Olives #3
Tanyn’s eyes were getting red.
Oh boy!
“And he got pissed about this thing because he’s loyal, but he’s also an idiot,” Uly concluded.
“Again, fuck off,” Nayden spat.
“I told him you were not,” Uly explained to Tanyn, completely ignoring Nayden. “An idiot, that is. You wouldn’t have picked Catla if she wasn’t the one for you. So he needed first, to chill, and second, to butt out.”
Nayden sighed very loudly.
“And now, he knows he’s wrong, he’s just too demon to admit it,” Uly summed up.
“You can’t be too demon,” Nayden returned.
“You would think not, but you prove that wrong,” Uly ribbed, then drove it home, “Repeatedly.”
“Just to say,” Nayden said to Tanyn, “she won me over.”
Oh.
Well then.
Lovely.
“I’m so glad she won you over,” Tanyn drawled sardonically. “That’s been pressing on my mind.”
“Now you can fuck off,” Nayden returned.
“Oh my gods, do you males behave like this all the time?” I asked.
They all turned to me with equally befuddled expressions on their faces.
“Behave like what?” Tanyn asked back.
“I think I’ve heard the word ‘fuck’ more in the last five minutes than I have in the last five years,” I explained.
“Does cursing offend you?” Uly asked curiously.
“No. It’s only when its usage is aided and abetted by an overabundance of testosterone that devolves into pissing in corners that I don’t find offensive, but I might strain my eye muscles with how badly I need to roll my eyes at it.”
Uly looked at Nayden. “Totally like her.”
“Kiss ass,” Nayden replied.
“Bro, she understands we’re stacked in testosterone,” Uly returned.
“For fuck’s sake,” Tanyn muttered.
But I busted out laughing.
When I was done, Tanyn growled, “Get over here.”
Since he was sitting in a chair, and I was sitting in one four feet away from him, I asked, “Over where?”
“Fuck it,” he said, got up, reached, pulled me clean out of my chair, almost doing the unforgiveable: making me spill my martini. He then sat back in his, arranged me on his lap, and said, “Here.”
Although I wasn’t in the habit of sitting on someone’s lap in company (or out of it, really), I couldn’t say I was uncomfortable.
So I didn’t.
I said, “Oh,” and then sipped my drink.
“Och, are we late? I hope we’re not late. I didn’t know if I should change,” Zyra said as she and Manny bustled in (well, she bustled, Manny strolled).
“You’re not late, Zyr, and we don’t dress for dinner,” Tanyn told her, pushing me off his lap that he’d just pulled me into so he could go to her and kiss her cheek.
He also clapped Manny on the shoulder.
But he repositioned us in the chair as Nayden asked for their drink orders and they settled in.
“You’re looking good,” Uly said to Zyra.
“Some tightness. And I think I’ll have an early night, because I have some fatigue,” Zyra said. “But other than that, fit as a fiddle.”
“Good to hear,” Uly said on a smile.
“Thanks to you,” Manny put in.
“My job, my honor,” Uly murmured.
“And our gratitude,” Zyra said earnestly.
Uly tipped his chin to both of them.
Tanyn adjusted us so he could pull out his Palm.
He looked at the screen, so did I, and I saw an incoming comm from Aleksei.
I slid off his lap and said, “You probably need to take that.”
He got up and stole a quick kiss before he put the Palm to his ear and walked out.
“He needs a vacation,” Zyra prescribed.
“He’s been king for two months,” Mangold replied.
“He still needs a vacation,” Zyra stressed.
“He needs to get used to the rigors of this, love,” Mangold said gently.
Zyra huffed.
And I loved this exchange, because it confirmed what I already knew.
Tanyn lost his mother and father.
But he still had both.
Not to mention a lot of love in this room all around.
And that made me very happy.
We sipped and chatted until we all stopped doing both, and the room got deathly silent when Tanyn returned, his expression so cloudy, it was a storm.
No one missed it, but Uly got there first.
“What’s going on?”
Tanyn didn’t address Uly.
He turned to me.
“Gayle is on her way.”
“What?” I asked, alarmed. “Why?”
“So are Laura and Aleksei, but on a different craft,” Tanyn went on.
I stood. “Okay, but…why?”
Tanyn wasn’t done, however.
“Cormac is on his way too.”
I closed my mouth, stunned silent.
“And, with very bad timing, both Aleece and Bainon,” Tanyn kept at it.
My gods.
“Apparently, the attack on Sigil triggered Cormac, and he attempted another abduction of Gayle,” he finally explained.
“This was thwarted by RS agents. They spirited her away. Aleksei ordered her sent to me. Mac went after her. And Aleksei and Laura went after both of them. As for Bain and Aleece, I have no idea what’s going on there, except Aleksei said she’s livid for some reason…
at Bain. So I can only assume Bainon did not give us the heads-up he told us he was going to give us before he shared something crucial with her. They’ll all be here in a few hours.”
“Holy Hecate,” I breathed.
“You can say that again,” Zyra whispered.
“Holy Hecate,” I repeated.
Then I slugged back some martini.
Because I had a feeling I was going to need it.