Page 65 of Veil of Blood and Bone

“Let’s get you warm,” he offers. “You’re shaking.”

I’m freaking out, there’s a difference.

Impulsive behavior gets you hurt. Recklessness ruins lives, and I've never been this reckless before. Never so daring.

I'll never let anyone push you down again, kid. I promise. No more crying. Skinned knees heal. So do broken hearts.

My knuckles crack, and for an instant, the three soft lines on my wrist seem to pulse.

Is that why Mom insisted? Every time we settled, a new state, a new shithole apartment, we trained.

The familiar scent of the bookstore has been permeated with the distinctive metallic reek of cold. Or maybe I’m imagining phantom scents now, too. Those are linked to panic attacks or breaks from reality, I think.

This space is not mine. It’s been damaged.

And I should have paid more attention to her.

Or maybe I could have listened to her muttered rambles instead of brushing her off because I was too worried, too freaked, to give her my full focus.

And right in the middle of me trying to remember how to exist, a third set of footsteps thuds behind us.

“Ah. I've missed all the fun.”

That voice...

“Late again, as usual,” the hot vamp grinds out.

“I had other business. Unless you want to trade places?”

I crane my head toward the black-haired man from earlier. The lines of piercings along his ears glint in the flickering light from the chandelier valiantly struggling to maintain its connection to a power source.

And above the earrings, the tips of his ears are pointed. Pointed...how did I not see it before?

He catches my open-mouthed stare and winks. “Someone is in a mood,” he tells me in a conspiratorial whisper.

Forest hauls me into his arms and ignores my groan of protest. “You’ve missed everything. As usual."

“Bird brain remembers something?” He hikes a thumb at Forest. “I’m shooketh. So soon into the cycle, too.”

Hot vamp curls his claws into his palms, clenching and unclenching his fingers. Forest goes still behind me; he might have frozen.

“What did you say?” he mutters.

“I said, you know me. I’m a lover, not a fighter. I can’t spread my talents too thin. Besides, you had it handled.”

“You’re a master at running your mouth, Wren.” Hot vamp replies, nudging a maple wood credenza laden with mason jars of dried flowers with his boot. “Is that not enough?”

A tremor shakes me from chattering teeth to locked knees and Forest immediately rights me.

“My mouth is one of my greatest skills.” Another wink toward me. “You’ll remember.”

“Wait. Wait!” I slap against his hold, but I’m ineffective. The same way a gnat is ineffective when it crashes into a semi-truck barrel-assing along a highway. “You all know each other.”

It’s not a question.

“And by all means, make yourself at home, Nicholas.” The black haired man—Wren—chuckles. “You keep destroying furniture like you own the place. This is history.”

“History? This is trash salvaged from a streetcorner. There is only one thing of worth in this hovel.”