Page 27 of Clarity

“Don’t do that,” I laughed. “I…this is different.”

Rhys chuckled. “So… you don’t deny it then?”

My mouth fell open, but I didn’t say anything.

WhatcouldI say?

“Relax,” Roseline laughed. “It’s not like you can help it, or like you should want to. Congratulations, Riv.”

“Yuup,” Rhys agreed, coming around the counter to hug me. “I told ol’ boy he better not fuck around with my cousin,” he said, with his big arms still tight around me. “Told him I’ma put the type of hex he couldn’t get rid of on him.”

I gasped, leaning back to look him in the face. “Parris is incredibly powerful, he could?—”

“Still get his ass hurt? Mmmhmm.” Rhys chuckled as he let me go. “The family magic is back in action, baby, you ain’t realized? Now I ain’t saying I’d win, but I’d definitely give his ass something to think about for the rest of eternity.”

“Won’t be necessary,” Parris spoke up, from the door. “I told you already. I couldn’t hurt Riv if I wanted to, not with the type of bindings we’ve done.”

“Plural.” Roseline giggled from her perch at the counter. “Y’all so extra.”

“No,thisis extra,” Parris complained, pointing at the door again. “You reset the vampire trap? You know I could just destroy this, right?”

I looked to Roseline, who seemed genuinely surprised. “I never erased the first one. I didn’t touch it all. I guess now that the conduit is restored, a little smudge isn’t enough to keep the rune from working.”

I thought she would tag a “my bad” or something onto the end of that, but instead… she just shrugged.

There’s the Roseline I know.

Laughing, I moved to the doorway. Instead of just smudging the rune, this time I wiped one of the symbols completely out. It wasn’t until it was fully unrecognizable that Parris was able to move.

“Hey,” he said, grabbing my hand.

“Hey, yourself,” I countered, trying my hardest not to start beaming, but honestly?

Only because we were in front of Rhys and Roseline.

“Man, y’all go somewhere with the lovey dovey shit,” Rhys grunted, only barely keeping his face straight as he joined Roseline behind the counter, and she nodded.

“Yeah, ew. Get a fucking room,” she added, with a quick wink.

“I’m actually taking her back home anyway, so fuck y’all,” Parris groused, frowning while I laughed.

Clearly he wasn’t yet familiar with our dynamic.

And I wasn’t about to teach him either. I could probably getyearsof laughs by letting him figure it out on his own.

In the meantime, I rushed back upstairs to say my goodbyes to my mother and Clerie, then Rhys and Roseline, and a quick stop back by St. Louis No. 1 to lay yarrow and magnolias at Este’s tomb before we got on our flight.

That was something Parris couldn’t affect.

The time the flight took was just the time it took, but those couple of hours gave us the opportunity toactuallytalk, and get a better sense of who the other was, rather than preconceived notions.

Based on his stories… Parris wasexactlythe wild boy I already believed he was.

His claim was that he’d been doing those things—fighting and fucking and whatever the hell else—because he was trying to fulfill that empty space we’d loosely talked about before.

When I asked him if he would stop though…

“I definitely won’t be fucking anybody but you,” he swore earnestly, and really… I appreciated the transparency.

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