Epilogue #2
Shear turned from the stove and smiled, a look that melted me.
He still didn’t smile as much as the others, but far more than he had before.
I figured some of that was living this far away from people and their noisy minds, the quiet he’d gotten, the peace from not hearing so many other minds, from the constant onslaught.
“It’s ready,” he said after one more stir of the large pot, the scent of beans and meat filling the house.
“You know, he’s gotten pretty damn good at that.
” Carter piled the wood in the holder that sat to the left of the large brick fireplace.
We had more than enough wood inside, but some part of me still felt like anything less than full just wasn’t enough, especially as the dusk started.
The darkness still bothered me, reminding me of The Pitt, so the idea of the fire going out panicked me.
“Take a seat.” Shear took down a stack of bowls from the cabinet, the pretty green dishes ones that we’d picked out together the first week we’d moved in here. By we, I meant mostly me.
In fact, looking around as I took a seat, I realized that everything was something I’d picked out. Even if we’d gone together, they’d always given into whatever I wanted happily.
“What’s wrong?” Kenyon took the spot to my left.
“Why is everything here something I picked?”
“Because we already got what we wanted.” Carter sat to my right, smiling so brightly that I was pretty sure he thought he was charming.
And damn him, because he was…
“What did you want?”
“Dumb question,” Ingram said. “Obviously it’s you.
I’m happy as fuck to live my life in a fucking pink, fluffy unicorn hellscape just so long as you’re there.
So you want green dishes or that lumberjack-looking bedding, that’s just fucking fine with me.
” He paused, then smirked. “Besides, we got one thing we wanted.”
I didn’t have to ask what that was. I was pretty damn sure it was the huge bed that filled the space in our room, large enough for the five of us to sleep on, one that needed custom-made sheets. It might have been something they’d picked out, but I’d been happy as hell with it as well.
We had guest rooms, and if there was a reason, someone might crash in one, if they needed a little privacy, if they weren’t sleeping well. Mostly, though, we all piled into that one massive mattress, and at times like that I didn’t need to worry about heat at all.
It had me looking around and wondering how this had all happened…
“Oh no, her brain’s on a loop,” Carter said, his arms crossed as he stared at me, his lips pulled into a smirk.
“It feels like a life I didn’t think we could have.” The words flew from my mouth so fast I couldn’t stop them.
We’d moved along so far from one task to the next, from one important detail to the next, never stopping, never slowing down.
We’d had land to buy, a house to build and furnish, all of it while not letting the world know we weren’t nearly as dead as they’d reported.
Thankfully, that was far easier to do in this small forest town in Norway, a place far away from the drama of the North American Guild. Getting thrown here from the dungeon as it closed had been a blessing. No one looked twice at us here, and that worked fine by me.
A hand rested on my cheek. It woke me from my musings so I found Kenyon there, his gaze soft. “Are you regretting it? Maybe you don’t like being isolated like this? We can go to a more populated place, move to a city?”
I shook my head, chest tight. This was so Kenyon.
He would help even if he didn’t understand the problem.
“I don’t mean it like that. I’m not saying I regret it, or that I don’t like it here.
I’m just saying that I didn’t think it was possible.
It wasn’t that long ago we were all just trying to survive…
well…everything. The Guild, Obsidian, The Pitt, Corsa.
It’s hard to believe that we can have this sort of life now. ”
Kenyon’s worry drifted away, and he pulled me closer, pressing an almost chaste kiss to my lips. “Well, they thought we were dead, anyway. Why not get the life we really wanted?”
“Besides,” Carter chimed in, “we were spat out from The Pitt in Norway of all places! That had to mean something, right? Like the universe telling us to get on with it and live the life we wanted.”
“You don’t believe in fate,” I pointed out. “You’re too much of a control freak for that.”
He snicked and caught my wrist, pulling me over to him.
“Maybe, but that doesn’t mean I’m not right.
I get it, because this wasn’t the life I thought we could have, either.
Never even fucking occurred to me it was possible.
Do I love the whole hauling wood and fucking moose right outside our windows?
Nah, not really, but it turns out that so long as I get to have you, I can put up with wildlife.
” He kissed me and it was less chaste, less sweet.
Then again, Carter didn’t tend to be sweet.
Before I knew it, his tongue had delved into my mouth, his lips still chilled from outside, and I clung tightly to him. My guiding happened without any effort, as though my powers knew right away what to do.
It had become like that, the more time we spent together, the easier it got.
I’d had no idea that guides and espers could bond this closely, could be so compatible, so connected.
To me, espers had always presented danger.
They’d been an uncontrollable force that I’d thought would crush me.
I’d spent ten years trying to avoid them as best I could, keeping my defenses up, never letting them get closer than absolutely necessary.
But that wasn’t the case anymore. I’d realized that it wasn’t about trusting anyone. It was about finding the right people to trust.
Fingers caught my chin, breaking the kiss, turning my face to the side.
“Wait your turn, perv,” Carter muttered, but didn’t try to keep hold of me. That was so Carter, though. He complained about the others, but in the end, he always took care of all of us, putting us before himself. He’d never admit it, never let on, but it was still true.
Ingram grabbed my hips and set my ass on the table—thankfully, Shear hadn’t moved the food off the stove yet.
Ingram didn’t wait for permission, didn’t tease.
That wasn’t his style. Instead, he dove in, immediately offering a kiss that didn’t even pretend to be innocent.
He kissed me as though starved, like we hadn’t stayed up late wrapped together in bed.
Then again, Ingram was forever like that, always hungry for me.
It used to be that the hunger inside him would take anything, but now? It focused on what mattered, on me, on Shear, on the bond we held.