Page 99 of Hunted

Ellie came around the bar. Her hair was tied up in a messy knot on top of her head, a few stray tendrils framing her face. She had on a swirly pale green dress that floated around her knees every time she turned. When our eyes met, she smiled and for the tenth time that morning, I couldn’t believe how lucky I was.

“Hashbrowns just came off the stove,” she announced. “Get ‘em while they’re hot.”

“Mommy, is there toast?” Jonah peered past the fruit Fallon was trying to load onto his plate while surreptitiously feeding bites of his blueberry pancake to Waffles under the table. To be fair, Waffles was standing on his hind legs to beg for table scraps like the world’s most adorable Cadbury bunny.

“You bet,” Cal said, sliding a plate of buttery toast strips across the counter to Fallon as Ellie skillfully intercepted Situation Blueberry Rabbit.

“That’s very sweet of you to share your breakfast with Waffles,” she began.

“And Butternut,” Vlad noted, twirling his fork at rabbit #2, who was hopping in circles beneath the table on an obvious sugar high, whiskers suspiciously sticky with syrup.

“Why don’t we give them some fresh hay?” I captured Butternut, tickling his soft underbelly. “And then after breakfast, Ellie and I will show you how to set up a bunny maze for them to explore out of Amazon boxes and fleece tents.”

“Okay.” Jonah hopped off his chair, following us to the other room in search of more rabbit appropriate diets.

“You should eat,” Cal said as soon as I returned, setting a heaping stack of blueberry pancakes in front of me. “I don’t think I’ve seen you sit down once in the past seventy-two hours. You’re starting to develop that permanent frown line between your eyes just like Dad.”

“Thought you only earned that after your two oldest sons nearly set the barn on fire setting off firecrackers.”

“Wow.” Cal laughed softly. “I’d almost forgotten about that one. He had us mucking out stalls for a month.”

“I will eat,” I told my brother. “I promise. I just need to do one thing first.”

I faced the room. Ellie’s entire protection detail was assembled, filling plates and laughing. Jori had on one of her amazing vintage dresses, this one dark blue with tiny white butterflies fluttering across it. Her partner Ursula had an arm slipped through hers, the two of them so comfortable together that they looked like they’d been mates for decades rather than only a few years. Quinn and Xander were in the corner discussing their favorite daggers, and Cris and Phoenix looked especially cozy seated over in the corner of the living room. Guess getting pulled out of the floodwaters had served to clarify some things for both of us.

I cleared my throat. The room instantly quieted. Brody and London, who had been at the end of the serving line, moved to stand over by the window, giving me a clear view of the room.

“I can’t thank you enough for everything you gave of yourselves over the last few months to keep Ellie and the other members of her research team safe. You were given an impossible task, put up against possibly the most powerful dual magic user we’ve ever faced to date. You didn’t falter. You didn’t set conditions. You said, ‘Where do I show up?’ And you kept her safe so that she could do the necessary work to try to help hundreds of thousands of people who we’ve left in the dark for far too long. I’m damn proud to call you my team.”

Whistles sounded around the room. I looked down. “We all know I’m not much good at speeches, so I’ll keep this brief.”

Brody’s voice was the one that cut through the quiet murmurs in the back of my mind. You never give yourself enough credit. They need to hear from you. To hear you lead.

I looked up, meeting my oldest brother’s fierce Alpha stare. London squeezed her mate’s hand.

I cleared my throat. “What we did the last few months was hard. In an hour, I’m going to ask for volunteers for something that will be even harder. And I won’t fault anyone who decides they’re out.”

* * *

“NO ONE CAN KNOW MY RESEARCH WASN’T REALLY DESTROYED,” Ellie said a few hours later as we were washing the last of the dishes. “There were leaks before.”

“Rowan, Vlad and Cris have been coordinating on this. They believe they can leak that the project can’t move forward on the vampire end without your data.”

“It’s still risky. We have to assume Rossi has moles on the inside. He got to Felix.”

“Sure. But he won’t be able to access any of his drones for at least nine months. All thanks to your badass move stabbing him at the last second with Blackout.”

Ellie shut off the water and dried her hands on a dishtowel, leaning back against the sink. “We talked before about the possibility of me moving to Dallas. I can’t. Not yet at least. I have to see the ALDD project through to the end. So many people risked their lives because they believed I could find a therapy that would reverse myelin degeneration in vampires or prevent it from occurring in the first place. I can’t stop now when we’re so close.”

“So about that.” I slid a small white box across the counter towards her. At her raised eyebrow, I nodded. “You’re right. Definitely an alligator.”

She pinched my side right where she knew I was ticklish, then opened the lid. Inside was a key. She tapped it against her lip. “Explain.”

“I asked to be transferred to the Austin field office.”

Her eyes widened. “But how—”

“I’m still going to be sent out on missions. I’ll be away some nights, sometimes for days at a time and I won’t be able to tell you where I’m going. But when I come home, I’ll be based in Austin. I’ll be with you.” I took her hands. “There’s this cute little townhome with roses in the front yard and a diner just down the street that’s available to rent not too far from here. If you want to look at it—”