Page 33 of A Bloom in Winter

And the envelope she had left behind.

“She knew what she was doing,” Tohr said.

V nodded. “She did.”

“So why’d she deny it?”

“Well, there’s the fun part. I tried to call her back? She didn’t answer. Phone’s a burner, address was a lie, and there’s no record of that name in any of the databases.”

“So who the hell is she?”

Vishous shook his head, and shut the laptop. “At this point, your guess is as good as mine, true?”

CHAPTER ELEVEN

When the sun was properly peeking over the horizon, Callum pulled on his parka and stepped out of the garage’s secondstory living quarters. As he went to shut the door, he caught sight of something on the newel post at the top of the staircase.

With a frown, he picked up the yellow and white tube. Turning it over, he read the label: Polysporin.

He put the ointment back where it had been left for him—and with the next step he took, he felt the pain in his ankle as if it were a fresh bite.

Funny, how you could ignore something as long as you weren’t fucking reminded of it.

Yup, on the descent, he was definitely limping, and as he exited the garage, he inherited another physical inconvenience: Snow-blindness.

Covering his eyes with his bare hands, he thought,Well, hell, all I need is a good knee to the balls to finish things off.

After his retinas calmed down, he lowered his arms, but still had to fight the squint as he headed to the truck. Overhead, the last of the storm clouds had moved off, and the sky was a brilliant, robin’s-egg blue. With nothing to block the sun’s rays, and everything covered with snow, daylight was amplified to an unbearable brilliance.

Breathing in deep, the inside of his nose hummed, and when he exhaled, he created his own cloud that hung in the still air in his wake. Odd, that there was absolutely no wind. It was like the intensity of the blizzard had used up all the energy in the elements, and there needed to be some kind of recharge before there was so much as a breeze.

Before he got behind the wheel, he looked over at the big house. The safety shields were down for the day all around the rambling structure, the reflective skins providing dozens of snapshots of the winter landscape. Even with them in place and keeping the sunlight out of the interior, he was willing to bet the vampires were all underground, in those newly built subterranean bedrooms.

Screw the creepy crypts of human lore. Modern Draculas had Wi-Fi, nice sheets, and indoor plumbing.

He refused to think about which room Apex had chosen. Or whether the male had decided to sleep on top of one of the king-sized beds . . . or if he’d decided to strip down and get under all the duvets—

“Get going,” he said in a low voice.

Instead, he just stared at the Ford. The truck needed a bath, all kinds of snow streaks and salt grime dusting its flanks and hood and front windshield.

As he considered where he was headed, he recognized that there was a time when he would have shifted and traveled on paws to his destination, but he didn’t trust his other side anymore. A month ago, his wolf had broken out and he’d ended up back on Deer Mountain, where the clan was. He’d woken up naked in the cave he’d once called his home, the heated spring just as it had once been, the furniture he’d put in it more than forty years ago totally unchanged.

It had been the last thing he’d wanted to revisit. And then one of his cousins, who he hadn’t wanted to see, either, had shown up with questions and kindness.

Both equally unbearable.

So, yeah, when he’d merely come to next to the plow last night, he’d counted himself lucky.

Forcing himself into action, he yanked open the door—

And found the keys he hadn’t realized he’d left behind in the drink cup holder.

Hefting himself up, he thought, Well, fuck, some groundskeeper he was, not protecting the estate’s equipment. Although in his defense, no one would have been out in that storm.

On that note, not many were this far north at all this time of year.

After starting the engine, he hit reverse, and then realized the plow was still on—and keeping it on would be a waste of gas, and a pain in the neck on the highway. Getting back out, he went around and disengaged the thing, leaving it where it was, right in the way of the garage bays.

---