Page 157 of White Raven
“It’s not the rabbit food he’s after,” Athan chuckled, toweling off his hair while he trudged shirtless from the bathroom. “Smells fucking amazing.”
“Do you mean the blood he made a mess of on the counter a minute ago? Or the stuffed turkey breast I’m about to pull out of this oven?”
“Keep rubbing it in. It’ll give me a good reason to tear that ass up later.” Sarah snickered at his admitted failure at any attempt he ever tried to make at cooking something other than microwave dinners—which he swore were about as poisonous as his venom. “What do you mean blood? He’s eating it?”
She waved off the steam as she lifted the aluminum foil from the roast pan, and Poe winced back at the heat. “He tried, yeah. Almost spilled my glass.”
“That’s weird. He’d never done that before.”
She didn’t want to admit that the thought had crossed her mind too. That everything since killing John—Poe…had changed things. She wasn’t sorry. And if she let herself begin to feel remorseful about it, she reminded herself that while it wasn’t just his death sentence for murdering her mother, it was also a mercy killing. He’d lived too long and was sick and tired of being—sick and tired. But it was a lie to claim that coming backhome after this wasn’t different. Uncomfortable. Not as warm and fuzzy as it had been before that dead bird had been left at her door. She hadn’t realized that she’d stood deathly still while her mind rattled off, and Athan’s bare arms wrapped around her waist.
“You might not be burning dinner, but you’re burning your hair with whatever deep thought you’re filtering through,” he mumbled in her ear. Poe nipped at his chin, warning him about his personal space, and Sarah turned to face her mate.
“Do you regret it?” she asked, searching his cerulean eyes for anything she could grab onto, and never let go.
“No. But just because we were the scales of justice, doesn’t mean we shouldn’t grieve for him. He wasn’t a bad man, Sarah. I think we both knew that the minute we realized who he really was.”
Sarah bit down on her lip. “But I didn’t know him. I never had the chance to know him, and Mom might still be here if she’d let him into my life.”
“Youwerein his life,” Athan retorted, tipping her chin with his finger. “We both were. He’s been watching us for a really long time. We shaped our lives around every written word he published. Even some he didn’t. The two of us might have known him even better than some of the people he called friends. Youknewhim, love. And you knew him intimately. Somebody recently put a lot in perspective for me about shouldering responsibility for things we have no business trying to carry. We’ve got enough responsibility now that we know what he really wanted.”
“Do we even know what the fuck that is?” she asked, sadly.
Athan smiled, nodding slightly. “Yeah. Leaving that legacy a lot better than we found it.” He traced a fingertip over the jagged shape of the scar on her neck, and she shivered. “Iknow exactly what it felt like when he described the moment he knew it was too late for your mother. The circumstances were different, but that small fucking heart attack was the same. It brought him nothing. But it brought meeverything.” Their lips brushed, and her heart thundered. “Every time I take you from here on out…I’ll be thanking that fucking maniac. When I’m so deep inside you, that I can feel that insanity take the wheel, I’ll be grateful for his brutal test of loyalty. And every time you scream my name with my fucking blood on your mouth, and ecstasy in your veins…I’ll be taking his twisted version of a blessing and thanking God himself for whatever stars he rearranged to make you fucking choose me.”
“I’m marrying you, Athan Kane…” Sarah whispered breathlessly, taking his mouth.
“You bet your poor raw ass, you are.” He palmed said ass, gripping it firmly before smacking it with enough force to steal the wind from her lungs…
And Poe made haste to his perch stand while dinner got cold, and they made up for every lost moment on those god-forsaken counters.
“So, you’ll just sign here,” the man said, sliding a clipboard her way, and pointing down at a dotted line with the tip of his pen. What did they even call these people? Nurses? Dead people keepers? It just seemed so fucking odd. Wren glanced at Athan, who stood deadly quiet next to Brent behind her. “And then I’ll just make a quick scan of your driver’s license—that is if my scanner decides to be kind today. Then that’s it. She’s all yours. I’m sorry for your loss.”
Wren scratched her signature across the paper and handed him her I.D. “Yeah…um…thanks?”
“Be right back,” he smiled, turning away from the counter and disappearing around the corner.
“You guys alright?” Brent asked, focusing his attention on them both. Wren nodded and stared at the grimy tiled floor. Athan only clenched his jaw.
“She needs a memorial service.”
Wren could see the obvious pain flashing in Athan’s eyes. There was so much lately to grieve over. Nell was so important to him, and it seemed wrong to be the one signing for her remains—and claiming everything she’d left to her.
“I don’t disagree with you. But she made it very clear in her will that she wanted to be scattered…over Theodore Roosevelt’s grave.” She couldn’t help the snort…or the smile. Athan seemed like he had trouble with that too.
“She would have married that son of a bitch if she could’ve,” he chuckled.
“In love with somebody she’d never met. Nell was born in 1933,” Wren laughed, shaking her head. “She called him fucking ‘Teddy’ like he was an old lover.” The giggling died out, and the…nurse…came back to the counter with Nell’s ashes in a thick plastic bag. Something about it just made her angry.
“Here she is,” he said politely, handling the bag with the utmost care, and handing her personal effects along with it. “Is there anything else I could do for you? Would you like some information for pendants or charms that can be made with the ashes?”
All she could think about was how Sarah must have felt…receiving merely a handful of her mother and sending all she had left of her off to be made into the stone she wore around her neck. She didn’t know Sarah then, and—Sarah did this alone. Asmuch as it sucked now, it was probably so much harder for her best friend. Grief was fucking weird.
“No,” she choked, turning her body to usher Athan forward. “Athan…I think you should be the one to take her out of here.” Brent stepped forward, wrapping an arm around her shoulders and Athan nodded once, swallowing hard, and accepting Nell’s remains. The moment that bag hit his palms, she swore she felt the sting of his heartbreak. He wore it so much better than she did. Unwelcome tears forced their way out, and her mascara ran down her cheeks while she watched him stare down at the precious woman in his hands. All that was left of her…that legacy…fit into a plastic baggie. Nothing about it seemed fair.
He breathed a dreadfully heavy sigh, blinking back emotion that no one ever saw. “Alright then, Nell.” He glanced up at them, and Brent offered a soft smile. “Let’s go get her ready for her hot date. She’s been waiting ninety years for it.”
Wren, chase that fire. Feed it. Let it grow wild and consume everything around you. Live a full life. Let yourself love. Let yourself enjoy it. Write your own page in the history books and take this opportunity to heal the broken parts. They’re not really broken. Only changed. History might forget my name, and everything I loved about the unusual circumstances in life…the unusual people that you meet in it. But it’ll remember yours. It’ll remember yours, and Athan’s and the adventures that you all experience together. I’ll be watching and cheering you on.
