Page 30 of Awakened Light

“You are gonna love it. Love. It.” Mark pursed his lips into a self-satisfied smile and gestured for me to watch the top of the stairs. He looked at all of us and crossed his arms. “She started out looking like a wicked hot Lagertha from Vikings, and now she looks like she belongs on a Paris runway. May I present the new and ever-so-beautiful, Catrain!”

She appeared at the top of the stairs, and I had to clutch the table beside me for balance. It wasn’t that she was more beautiful, she’d been stunning before, but it was a different kind of beauty descending the stairs.

Instead of knots and braids twisting up her hair, soft, blonde waves fell around her face. Dark, smokey eyes replaced the war paint that once surrounded them, and tasteful makeup accentuated every incredible inch of her face. The leather clothing exposing all her tanned skin had been swapped out for fitted ripped jeans and a soft black shirt draping off her shoulder that showcased some of the black tattoos snaking around her arm.

Then there were her lips. Red. Sexy. Plump.

And unbelievably kissable.

“Told ya,” Mark whispered into my ear, having taken notice of my slack jaw and stunned appearance.

I didn’t even attempt to argue with him because words refused to form.

“Damn, girl!” Emilia whistled. “You look amazing. Mark is the master of makeovers... I should know.”

She gave him a hip bump and he took a bow. “I’m an artiste.”

“You truly are,” Grizella said. “She looks wonderful.”

“How do you feel, Catrain?” Emilia asked as Catrain approached us.

“Different.” She paused and glanced down at her clothes. “But good.”

“You look incredible,” I finally managed to say.

A shy smile drew up the corners of those impossibly luscious lips. “Thanks.”

It was impossible not to stare at her, but I caught Lothaire and Aiden’s smirks from the corner of my eye and knew I looked like a lovesick fool. Clearing my throat, I tried to find the senses her transformation had stolen from me. “Well, we should probably get going. We’ve got to get to Edinburgh, rescue Annella, and get back before dawn.”

“So, this will work? I can walk in the city like this?” Catrain asked, her eyes searching all of us then landing on mine.

“Yes. You’ll blend in just fine. But I want you to be sure you want to do this. You don’t have to.”

“I’ll be okay,” she said confidently. “I want to help. I liked Annella.”

“We’ll all be watching you closely, but hidden,” Lothaire said.

“I won’t let anything happen to you.” As I said the words, a primal protective rumble coursed through my body.

I couldn’t. Never in my life had I wanted to protect something more than I wanted to protect Catrain.

“I’ll call the helicopter,” Grizella said.

“What’s a helicopter?” Catrain asked as Grizella lifted her phone to ear, something else we’d had to explain to Catrain last night. She’d been mesmerized watching us call each other from different rooms and had laughed when I’d held my phone up to her ear so she could hear Emilia talk.

“We could all run to Edinburgh much faster than the helicopter, but since you can’t, we’ll take a helicopter. It will fly us there fairly quickly.”

“Fly?” Her eyes widened. “In the sky?”

“Yes, fly. Remember I told you about the planes people fly in? This is kind of like that.”

She shook her head back and forth. “Only birds belong in the sky.”

“Catrain, I promise you’ll be safe,” I soothed, but she just shook her head harder.

“No flying.”

I was about to try more reasoning with her, but I saw the fear inside her eyes. “Okay, no problem. No flying. We’ll just drive there.”