paused, his voice dropping an octave. “She reminds me of someone.”
Cas turned into a statue. Zane crossed his arms. Me? I felt like someone had cracked me open and poured vinegar inside.
“I am happy to be here anytime you need me,” he added, even more surprisingly.
“You weren’t there the first time we did,” I said, the words just slipping out.
Lucian’s eyes met mine, still calm, still unreadable. He didn’t need to ask what I meant. He knew. He knew what galled me more than anything, more than the brutal training, more than the attempts to pit me against my brothers, more than the broken bones.
“Mahina asked me not to be. She said she didn’t want me to remember her dead.” He spoke quietly, like it cost him something. “I honored her wishes.”
No excuses. No embellishments. Just that.
And Dark take me, Ibelievedhim.
