Page 27 of Until the End of Ever
At first there was silence as they chewed, blatantly ignoring both their drinks and the cupcakes, though they had been a favorite in the past.
“It’s so soft inside,” Cassius grumbled, shoving a fifth canelé in his mouth with his fingers.
He didn’t even bother with the little dessert fork.
“And crusty outside,” Lucian completed as the last one on his plate disappeared.
His eyes were back on the cooling rack. With a chuckle, I levitated another six, dividing them between their two plates. They had enough caramel left to not have to add any, in my opinion.
I was wrong, as Cassius reached for the pan and tipped a positively outrageous amount of salted caramel butter on his plate. “You seem a woman of good sense as well as wonderousabilities. May I enquire why this is the first we’ve seen of these divine offerings?”
“Because they take forever,” I explained. “About three times longer than anything else I’ve made so far. I woke up early today.”
“Some things are worth it.” He turned a glare on his grandson. “Whatever you achieved to deserve such treats, I suggest you keep doing it.”
“He made me a pretty dress,” I said with a grin, happy to be able to broach the subject. “And filled my wardrobe with tons of clothes in my size.”
“A dress?” Cassius blinked. “I could shower you with dresses every day of the year in exchange for these.”
Lucian expectedly swatted his grandfather with a kitchen towel. “Don’t make deals with a Regis,” he reminded me darkly. “Especially not this one.”
Would that have started an eternally binding promise if I said yes?
“Well, if you’re not tying her to our family, someone ought to,” Cassius snapped. “Have you tasted those things?”
“Shut up, Cassius.” Lucian turned to me. “What will it take for more of these? Say, weekly.”
I shook my head. “You guys should just hire a French baker.”
“What will it take, Valesco?” he repeated, eyes narrowed.
I couldn’t help it. I grinned. “You can’t buy me. All you can do is keep me in a good mood and hope for the best.”
Cassius finally lifted his full cup of tea to his lips, fixing Lucian in a stare. “Marry her.”
11
LUCIAN
“Oh, Theke hasn’t changed!” Kleos mused as we walked into my library.
So, she’d noticed the house slowly morphing, adapting to the feminine presence.
Frankly, it was concerning. I was rather certain our manor considered Kleos an inhabitant of the house now. The fact that she regularly poured her energy into the pool probably didn’t help.
“You’ll run out by the end of the day if you don’t stop eating them, you know,” Kleos warned me, as I put yet another one of the tiny cylindric marvels in my mouth.
“I know. I can’t stop myself. You must have cursed them,” I grumbled.
They were so fucking great, with or without that smooth, perfectly balanced marvel she called salted caramel butter.
I knew salted caramel butter. I had a jar in my pantry. What she’d made this morning wasn’t it.
And to think I’d wanted merecupcakes.
“And you’re wrong, there’s one change here,” I told her, pointing to the area where my chair used to be—catching theperfect light for reading. I brought it downstairs and replaced it with a sofa. “Got tired of you stealing my spot.”
“Nice. Is it as comfortable?”
