A Crown Of Smoke And Ash - Sloane Murphy Page 0,85
of you, either move to the table or shift out of here. I’ve got magic to make.” She winks at me, and I blow her a kiss. She’s like the grandmother I always wished I had. She grabs my arm as we go to leave the room, and waits until they’ve left.
“I made you a cheesecake. It’s in the wine fridge, I had to hide it from those heathens. Enjoy, sweetheart,” she whispers, looking over my shoulder to make sure they’re all gone, and I can’t help but laugh as I hug her tightly.
“Thank you, I will protect it with my life. From them, not from my fork.”
“Anything for you, now go on, get out of here. I’ve got a treat in store for you.” She winks and shoos me from the kitchen. I find the others back in the sitting room, all sat around the coffee table as if this were a war room. Though I suppose with everything going on, it very well could be in the future.
“What did I miss?” I ask as I settle next to Kain, leaning into him when he lifts an arm for me to slot under.
“We’re thinking about trying to get some more information. The hybrid we had proved to have little information, before he… expired. We need someone further up the food chain. The hybrids, powerful as they are, they’re the foot soldiers for whatever is coming,” Levi says with a small grimace.
“You killed it?” I ask, looking at each of them, and Kain holds me tighter.
“We had no choice, mon amour. We could not very well let such a being go.”
“No, I don’t mean that. I meant, I didn’t get to speak to it properly.” I try not to be angry. I didn’t want to be around when they were torturing the creature for information, but that doesn’t mean I didn’t want to ask some questions of my own. Learn more about it myself.
“What did you want to know, that we didn’t ask?” Creek looks at me incredulously, and I roll my eyes at him.
“Well, considering I don’t know exactly what you found out yet, I don’t know do I? But I am not just going to be cast aside. I am not a useless part of this team.” I nail him with a look, and he holds up his hands. I’ve never seen Roman look so smug, because he wasn’t here when it happened.
“Next time, Angel. I’ll make sure that you get your time with whoever we question,” Levi says with sorry eyes. “I just didn’t want there to still be a threat here when you returned. This place is meant to be a safe haven for you. Always has been.”
I smile tightly and nod. I get it, I get that they want to protect me, but holy freaking fates, I don’t need that much protecting.
“I mean, if you’d seen her in action at the compound, you might think differently. I’ve never seen her fight like that before,” Roman says with a shrug. “Don’t get me wrong, I don’t want her hurt either, but maybe we need to give Princess a bit more credit.”
“Dinner!” Everly calls through, and I’ve never seen such relief from the other three. I’ll leave it, it’s done, but as much as I love them, we are going to have issues if they don’t stop keeping me in bubble wrap. I am not a helpless girl, maybe I just need to remind them of it.
With that in mind I fire off a text to Fallon, and smile to myself.
I follow my nose to the kitchen, and see the big gooey lasagna in the middle of the table with garlic sticks also covered in cheese. “Oh my god,” I gasp, and Everly beams.
“I remembered you saying how it was one of your favorites, and since you’ve been gone, I thought it would be nice to come home to. I even made sure to add extra mushrooms.” I hug her tight, because despite having not spent much time with her, this woman is quickly beginning to mean a whole lot to me.
“Thank you,” I gush before letting her go. Her cheeks heat and she waves me off.
“It was nothing.”
“It really wasn’t.” I smile at her, and sit down at the table with her. The guys are already seated, and someone already poured me a glass of whiskey. I look around the table, and despite everything, I think, slowly, we’re becoming our own kind of family.