“God, she’s relentless,” Lucky muttered, handing Scout a clean toothbrush from his cupboard. “It’s like trying to argue with a pit bull. You might win that argument, but she’s still got her teeth in your throat, so who cares?”
“She’s right, though,” Scout said on a yawn while trying to put toothpaste on the brush. “We’re both usually up earlier than this. Eight o’clock here is like… I don’t know. Luxury hours. We really must have been tired last night.”
Lucky’s lascivious chuckle brought heat to his cheeks—and his chest and even his inner thighs.
Slowly, still scrubbing with the toothbrush, Scout turned his head to meet Lucky’s eyes.
Lucky waggled his sand-colored eyebrows above his hazel eyes, and Scout fought off a pleased smile, mostly because he would have drooled toothpaste everywhere.
“Ya think, Scout?”
Scout hid his face by turning to spit and rinsed his mouth out before finding a towel to wipe off with. When he was done, he found Lucky had taken a step into the tiny bathroom and was standing next to him at the sink, close enough to lean on.
So Scout did.
Lucky leaned back.
“Last night was awesome,” he said, enjoying Lucky’s arm around his hips.
“Did you mean it?” Lucky asked, and Scout gave him a quick look because he sounded almost frightened. “What you said last night?”
Scout smiled slowly. “Yeah,” he mumbled. “I… uhm… we can use the word until it doesn’t fit anymore. I want to wake up next to you, a lot. I… it was the best way to wake up.”
Lucky’s smile practically took over his entire face. “I want to kiss you,” he confessed, “but I haven’t brushed my teeth yet. Now shoo. I left a pair of pajama pants on the bed for you, so we can wait to dress until after we shower.”
Scout kissed his cheek. “That’s a good detail to remember,” he said. “Thank you.”
Lucky shrugged and started spreading toothpaste on his own brush, but he looked pleased. “It’s my first sleepover,” he said with dignity. “I wanted to do it right.”
Then he started brushing his teeth, and Scout took that as a signal to leave.
He remembered to touch Lucky’s hip softly on the way out, because he figured that’s what good boyfriends did.
KAYLEIGH WAStrue to her word, and by the time he’d put on the pajama pants and the sweatshirt he’d worn the day before, the coffee drinks were ready on the kitchen island by the open donut box. Scout took one of four stools that surrounded the island, letting it double as a countertop and a kitchen table, and took a happy bite of a donut. “Mm, this is good. I mean, Helen’s still the best, but, you know….”
“A change,” Kayleigh conceded. Then she took a surreptitious look toward the bathroom, where Lucky was still getting ready. “So… how was it?”
Scout grinned. “It was awesome. I highly recommend it if you ever get the chance.”
“Not with him!” she muttered, and he rolled his eyes.
“With the human being of your choice!” he retorted, keeping his voice low. “I’m just saying….” He gave a happy shrug. “Not overrated.”
She winked and leaned her head on his shoulder. “Good. Glad to hear it. It’ll give me something to shoot for.”
Lucky entered the room, hopping into his pajama pants as he did, and in another thirty seconds he was sitting kitty-corner to Scout with his own donut and coffee drink.
“This is good,” he said through a full mouth. “Thanks, Kayleigh.”
She sighed. “Well, yeah, apparently I can’t be shitty to you without being shitty to my brother, so go figure. But now that you guys are fed and caffeinated, I need to tell you what we figured out so when Helen and Marcus get here, you guys can talk magic stuff, and we can figure out what to do with it.”
Scout frowned. “Wait a minute,” he said, trying to remember something. “Didyousee the spirit trap? Lucky sort of intervened because I was getting lost and—”
“Marcus showed me,” she said cheerfully. Then her voice dropped. “Okay, so you know how Alistair used to trash-talk hedge witches all the time, right?”
Scout regarded her. “Bullshit?” He was only making certain; he was pretty sure they’d come to the same conclusion.
“Bullshit,” she confirmed, taking a drink of her own coffee. She looked into the cup for a moment, ruminating. “See, what I think—and this is all conjecture, mind you—is that wizards and mages and hell, even luck mechanics like your boyfriend here were born with magic. Some of them were born with a whopping lot, like Macklin and you, and some of them were born with a middling amount, like Josue—”
