Page 84 of Wolf Bane
Mal and Waltripleft at the same time, and we pretended not to notice how they lingered by Waltrip’s car for nearly half an hour before Mal had to go back into his own house.Waltrip had been quiet about whatever he’d discussed with Cullen, only telling us he’d be out of pocket for the next week because he had a lead on the Monk and Hood group.He’d hesitated before leaving, finally telling us “If Justin is serious about getting back to work in his cytopath stuff, let me know.I may have something for him.”
“What?You’ve got a lab lying around?”I asked, incredulous.“Or you suddenly need a doctor on staff?”
“Not me,” Waltrip said with a small smile.“Just tell him to call me.”
Ethan helped me clean up the coffee cups and wash out the pot while we argued gently about dinner, whether it was too late or we were too tired.Finally, he just made us two bowls of oatmeal.
I had mine with too much brown sugar, just the way I liked it.Ethan was the responsible one and had his plain.“You lack whimsy,” I muttered around a mouthful, surprisingly hungry after all.
“For someone who knows better, you sure do eat like you’re immortal.”
“Well, we don’t know the extent of what Garrow did to me, do we?For all we know, I might be.”
Ethan’s expression froze mid-bite.
“Sorry,” I said.“Sometimes if you don’t laugh you have to scream, and I really don’t want to scare the neighbors.”
Ethan just nodded.We finished our oatmeal in silence.When I got up to wash the bowls, he stopped me with a hand to my wrist.“I’m tired of worrying you’re gonna be taken from me, Landry.And I don’t just mean by Garrow, or someone who has a beef with you being what you are.When you were missing, all I could think wasif he’s dead…”
“But I’m not,” I whispered, letting him pull me closer, down into his lap so he could press his face against my shoulder.“I’m not dead.And I won’t be any time soon.”Which, I knew, could very likely be a huge lie.
“I still want to marry you,” he said against my neck, the prickle of his beard.“I know it’s not going to magically protect you.Or me.But, Landry, I don’t want either of us to die without being husbands.Without… without that tie between us.Because I love you and I have since we were sixteen and seventeen years old.And the years we were apart were godawful, and I don’t want to go one more week without rings on our fingers.”He huffed, pulling back to look at me with surprisingly red, shiny eyes.“Sorry I’m not more romantic, but?—”
His startled grunt when I kissed him was the only answer we needed.
ChapterTwenty-One
Thursdays were a good day to get married, I decided.Everyone had either taken the day off work or, as was the case for Reba, Gina Perrin, and myself, didn’t have work to go to that day.
Which… okay, that sucked but I had high hopes things would be improving soon.Mostly.
Cullen had been a bit tight-lipped about things, but I knew now, better than ever before, that he actually was on our side and not just the ICW’s puppet.
Still, even knowing that, Ethan hadn’t looped him into the situation with the Lugaru weres.He and Benoit had had a few phone calls, even more video chats, some very rapid-fire email exchanges, and were… well, not on their way to healing a rift by a long shot but tentatively agreeing to work together for the time being.It apparently took a shit-ton of paperwork and arcane ceremony to start your own clan and neither of them felt favorably towards dealing with that level of headache for the time being.
That didn’t stop Ethan from trying to ‘make things right’ for Benoit and his people.The only problem was, there was no telling whatmaking it rightlooked like.Benoit and his clan didn’t want to reunify with the Belmarais bunch, but they didn’t want to beignoredeither.So,for now, it meant a lot of talking, a lot of feeling each other out and posturing.
I’d had a few calls with Zero, who was slowly creeping back to their version of normal.They were one of the lucky ones who seemed to be recovering from the virus, but it wasn’t linear as far as we could tell.And until there was a definitive treatment, we just had to cross our fingers and spit in our hats that they’d continue to improve.
And nobody was talking about Daniel at all.
Still, I couldn’t help feeling like this was all a razor-thin ledge we were on, and it was about to crumble.Not any sixth sense, just knowing my history and how the universe liked to fuck with me.
Gina Perrin wandered over to us, her hair an elegant twist of braids and wearing a dress that made her look like a storybook princess with buttery yellow layers of sheer fabric over a sky-blue sheath.“You’re too fancy for us,” I said as she drew nearer.“I feel under-dressed.”
She grinned.“After this past week, I wanted to feel nice and look nice,” she said, smoothing her hands over the frilly layers of her dress.“And you’re looking sharp yourself, Landry.You and Ethan both.”
Ethan preened a little in his good dark blue suit.“I clean up good when I’m not in the middle of a life-altering crisis.”
Both of them looked at me.I just shrugged.“I’m usually the cause of the life-altering crisis.But I still look good anyway.”
Gina Perrin rolled her eyes.“You two were made for each other.”She glanced past me, her grin widening.“Reba’s here.Looks like she brought another metric ton of peanut brittle.I should go help take some off her hands.”
Gina (it really was easier just to say Gina, but I didn’t want her to think I was getting complacent) hustled across the lawn towards Reba and Reba’s partner Chester, rarely seen and even more rarely heard, to help take a few boxes of her specialty brittle before they toppled from the stack they were both carrying.Reba exclaimed over Gina’s dress and Chester just nodded as the three of them disappeared into the house with the boxes, reappearing a minute or so later with bottles of soda and, for Reba, a beer.
“Look, Uncle Landry!Look, look, look!”Mariska’s spiraling spin took her perilously close to the edge of the back porch where Mal swooped in and snatched her up before she could tumble into the heavy concrete planters full of Ethan’s marigolds.“Dad!I had it!”
“Yes, and you almost very nearly had a concussion to boot.Come on, let’s go find your shoes so we can get going.”
