To marry me.
He saw me staring and walked over, holding out a hand—the left, a silver ring shining on his ring finger—to take mine. He reached up, grabbing the side of my face to kiss me.
By the time he let me go, my neck and face were on fire, and not just because it was Richmond in August. It was mostly because of the hooting and catcalls that hadn’t all come from our friends because we’d just been making out on the sidewalk outside the courthouse.
“We should go,” I half-whispered against his lips.
“Mmhmm.” He kissed me again. “The sooner we go to this party, the sooner we can leave it?”
“Something like that, yeah,” I replied, the flush in my cheeks only getting hotter.
Mason and Wardhosted the party—both because they had the most space, and also because then the kids could be put to bed when their bedtime rolled around. The amount of food wasstaggering—Mason and Taavi and Hart had clearly gone all out.
I was sitting in Mason’s garden, which, although smaller and less impressive than Gregory Crane’s, was still really impressive for one in a tiny Richmond back yard, so that I could have my feet up. I was pretty sure Ward and Mason didn’t own all of the mismatched garden and beach chairs cluttering up the grassy parts of the yard, and the whole thing was bathed in the warm glow of citronella tiki torches that were miraculously keeping most of the mosquitoes at bay.
That, and Jackson, who was apparently practicing his magical control by occasionally sniping mosquitoes with death magic. Or so Ward had told me proudly.
I wasn’t entirely certain how to feel about that. On the one hand, I’m not a fan of mosquitoes—I don’t think anybody is—but on the other, that meant that there was a teenager shooting little jets of death magic through the air.
Ward laughed at what must have been a rather conflicted expression on my face. “Don’t worry,” he told me, patting my arm—his wheelchair was parked next to my wooden lounge chair. “There’s not enough strength in any of those to do more than kill a few random bacteria and maybe a skin cell or ten if he misses.” His grey eyes sparkled in the flickering torch light. “But he’s not missing.”
“Does he do this a lot?” I asked.
“Given that Grace will throw an absolute tantrum if she gets bit—yeah, he does.” His features regarded both his adopted orc daughter and nephew with fondness.
“Hey!” Quincy came over and plopped down in the empty lawn chair—this one fabric stretched over a metal frame that looked like it belonged in the 1970s—on my other side. “I had no idea that Hart was abaker,” she told me, her wide eyes serious. She was clearly very tipsy. “This cake isamazing.” She had what I was pretty sure was her third or fourth piece of cake.
The cakewasgood, although I had no idea how Hart had somehow even found the time to make a wedding cake in the last few days. I was suspicious that he hadn’t slept much, given how elaborate it was. The cake was layers of chocolate and vanilla cake, with vegan champagne buttercream frosting and blackberry filling. The top had been decorated with icing roses and piles of fresh blackberries. Mason had also put a single blackberry in every glass of champagne.
“You should have more cake,” Quincy told me, very seriously. “It’s so good.”
“I’ve got him covered,” came Elliot’s amused voice from behind me. He did, in fact, have a generous slice of cake—with a few more berries—on a plate that he handed me. “If we don’t eat it all, Val will be mortally offended.”
I felt my eyebrows go up. “Seriously?”
“You’ve met Ma, right?” he asked, and I couldn’t help chuckling. He wasn’t wrong—Judy Hart absolutely got hurt feelings if you didn’t finish your dinner and have both seconds and thirds.
I took the plate from Elliot, still smiling. “More cake it is, then.”
It was almosttwo in the morning by the time I lay spread-eagled and panting on the hotel bed Elliot had insisted we get for the night, sweaty and thoroughly sated. Elliot lay next to me on his side, running a finger across one of the still-fresh-and-tender scars on my chest. “How does it feel?” he asked me.
I looked down at the scar. “A little sore, but fine?” I’m sure I sounded as confused as I felt.
“Not the scar, baby,” he said gently, a smile playing around his lips. “Being Seth Crane.”
I grinned at him. “Like coming home.”
He laughed, then kissed me. “Are you saying you want to stay here?”
“God, no. I want to go back to Shawano. I just—You’re my home,” I told him, feeling my neck heat a little.
He smiled at me, the lopsided expression tender. Then his fingers slid into the sweat-dampened hair on the back of myneck, pulling us tighter together. “I love you, Seth Crane,” he said softly.
“I loved you first,” I told him, and then I kissed him, pulling his lips against mine.
21
Elliot Crane
