Page 99 of Veil of Night & Flames

Please, please, please don’t let him regret it.

The words are loud in my head, and for one cold second, I’m sure that’s exactly what’s coming. And how freaking fitting would that be? Adric off in his realm, not seeing the danger, and Chase pulling away because of second thoughts about what the three of us did.

I’m seriously considering spiraling down into panic when a slow grin touches his lips, and he extends his hand to me. I hurry to his side, hope building in my chest.

“I either had one hell of a dream,” he says, pulling me onto the mattress and tucking his arm around me. “Or last night was extremely real.”

“Real good?” I ask. “Or real bad?”

The corner of his mouth twitches. “Are you telling me you regret it?”

“No.” I bite my lower lip and talk to my fingernails. “I really don’t. Do you?”

“You’d think I would,” he says slowly, his finger under my chin lifting my head so that his eyes meet mine. “But I don’t, either.”

The relief that cuts through me is so huge it’s embarrassing. “Really?”

“Trust me,” he says with a wry grin. “I’m the most surprised of all of us.” He glances around, his brow furrowed. “Don’t tell me Adric’s the one who had a problem with last night.”

I can’t help my laugh. “If he did, he should win an Oscar. No, he had to go deal with stuff. The weight of being king.”

Chase smiles. “Well, isn’t that convenient?”

“What?”

“Just that while I truly enjoyed last night,” he begins, flipping me onto my back as I squeal, “right now, I wouldn’t say no to some traditional one-on-one time.”

“Tempting,” I say. “But shouldn’t we go see Whistler?”

“Don’t worry,” he says with a tease in his eyes. “We’ll be quick.”

The walk to the Griffin’s Nest is twenty minutes of brilliant Florida sun defying the dark clouds that hover over the ocean in the distance. Chase keeps his hand at the small of my back, half-watching traffic, half-watching me, and while I don’t regret last night at all, I have to admit I love the ordinariness of simply walking across campus with my boyfriend.

Once through the door, I say hello to a few of the regular customers who buy coffee and study amidst the books. Griffin isn’t at the register, but a new hire named Amy tells me that he’s running errands, and I picture him out buying more coffee beans, because despite being a bookstore, this place gives all the other coffee bars a run for their money.

In other words, everything seems perfectly normal here at the Griffin’s Nest.

That, however, is an illusion that shatters once we reach the training room. Except it doesn’t shatter. Not really.

I look around the room. At Solenne changing one of Whistler’s bandages. At my onyx-eyed friend from another realm, gaunt and crooked-grinned, smiling at me from where he sits on the table. At the various screens and graphs and photos that Tia and Riley have hung all over the walls.

Not ordinary at all to most people. But to me, it is.

I guess I’m the one who’s not ordinary anymore. And, frankly, I’m okay with that.

“You look good,” I tell Whistler, meeting his smile.

“I’m alive,” he says. “Anything beyond that is a gift.”

Solenne sits in a chair beside him with a bag of herbs and a cup of something that steams. “He have little time before must sleep again. Sleep make better to heal.”

“I’m healed,” Whistler says, then holds his hands up in surrender when Solenne nails him with her narrowed eyes. “But extra rest never hurt anyone.”

“Is so,” she says, passing him a glass of water. “Drink. Soothe throat. Make strong. Then more rest.”

Chase is already at his side, his hand closing over Whistler’s good shoulder, and I can see the relief—and the respect—that flows between these two men as Whistler’s injured hand closes weakly over Chase’s wrist. Two fingers and a thumb, the others gone, and I blink back tears, not wanting to shed them in front of my friend.

“He is well—you see. Go now,” Solenne says. “He need more sleep. More heal.”