Chapter 20
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One thing at a time.
Kyran
My wife returns from having a little chat with my brother, and I cannot express the emotions that grip me at the sight of her cuddled up in his coat.
Wait, no. I can.
I hate it.
Shy as ever, Morana tucks deeper into Kaleb’s coat and flushes the second her pretty glass eyes find me. I march from her doorway, where I’ve just delivered another one of her boxes, reach her side, link my fingers in the neckline of the coat, and slip it right off.
“H-hey,” she protests, weakly.
I return the garment as I wrap my wife against my side and hold my brother’s humored gaze. “Thanks. No.”
“Protective, are we?” Kaleb asks as he pulls his coat, which likely smells like lavender now, back on.
“Yes, actually,” I mutter.
“Good. She needs that.”
I bristle as my brother passes, meeting up with the others bringing in Morana’s things.
I know Morana needs protection; he is not supposed to know that.
“What did you two talk about?” I ask.
Face fighting scrunch, Morana looks at me. Then her cheeks deepen in hue. Then she hides against my chest. “N…nothing.”
“Mistress,” I murmur, lowly. “I’m a jealous man.”
“Ew. Don’t be jealous of my brother,” she hisses. “He was just giving me some helpful older brother pointers. And he’s not…” Her voice wobbles; she regains strength with it. “He’s not you, so he is very sincerely my actual brother.”
Glad to know we’ve completely put the whole I’m her brother thing behind us, given how we’re husband and wife now and all.
Something about the sheer, unhindered disgust in her reply has me settling some because it’s so starkly different than the “disgust” she fabricated for me.
She said ew this time with her whole chest, and I need that kind of reassurance in my life.
“K-kyran?” she whispers while I’m busy combing the cold from her hair because the chilled locks have me entranced.
“Yes, mistress?”
She dares to peek up at me. “Do you…think…after I’m moved in…that maybe…wecouldgoseemyparents?”
I replay what she’s just said, slow it down, and let it click.
“Oh, yeah. I suppose we should go see your parents. I’ll check my collab schedule for when I’m free.
” Snuggling her under my arm, I pull my phone out of my coat pocket and check what I have coming up this week.
“Ah. A WonderCraft meeting.” Eh. I can skip that. “How long should we visit?”
When she doesn’t answer, I look down into her giant eyes.
Peculiar.
Adorable.
“Morana?”
She jolts back to awareness. “Oh…uh…my parents are only two hours away. It can just be a day trip.”
I stare at her. Then I look back at my phone. “It’s right outside Washington, DC isn’t it?”
“Huh?”
“Where your parents live.”
Her lashes flutter. “I mean…yes. But…how do you know that?”
“Zakery and Maelin visited last year? They talk? They live here?”
“Oh.” Her gaze lowers. “Right.”
I look up the weather. “Ooh. It’s snowing there. Do you think we’ll get snowed in?”
She shudders. “I sure hope not.”
Probably not the most romantic endeavor to be snowed in with her parents anyway. “Next Thursday through Sunday is relatively free. We can plan for then.”
“Thursday through Sunday?” she asks.
I watch her as the red drains from her cheeks. “Well. Yes?” I pocket my phone and touch her soft bottom lip. “I’d like the chance to get to know my parents a little bit. And they’d probably like to know that their other daughter is in good hands, too.”
Morana gulps.
She’s so anxious. Poor thing. Kissing her forehead, I murmur, “Why did you want to see your parents all of a sudden if not to introduce them to your husband?”
“Repentance,” she whispers. “I plan to fall prostrate in the snow and plead forgiveness.”
That is certainly an option. One I’d like to avoid, if possible, but an option for sure.
“How about,” I start slowly, “for right now, we just focus on getting you settled into your new home?”
She looks past me, at our brothers and her sister as box after box comes up the hall to fill a fraction of the space in her new room. My room lies ajar, closer to where we’re standing now, and she turns her attention toward the sliver of cotton candy pretty within.
Gradually, her shoulders loosen, and she rests her cheek against my chest. Letting her eyes close, she squeezes me once, then separates us. “Yeah, okay.” She swallows, breathes. “One thing at a time.”
One thing at a time, we spend the rest of the afternoon bringing boxes in and the rest of the evening unpacking them until one little corner feels and looks like what my wife knows to be home.