Page 65 of Plain Sight

“—upstairs, and I think you’ve all met Daisy, Hades’s daughter, but if you haven’t, this is Daisy. Daisy, these are our friends. They’re going to be staying with us for a little while.”

Daisy looks from one person to the next, her dark eyes solemn, then buries her head in Zeus’s shoulder as if none of us exists. Zeus pats at her back. Hades emerges from the kitchen and crosses the dining room with long strides, a shining can of Diet Coke in his hand. Conor pads behind him, then wanders over to the family room rug and lies down. Hades stops next to Zeus and nods like it’s perfectly normal for entire families sans their most upset member to show up at his brother’s mansion in the middle of the night.

“Some people,” Zeus says, pointing at Daisy, “don’t agree with being in the light and rely on their cousins to know when it’s daytime, so don’t be alarmed if you hear small footsteps at odd hours. Should we show them the bedrooms, Daze?”

A muffled yes.

“Good plan.”

We go upstairs.

Hades, Zeus, and Poseidon’s wives are sleeping in rooms on one side of the house along with Artemis, Zeus’s toddler. He sends Mason and Charlotte and Robin into one room. Gabriel and Elise take the next one. Nate sticks his head in one door, then motions for Lydia to follow him. She yawns, her shoulders drooping, and trails after him.

Hades opens a door to his right. “You’re welcome to this room, Lily. There are others if you’d like a different one.”

I want to know how there are so many rooms, especially since the one I step into is not small by any means and has its own en suite.

“It’s lovely.” Snowball tweets tiredly in his cage. Sounds like he agrees. Scott comes in with my bag, deposits it on the foot of the bed, and leaves with a murmured greeting for Snowball. “But I don’t know when⁠—”

Relatively hushed voices filter up from downstairs.

“That’s Nicholas and your husband,” says.

A relieved sigh whooshes out of me. I knew Jameson wouldn’t get lost on the way here. I knew he’d be fine.

I knew it the whole time.

I find a place for Snowball’s cage on a polished credenza and go back downstairs. Nicholas and Jameson are in the foyer, shoes kicked off, in mid-conversation.

“—reclamation?” Jameson asks, his voice rough but not nearly as rough as it could be. “The repairs for those kinds of systems would mean⁠—”

“Sure,” Nicholas answers, and answers Jameson’s question while I wrap my arms around his waist and press my face into his chest. Jameson smooths my hair, then my shoulders, then hugs me back. “A few things,” Nicholas finishes, then seems to wander away.

“Water reclamation?” I say into Jameson’s chest.

“Ships are so…” He lets out a breath. “Fascinating.”

“Did you want to come to bed?”

“In a while.”

“Okay.”

I’m getting belated jitters from the whole day. Or the whole night. Both, I guess.

“You’re cold,” says Jameson. “Let’s warm you up.”

The shower in my new en suite is large and luxurious—pretty, my brain supplies, over and over, because it doesn’t need much more than that in the middle of the night. Jameson kisses the side of my neck and the top of my shoulder and then just kisses me while he washes my hair.

“Oh, no.” Everything I say feels monumental by the time I gently insist on washing all the blood off him. “What happened?”

Of course I already know. Of course he already knows. But Jameson just closes his eyes and lets me run the washcloth over his face.

“A run-in,” he finally answers. “Won’t happen again.”

“Good.” I kiss his newly unbloodied cheek. “I don’t like when you come home hurt. I need you here in one piece.”

Jameson opens his eyes, his big hand sliding over my still-flat belly. “I’d understand if you didn’t.”