Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 109245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 546(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109245 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 546(@200wpm)___ 437(@250wpm)___ 364(@300wpm)
There you are.
He crossed the floor and dropped down onto Scar’s lap.
“I love it when you do that,” Scar said, pulling him close.
“How the hell do you do that?” Zorion asked from the direction of the cork board.
“Each of you are distinctive.” He shrugged. “If I’m not recognizing you by your voice, all of you have other tells.”
“Oh yeah?” Mirage challenged. “What’s mine?”
“Mirage, you breathe through your nose. There’s a very subtle wheeze to it because of your deviated septum, and since you’re never less than a foot from Grace, it’s easy to pinpoint him too.”
“Well damn.” Mirage gritted. “Thanks for telling everyone I have a deviated septum.”
“Opps,” Gage smirked.
“And me.”
“Valor, you’re outside so much, you always smell like nature. You’re also the heaviest out of all of us, so I can hear you coming a mile away. Zorion, your movements cut the air differently, you don’t step so much as place yourself. And because you prefer the late hours, you always smell like the chill of night air.”
He realized everyone had gone silent while he spoke.
“Interesting,” Ex said. “But I know I don’t have any tells.”
“Oh yes you do. They’re just more unique.” Gage thought about it before he said, “Ex, you have two auras. One when you’re alone, and one when you’re close to him.”
Someone swallowed roughly.
“When you’re away from Meridian, your aura frays at the edges. Your breaths are faster, closer together, as if your soul can’t settle.”
“Holy shit,” Ex sighed.
“When he’s with you”—Gage’s voice softened—“your pulse slows and your movements steadied. You also play and joke around more when he’s nearby, as if he just puts you in a good mood. But even if I couldn’t feel your auras, you carry a very noticeable scent of heat and spice from his fancy cigarettes.”
No one asked him to explain Meridian’s presence, but he knew they were waiting for him too.
“Meridian,” Gage said gently, his brows furrowing as he searched for the right words. “I feel pressure when you enter a room. Gravity. The closer you get, the heavier it becomes.”
Gage blinked, another feeling rising.
“Your darkness is like a dozen shadows gathered in one place. A coldness that settles over wherever you stand.” Gage smiled, turning toward where he felt Meridian on the other side of the room. “It’s frightening to some…but not me.”
The silence thickened before Meridian said calmly. “Good…will never fear evil, Saint.”
Ex cleared his throat.
“Damn, that’s fuckin’ deep as hell, babe,” Scar said. “Do me.”
Gage pressed his forehead to his husband’s and whispered, “You’re the easiest to find. My heart leans toward you…and I simply follow.”
“That’s some serious, insightful-ass shit right there,” Corvo said.
Gage turned toward the lead handler and sniffed.
“Corvo, for the love of everything holy, can you puhleeze find a cologne that wasn’t bottled a century ago. Stop using freakin’ Old Spice!” he yelled.
The guys cracked up, and it was just the kind of humor they needed to bring the mood back up to crazy.
“Time to eat,” Mirage called out twenty minutes later.
Gage let Scar lead him to the large dinner table.
After they all sat, he offered to say grace to bless the table, and no one objected.
As the many dishes began to circulate, he felt something else in his spirit.
Home.
“Guys!” He started right in, already laughing. “You won’t believe what I walked in on when I went to my doctor’s office.”
White Ravens
Scar
The Browns’ quarters looked like the aftermath of a Thanksgiving holiday party.
They’d consumed the kind of meal that required several eight-hour gym sessions to recover from.
Most of them had collapsed onto the couches and chairs, watching an action movie blasting on the oversized screen and critiquing every explosion, gun fight, and sparring match.
“No recoil,” Scar snorted. “And how the fuck did he just fire thirty rounds without reloading?”
Zorion tossed some popcorn at the screen. “That’s not how flashbangs work, dumbasses.”
Scar had one arm hooked lazily around Gage, who was folded into his side, warm and heavy. He’d eaten as if he’d been starving for a year. Now he was half asleep with his cheek resting against his chest.
Scar brushed his knuckles languidly along his arm while he continued yelling at the screen.
Mirage and Ex were in the kitchen, clanking dishes, the only task Grace allowed anyone to do, while he sat at the island in the center, with a beer in his hand, directing where everything went.
Ex came back into the living room, drying his hands on a towel. “You ready to go?”
Meridian nodded and stood, before he got to the door his phone buzzed loudly in his pocket.
He pulled it free and read the screen before a serious expression blanketed his face.
He didn’t speak, didn’t blink, as a slow, lethal stillness replaced the casualness that’d been there a second ago.
Meridian looked at Ex in a way that quieted the room.
Scar assumed it was Jo, alerting him of some world catastrophe that required raised hoods and their field teams.