Page 96 of Bright Soul

Now that was a change in tone from the hostile way we’d met. Cress had led me down this path, though, where I suspected he and Ben would both become my closest friends in time. Because of her, I had a future where Ihadfriends.

We gripped one another’s forearms with a new sense of kinship.

34

CRESS

After how intense Phaeron and Geo could be, it was nice to sit with Ben in the quiet conference room. We held hands, our anam cara marks brushing with the spark to remind us that we were connected too. He’d left a mark on my skin too, but one first made of deep friendship that we’d turned into something more.

We chatted around the subject, calming down together, before he finally sighed and said, “I never thought the fate of anything would hinge on me getting married.”

“Me neither.”

He snickered, and I giggled, which snowballed into a laughing fit for us both.

“I don’t even know where we’re going to find a cupid for the ceremony!” he chortled.

“Imagine if we could make Dr. Aurina do it,” I said, picturing her embittered face. That airbrushed bitch had tried to steal Phaeron’s affections, and I was angry about it anew now that I’d experienced the intimacy of his mating bond.

On second thought, I didn’t want her anywhere near him again.

“You know, Ben, we could do a lot with forever,” I added more seriously.

He sobered up as well. “I know. But it could be about as long as one week if one of us get eaten by Myuna. At the same time, it sounds like we will all gethomphedby her if we don’t make a mating circle.”

“Homph?” I echoed.

He smirked. “Thought the situation warranted some onomatopoeia.”

I laughed again and shook my head at the same time. My cheeks were starting to hurt in the good way from all the fun I’d been having within the last day. To think I could have this every day for the rest of a—hopefully—very long life with my men.

All I had to do was slay an interstellar dread goddess first. No pressure.

“I love you, Ben,” I said. “Let’s do this and see if it’s so bad.”

He squeezed my hand. “I love you too. And something tells me it’s not going to be bad at all.”

“If it doesn’t work out, we can disband it after we kill Myuna,” I continued, worrying my bottom lip between my teeth.

“Nah.” At some point, he’d swapped the smirk he wore like armor for a more genuine expression. “It’s going to be amazing. You kidding? First thing I’m going to do is steal your celestial magic and piece it together with mine. Maybe together we make one celestial witch.”

I was a little surprised that was what he’d go for, but maybe he was right. He’d practiced and ended up with a better basic grasp of the spells than I did, and I was the one with the light in my soul. Come to think of it, my birth mother’s ghost hadn’t appeared much lately. I should’ve practiced harder with her.

“Good luck with that,” I chuckled. “Should I get Phaeron and Geo to come back?”

“Nah. Let them figure some of their shit out first. C’mere, babe,” he said, patting his lap. We cuddled together for a while, to my less than subtle sigh of relief. I’d definitely overdone the animaris yesterday. It’d healed away most of the lingering soreness I’d otherwise have, but I was content to have my lady bits relax after sharing so much passion in a short time with him and Phaeron.

He took my phone and worked on setting up a plan with four lines. I rested my head on his shoulder and watched him type in a card number straight from memory. “I always forget it’s a ‘Ph,’” he said, going back and fixing his spelling of Phaeron’s name.

“You have this memorized?” I asked, raising a brow up at him.

“Yeah. You think he knew how to set any modern stuff up? I got him a bank account and credit card and made sure he paid all the bills for our place.” He shrugged underneath me. “Now he’s making our cell plan payment. We can change the name on the account later.”

“Out of curiosity, do you know how much money he has?” I asked.

“Let’s see.” He navigated to a bank’s website and logged in. Snickering, he added, “Nice.”

Phaeron had $969.47to his name. “Fuck, we’re all broke,” I said, covering my face. “You, Geo, and I have nothing.”

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