by Lilia Moon
There’s a light chuckle from behind me, which has me whirling to face my laptop screen. “He’s never been very good with those kinds of rules, dear. Ask his cousins.”
Rafe’s head pops into view over my shoulder. “Hi, Mom.”
She gives him a look that manages to mix fondness with threat. I so need to learn how to do that. Right after I figure out how he started a video call without me noticing. I wave my fingers at the screen. The world can just swallow me now.
She waves at me and then smiles at her son. “Hello, sweetie. Judging from the look on India’s face, you’re being bossy again.”
I nearly swallow my tongue, but he looks entirely unperturbed. “She’s shy. I was just being encouraging.”
I really should leave more torches lying around. “I’m about as shy as your airplane, you jerk.” I shake my head at his mom. “Yikes. Sorry. This is why I should never be introduced to anyone’s parents.”
She smiles like I’ve just said something clever and polite. “I’m delighted to meet you, India. You do beautiful work. I was hoping you might help me find something for Rafe’s younger cousin. She’s sixteen and feisty and wonderful, and I think her hair is blue this month.”
I blink at the woman who just said all of that in fond tones. I remember being sixteen. Lots of people thought I was feisty. Very few of them thought I was wonderful. “Um, I might have something. Do you know what piercings she has?”
The woman on the screen flashes a grin that looks eerily like her adopted son’s. “There are a few I’m not supposed to know about, but she’s got several in her ears, one in her nose, and a very cute ring in her belly button, although if you meet her, please don’t tell her I called any part of her cute.”
Dammit, I don’t want her to be nice. Or understanding of sixteen-year-old girls with more attitude than they know what to do with. “That’s a pretty wide range, then.” I flail helplessly in my head. Parental units are going on my hard limits list the second I figure out how to extract from this particular ring of hell.
Rafe’s mom leans toward her screen. “Whatever you’re wearing on your left ear is really beautiful. Do you have any more like that?”
I reach up and realize I’m still wearing the steampunk cuff I was trying to get good product shots of earlier. “These aren’t for piercings, actually.” I tug it off so I can show her, and grab Rafe’s ear because he deserves it. “They slide on and wrap around just like this.”
He sits perfectly still as I make him model steampunk fairy gear.
His mother has a perfectly straight face when I turn back to the laptop screen, but her eyes are spilling over with laughter. “That one is just lovely. I’ll take it.”
I wince. “They’re kind of expensive.”
She gives me a look, and I know exactly where Rafe gets his stubborn, bossy streak. “Good art should be. I’ll be delighted to pay whatever it’s worth, assuming you can bear to part with it. It looks absolutely lovely on you.” Her eyes crinkle. “And on him.”
I sigh, because even my thorns can’t resist this much steadfast sweetness. “I can mail it tomorrow. Would you like me to wrap it up? I have some new boxes for the steampunk stuff that are pretty cool. And some black ribbon.”
She beams at me. “That would be wonderful. I’m a disaster with anything that involves tape, which Rafe can attest to. But there’s no need to mail it. You can deliver it yourself on Sunday. Gabriella’s birthday isn’t until next week.”
I blink at her, because the steel jaws of a trap just closed around my leg and I never even saw it coming.
The man beside me clears his throat and manages to sound fairly chagrined. “I hadn’t asked her about that yet, Mom.”
Laughter from the computer screen. “So I gathered from both your faces.” She looks directly at me. “Rafe’s bringing you to Sunday dinner, sweetie. It will be small this week, probably only twenty of us or so. If you have any favorite things you like to eat, we have several cooks who would love to make you something special.”
I have no words. I just nod numbly and try not to cry. I’m not sure what schedule I’m on with this whole thing yet—but I’m pretty sure I just got adopted.
Chapter Fifty-Four
Epilogue - Rafe
I wanted her to begin to get to know my family. To see my roots. To meet those in my life who know what it is to choose their people in ten minutes and then spend a lifetime making it work.
I didn’t expect this.
I lean forward, because I can feel India vibrating beside me. “She loves fudge. The icy mint one.”
My mom’s eyes light up. “Perfect. Thank you.” She gives me a look, one that says I did good and we’d better be there on Sunday. Then she gives the woman beside me a smile that could make angels cry—and hangs up.
India jolts as the screen goes blank.
I laugh and snug her into my chest. “Sorry. My mom is terrible at small talk. She heads straight for the important stuff and then she bails.”
India snickers into my chest.
Something inside me relaxes. “She makes better fudge than I do, though. You’ll be in good hands.”
She snorts. “I haven’t agreed to go yet.”
We both know that’s a lie. I hold her gently. The tremors aren’t done yet.
She sighs. “This is so damn fast.”
It is. “That’s how you roll. You chose your friends that fast, your career, your house…”
She grunts into my t-shirt. “I’ve been talking way too much in my sexual delirium.”
I grin, loving every part of that sentence. “And here I was hoping you had all your wits about you.”
She pushes back from my chest, clearly catching the new note in my voice.
I kiss her nose. “I thought we might go flying. Find ourselves a backwoods dirt strip to land on and go have a picnic in the woods.”
She gives me a dirty look. “It’s nearly dark. We’d crash and freeze our asses off. And I’d miss book club, which means the reckless readers of Crawford Bay would drink all my good alcohol and try to give each other unsupervised piercings.”
I really am joining her book club. “Fine. We’ll go flying tomorrow then. I was going to see what you thought of my new jewelry, but clearly you need to get bonbons ready for your ladies.”
Her eyes get wide, and it isn’t because I used bonbons in a sentence. She hops off her chair and yanks on my arm. “Stand up, dude. Pants off.”
I grin at her. “You have such a way with romance.”
She snorts. “This isn’t romance. It’s frisking. Possibly followed by seizure of stolen property.”
I pat her shoulder. “Ladies. Bonbons.”
“No, way.” She backs up, dragging me along with her. “I’m about to have dinner with your mother. I’ve earned an hour with your cock and whatever you made him pretty with.”
I scowl, which takes work. “Pretty and cock should never be used in the same sentence.”
She rolls her eyes and keeps dragging me to her lair. Or her bedroom, which is where I presume we’re headed. “You can’t stay for book club. But you can bunk in my garden cottage for a while if you want. Judy’s other granddaughter wants a quiet place to write her thesis.”
My head whiplashes hard enough to do permanent damage. I take advantage of the laws of physics and the fact that I outweigh her by a hundred pounds and drag us both to a halt. “Could you repeat the part about your cottage, please?”
She makes a face. “It’s no big deal. You need somewhere to live. My garden shed likes to be occupied.”
I’m a little stupefied.
Okay, a lot stupefied.
She huffs and starts dragging me off to her lair again. “You can be my garden gnome in residence. Like one of those artist programs, except with sexual favors.”
She can dress it up in whatever costumes she wants. Her house and her garden are where she hides from the world, and she just invited me to hang out right in the middle. I pull us to a ha
lt again, and this time I wrap her in my arms.
She struggles for a moment, and then she goes pliant against me, her head cuddled into my chest.
I let my body say the words she doesn’t want to hear yet.
She sighs out softly.
I stay perfectly still. Letting the feet of her butterfly rest on my heart.
NEXT UP: I have such a nice surprise for you. Daley’s story wrote itself fast and furious, so that one is ready for you too! Get Shaded Lines, the final book of the trilogy.
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If you can’t follow a link from here, go to liliamoon.com and I’ll get you hooked up.
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xoxo Lilia