Page 31 of A Bloom in Winter

“I can make more?” Fritz’s wrinkly face was pitched like a tent off the tip of his nose, and his clear concern for the adequacy of his efforts made everything seem looser. “Perhaps another dessert?”

There was a “please” dangling in the breeze, as if he needed to work out his anxiety on a flan or something—and Tohr hated that he’d worried the elderly butler, too.

Fuck.

“Absolutely.” He forced a smile at thedoggen, as regret soured his stomach. “And you know what I feel like I need? A fresh apple pie.”

“Oh! Sire!” Fritz clapped his hands like someone had offered him a winning scratch-off. “I have the most beautiful Braeburn apples. And I can sweeten them up with some Galas. And if I start now, I shall be able to provide it warm in ninety minutes!”

The butler was already turning away and going for the Crisco. Handmade and flaky as ever was the only way a crust was happening in this, or any Brotherhood, household.

Tohr pressed a quick kiss on Autumn’s mouth.

“Before you say it,” she murmured as they went over to the cellar door, “I’ll be staying for the conversation with Butch and Vishous. And yes, I know you hate it, but I live in your world alongside you. Reality is what it is, and I have a right to know.”

For a split second, Tohr entertained a fantasy that there was another zip code, far, far away from Caldwell, where there was no violence, no need for the Brotherhood’s official duties, no war with Lash and thelessers. In his utopia, he would sequester all those who he loved—

“And I just made some fresh vanilla ice cream,” Fritz announced.

“Thank you,” Autumn said. “That would be lovely.”

The pair of them descended together, and as he held the warm, vital hand of his mate, he was grateful for the here-and-now. And he really was going to try to not burn himself to a crisp in the future.

At the bottom, they hooked up with the Wheel’s outermost ring, and they didn’t have far to go. The next door was their quarters, and he jumped ahead and opened the way in. As Autumn stepped through, he closed his eyes and breathed in. She smelled like a summer night, clean, fresh, tinted by rosebuds.

His blood stirred, and he found himself craving another kind of dessert—

“You could have cut that closer,” came the dry greeting from the sitting area. “I mean, really, you had at least three or four minutes’ wiggle room.”

Tohr leveled a stare at Butch O’Neal, but as usual, the former homicide cop was impervious to a good pipe-down-sonny and merely smiled back. Next to him on the couch, the brother’s roommate and best friend, V, was going back and forth between a cell phone and a laptop as if he were watching an argument and not sure who to back.

Vishous was always sharp as a dagger. “I was about to break out the ranch dressing—”

“Enough.”

As Tohr made a pointed can-you-please-not-freak-her-out-more glance at his mate, the two of them winced.

And Butch stammered. “Ah . . . yeah, so anyway, I . . . hey, is it time to eat?”

“Last Meal will hold,” Autumn said as she took took her place on the love seat across from the brothers. “Fritz has it in our warming drawer. What happened tonight.”

Tohr glanced around the cozy living room with its relaxed furniture and many throw blankets. Autumn liked their home to be the kind where people could kick their shoes off and curl up—and he wanted it that way, too . . . especially because so many of the conversations were so damned heavy. Like tonight’s.

This morning’s, rather.

And yes, he wished he could talk about this shit out of earshot from her. But he respected her enough not to play the chest-thumpinghellrenwho demanded that her delicate ears be protected from subjects not suitable for the fairer sex.

“What have we got, boys,” he asked in a low voice.

Butch brought his rocks glass up to his lips and took a sip of the Lagavulin in his traveler. “I went through the entire scene at Broadius’s. Very professional job. The killer knew where the security system was, knew how to disarm it, knew the layout of the house. Also knew the schedule of the staffing. He—or she—picked the dead zone right before the maid arrived. ”

Tohr glanced at Autumn. Her eyes were locked on the cop. So he just cleared his throat and continued on. “What about the body?”

“Again, our murderer was very confident in their work. No defensive wounds, no disruption in the closet except for a couple of scuffs on the wall-to-wall, and minimal blood. They’re also strong enough to carry deadweight without knocking into doorjambs or dragging the body to the bed.”

“Why bother with that,” Tohr said. “I mean, you could have just left him in the closet—”

Butch held up his forefinger. “I think there’s a message being sent. You lie in the bed you make. I’ll bet dollars to dickheads that the killer was making an example of Broadius, and took a couple of pictures to send to people. The male who did this—”

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