Total pages in book: 177
Estimated words: 171450 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 857(@200wpm)___ 686(@250wpm)___ 572(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 171450 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 857(@200wpm)___ 686(@250wpm)___ 572(@300wpm)
The best part about London? Lorcan had been on the other side of an ocean. She’d forgotten how oppressive the bond was when she had a reprieve from him.
Now she could almost sense Lorcan noticing her. As if he felt the bond snap tighter. It was like altitude sickness. It wasn’t so bad when you drove up the mountain, but flying into it made it come on all at once.
When Graves had helped her regain her memories, he taught her how to keep someone out of her head as much as she let him in. For her, she’d envisioned a place where she was learning to open vaults. It helped now when dealing with Lorcan.
“Are you going to stay down there all day?” Graves asked, his expression flat. He held his hand out to her.
She dropped her hand from her chest, but it was there all the same. The unsaid thing between them lingered. They’d gotten good at tiptoeing around the obvious.
“Not all day.” Kierse let him haul her to her feet. “The tea was very good in London.”
“It always is. But I poached Isolde for a reason. Why go to London when I can have the best of London right here?”
“Fair.”
She followed him up the stairs, pushing Lorcan farther out of her head.
When they reached the second-floor landing, her heart stuttered at the sight of the entrance to the Holly Library. The massive double doors with the ancient language carved into the frame of Graves’s warlock symbol, holly, reinforced the magic of his wards. A plaque at the top read The Holly Library, and when she pushed through the doors after Graves, the sight was even more beautiful.
The library was full to bursting with thousands upon thousands of books. Holly vines choked the stacks. A skylight far overhead revealed the afternoon sun. A black cat curled up in a new blue velvet couch that had mysteriously appeared one day to replace the chaise Kierse had been using for her memory lessons since they were on an indefinite hiatus.
Isolde rushed up behind her with a teapot and freshly baked scones on a tray. “So glad you’re back.” She patted her back. “I heard you went to London.”
Kierse took a scone with relish. “We did. No worries. Your food is still the best.”
“Oh, I wasn’t worried,” Isolde said with a laugh. She hugged Kierse around the middle. “Just glad to have you back is all. Too quiet without you especially when the others are all gone.”
“We’re here to stay,” Graves said, appearing out of the stacks with more volumes in hand.
“Excellent. Let me know if you need anything else,” Isolde said before hustling back out of the room.
Kierse took a bite of her scone and then offered Anne Boleyn, a tempestuous fixture of the library, her hand. “Hello, Anne.”
The cat swatted at her, hissing, and jumped down to circle Graves’s feet. The cat had clearly chosen him and not the other way around.
“He’s a bird, too,” Kierse accused. “He told me himself that he’s a raven.”
Graves managed a small smile. “She adores you.”
“She has a funny way of showing it.”
He pulled from his pile and headed into the stacks. “That’s how she shows it.”
“Her and her owner are so similar,” Kierse teased.
“Are you saying that I am tempestuous?”
“That you adore me and have a funny way of showing it?”
Graves moved out of the stacks with a question on his lips. “Should I show you?” He lifted her around the middle and set her on the table. “I can spend a very, very long time showing you.”
Their lips met, and she tried to push all her need into that one motion. Just her and Graves against the world. It would be enough.
“Welcome home, songbird,” echoed in her mind as the kiss turned heated.
Kierse ripped backward from Graves and half scrambled across the table. His eyes were round with alarm. Her hand went instinctively to her chest and the bond and the reality of Lorcan in her head. Was that…was that real? Had she made it up?
“Stay out of my head!” she yelled back into the aether.
No answer came back. What was happening?
“Wren?” Graves asked slowly, hands up as if he were approaching a wild animal.
“Sorry. I…I don’t know what happened.”
She did. She did know.
The way he tilted his head said he knew what was going on, too. That he’d recognized the problem the moment they landed back in New York and she rubbed at her chest. Lorcan was close again. The bond was close again.
“It’s been a long few days,” Graves said finally. “You need to rest. Maybe take a long shower.”
“Yeah,” she said, jumping to her feet and feeling like her body had been shot through with electricity. “Yeah, maybe you’re right. I don’t know if I can nap, though. I might go see Gen and Ethan.”