Eight
The relief I felt just seeing duffel bags, suitcases, and clothes on hangers being walked into my home was amazing.
Our home.
I shivered watching Cole.
“What are you doing?” he asked.
“Looking at you.” I stared at the beautiful man. We hadn’t had a moment alone since we’d confirmed that he was my mate, and I wanted one.
“Well, maybe you could help me instead? That way we can get this done so I can go get us something to eat or—do you cook?”
It took me a second to process what he’d said. “What?”
“Can you cook?”
I squinted at him. “Of course I can cook. Who can’t cook?”
“Me, for one.”
“Really?”
“Yes, really. It’s not a character deficit or something, it’s just not something I’m good at.”
“Well, then you’re fortunate for the second time today,” Ondine told Cole. “For Merritt is an excellent cook. The things he enjoys, he masters. Like pruning those little bonsai trees. There are several in here, and they’re all ancient.”
“That is very good news,” Cole told me with a grin that made his eyes warm. “Because we need to wake Evan up soon so we can feed him. Is it all right if I put his things in the guest room?”
“It will be his room now,” I told him. “You do whatever you want.”
The possessive way he was looking at me was making my breath catch.
“So it’s you, me, and Evan here, as well as Teague and Ondine.”
“Both of them are here sporadically, but they’ll always have a place with me.”
“Oh no, of course. I’m looking forward to getting to know them both.”
“Well, Ondine you will, but Teague is…”
“Difficult,” Ondine chimed in.
“Is he?”
She nodded.
“He’s not,” I assured Cole. “He’s just quiet.”
“And difficult,” she repeated, crossing her arms.
Cole looked from me to her, then back again. “Some history I’m missing? Lover’s quarrel?”
“Hah! Lover’s quarrel,” she spat. “As though I would ever take an elf to my bed.”
“Let’s get back to moving clothes,” I suggested.
“Why don’t you make a cheese and fake bacon quiche and that wonderful tomato soup.
It’s cold outside, and I think that would be lovely.
” Ondine yawned, and when she stretched, her hair went from blond to jet black, so dark that the highlights in it were midnight blue.
She was also wearing flannel pajama bottoms, fuzzy slippers, and a baggy long-sleeved T-shirt all of a sudden.
The only thing that remained the same was the messy bun.
“That’s amazing,” Cole told her.
She grunted, picked up a laundry basket with toiletries in it, draped some clothes on hangers over it, and headed for my bedroom. Or our bedroom, mine and Cole’s, now.
“Are you gonna eat?” I called after her.
“Of course I’m going to eat,” she snarled back.
Cole turned to me.
“She’s just hungry, which is weird because she doesn’t have to eat, but when she wants to, she gets like that.”
“I think she’s luminous.”
I grunted. “We’ll see how luminous you think she is when she eats everything in the house and forgets to tell you.”
“I can’t wait.” He gave me a blinding smile before following her.
I went to the kitchen and started pulling out everything I needed, excited to be cooking for Cole and Evan. I wanted to show the man that I could take care of him and his brother.
It was fun to listen to snippets of his conversation with Ondine as they came in and out of the bedroom, picking up and carrying things.
“Apparently, I know nothing about sirens,” he told her. “I thought they were mermaids who hung out on rocks near coastlines and tried to get sailors to steer their boats into reefs.”
“Sirens come in many different sizes and colors,” she teased him.
“I just thought they wanted to kill sailors.”
“I mean, some do that.” She shrugged. “But they also come onto the land and hunt down men who have committed atrocities out on the sea.”
“Really?” Cole sounded surprised, and then they were both gone again.
I was grating cheese when they came back out.
“So even if you can’t hear, a siren can still enthrall you?”
“Of course. Sirens rely on more than just audible seduction.”
“Why?”
“Being reliant on only one form of temptation would be careless,” she told him. “Simple song would have made my sisters obsolete.”
“Makes sense.”
“A siren may also lure with sight, touch, and smell. We are the most fearsome of creatures, though I’ve always found wolves to be most susceptible to song. Perhaps it’s the fact that you engage in your own that makes it so.”
She meant the howling.
“Could be,” Cole agreed, following her into the bedroom again.
I was slicing up plant-based bacon a bit later when Evan got up, stumbled over to the island, and took a seat.
“Feel better?”
“Something smells good over here.”
“That’s the onions sautéing in garlic and butter. It always smells good.”
“I’m hungry.”
“Don’t worry, I’m gonna feed you.”
“Merritt, were people yelling before?”
“Yes. Your aunt and uncle don’t want you and Cole moving in with me, but that’s what I want and what he wants, and I hope you will too.”
“Will I have my own room?
“Of course.”
“Can we get a dog?”
“Certainly. I love dogs. We can go to the shelter.”
He nodded. “It’s really beautiful here, and it smells good, like rain, and the fire makes it nice and warm and… I have bad dreams,” he blurted out.
“I’m sorry.”
“But I feel like, maybe, I won’t have bad dreams here.”
“I hope that will be the case.”
“Is it okay if I call you Mere? I didn’t ask before.”
“Of course.”
“Where’s my room?”
I pointed. “Right over there.”
“Under the arch with the hobbit door?”
“Would we call that a hobbit door?” I didn’t love that. They were double doors, and nothing was round. Nothing Bilbo Baggins about it.
“It’s awesome.”
“Okay, then. Go see the room.”
He scrambled off the barstool and ran. After I was done prepping the quiche and putting it into the oven, I flipped a dishtowel over my shoulder and went to see what he thought.
I found him sitting on the floor on a thick, soft rug made from jute and cotton and wool, staring at the fire blazing away in the small hearth.
“I love that there’s a fireplace in here,” he told me. “And I’ll make sure it’s out before I leave to go to school.”
“Well, I can do that too. I got these going before I left today, and they’ve been safe for years, so even if you forget, it’s okay.”
“I won’t forget.” He lifted his head, looking up at the cave-like ceiling. “Was this room dug out of the side of a mountain?”
“Well, a hill on this far side. It felt safe to me to have it be out of the wind.”
“It was hard to see much in the dark.”
“I know. I’ll show you around properly tomorrow since I can’t imagine you’re going to school. Maybe I can get Teague to come down and walk you farther than the grounds if you’re up to it.”
“I will be, and that would be great.”
“Good.”
After a moment he said, “It’s beautiful in here. Your whole house is like—”
“Our house,” I corrected him. “You live here now, if you want. I would never force you to stay where you—”
“I go where Cole goes until I either go to college or work with him in his construction business. I already help him every summer.”
I nodded.
“You’re sure you don’t mind me being here?”
“I’m thrilled to have you here,” I assured him. “But there’s other people too, and we should get back to the kitchen so I can introduce you to Ondine.”
His eyes went wide as he stared at me.
“Goddess, what?”
“Is she magic, like Teague?”
“Yes, but don’t bring up Teague, all right? She’s not all that crazy about him.”
“What did he do?” Of course that was his first question.
“Oh, she’s gonna like you,” I told him.
As he followed me out, Cole and Ondine came out of my bedroom. Ondine’s smile when she saw Evan was big.
“Hi.” He rushed over, holding out his hand. “I’m Evan.”
“Ondine.” Her voice was silky and warm. She didn’t take his hand; instead she held out her arms for him.
Immediately, he went into her embrace, and after a moment, he took a big breath and his eyes welled with tears.
“Oh, love,” she murmured, rubbing circles on his back. “You are utterly safe here. You saw it yourself, didn’t you? When all your friends passed out but you alone remained on your feet.”
He nodded but didn’t let her go.
“And those forgotten patches of magic, those don’t show up hardly ever. I promise you, we can walk from one end of Merritt’s land to the other and won’t hit one. We might see some bears and coyotes, and so many deer, but no spooky old magic.”
“Okay,” Evan said, his voice breaking, his breathing uneven.
“Shall we go play a game until the food is ready?”
He sniffled, nodded, then took a step back and smiled at her.
“I have headsets. How are you with a flamethrower?”
His eyes got big.
“Come on.”
She led him up the stairs, chatting the whole way, and showed him the secret way to unlock her door. When it opened, a rush of briny sea air filled the house like a wave.
Cole turned to look at me, pointing up at Ondine’s room. “I wanna know what it looks like in there.”
“It looks like the bottom of a lagoon, with sunlight on top and deep water on the bottom.”
“How?”
“Unlike me, she is a magical creature.”
“Oh, you’re magic all right.”
“No. I have two forms and I can draw a boundary. That’s the extent of my power.”
“What about talking to ghosts?”
“I know a lot of regular people who talk to ghosts. My friend Crystal is a witch, and Leroy Banyon—he’s married to Sasha, who has bees and makes different honey blends for the restaurant—he’s a shaman.
He travels all over the US and Canada helping people, and I’m proud to call him my friend.
He does cheat at cards, though, but so does Ondine. ”
“Fine, you’re not magical.”
“I’m really not, just old.”
His eyes narrowed. “How old?”
“I’d rather not say.”
He exhaled sharply. “I need to talk to Ondine and let her know that my brother is sort of desperate to have an older sister or mother figure in his life. He never had one. I had my mom for ten years before he was born, but he never did.”
“Did Narah or any of the other pack members not mother him?”