“After I figure out how to do it without him thinking I was keeping it from him because I didn’t trust him. I do. I just—” I swallow. “I wanted one quiet corner that belonged to me before the world tried to own it.”
“We’ll make the corner big enough for the three of you to live in and then we’ll put razor wire around it,” Lucetta promises.
Then she glances at the items on the table. “Another package?”
“Music box,” Sunniva answers. “Totally coffin-chic. A bit over the top, if you ask me.”
Lucetta leans back against the kitchen island and folds her arms over her chest. “She’s targeting me, too. Unrelated to the packages, but definitely related to the fact that I’m in the way. She’s trying to thin the herd around you all.”
“You okay?”
“Obviously,” she answers me. “They were amateurs. I’m disappointed that she’s wasting her energy on theatrics.”
“Has she been trying to get into your head anymore?” Sunniva asks.
I sigh. “Yes. Thankfully, I can feel her before she has a chance to lock on, so it’s easy to block her out.” I glance at them both. “What about you all? Has she tried?”
“Not that I know of. My shields are pretty strong. Once I knew the truth about people having abilities, I went to work on creating shields in my mind. I think that’s another reason you’re able to block her out so easily. You’re stronger than she is. Plus, I think you have a built-in shield because of the bond with Konstantin,” Lucetta says.
“I thought I felt her once,” Sunni admits. “It was like this pressure of . . . wrongness in my head. But I just did some of the exercises you always taught us, Luce. Build the wall, secure the lock, then redirect.”
“I wonder,” Luce muses.
“Wonder what?”
“If it’s only people she has a bond with that her weak ass powers work on.” She shakes her head. “Just something to think about.”
“Giselda isn’t just sending a message with these things,” Sunniva says, tapping the box. “She’s measuring us. Seeing how close she can get before Konstantin loses his mind.”
“The let’s make sure he loses it on our timing,” I reply.
“Right. Let’s organize. Priorities first. Tell Konstantin. Lock schedules. Pick a better emergency word than ‘oh shit’,” Sunni says.
“Tell him what? That we’ve had this bitch stalking us and haven’t said anything? That she’s been trying to get into your heads? Or that he’s about to become a daddy?” Lucetta asks.
“Yes, because we were trying to protect him like he does us,” I reply, even as guilt chokes me.
“Daddy Kon,” Sunni muses, trying to break up the tension. “Sounds kind of sexy.”
I pick up one of her licorice twists and throw it at her. “Shut your whore mouth.”
“My mouth is a whore. She’ll do some shit for sweets.”
The three of us crack up before slowly sobering.
“We go to Kon. He needs to ramp up security. I want four on you and three on Sunniva. He also needs to replace those two,” she says, nodding toward the men in the foyer. “Complacency is death.”
Sunni laces our fingers together across the kitchen island. “Family meeting then.” There’s bravado mixed with resolve in her tone. “We tell the Bogeyman we’re being stalked. We let him rage and fix what fists can fix. You tell him he’s a daddy, and we keep doing what we do.”
I touch my stomach, a quick, thoughtless reflex that betrays me to myself if no one else.
Sunniva sees, of course. She doesn’t say anything, just leans across the worktop and presses her forehead to mine in a promise.
“You tell him. He’ll go nuclear and then he’ll kneel. And then he’ll build you a world that can’t touch our girl.”
“Girl?” I echo, half-laugh, half-sob.
“Don’t gender the fetus, Sunniva,” Lucetta says dryly.
