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I take her arm. “Let’s go.”
Mateo’s guitar sings across the chapel as I take Charlotte up the aisle, my brother’s presence here with us. I don’t say anything else about faith, or God, or fate; Charlotte has heard it all before. She tears up as we draw closer to the music and she finally lays eyes on Elijah, who covers his mouth with his hand.
And I barely know this girl that is theonlything I have left of my brother, but I still feel a pang of sadness as I let her go.
Peaches performs the ceremony beautifully, and I set my gaze on Tilda as Peaches starts talking about love. I find her in the pews as she finds me, and our eyes meet across the heads of my pack as if we can sense the other looking.
Maybe we can. I don’t know exactly how this works.
Charlotte and Elijah say their vows. They kiss. Peaches uses the lasso I wove with golden thread to tie them together, and they pass marriage coins from hand to hand as a promise to love and care for the other.
And then they’re married.
We file out of the outdoor chapel and into the field beyond, where a table has been laid out with tons of food from the city—and even with a cake. Charlotte’s grandparents went above and beyond to cater the party, and it almost feels like a summer night just like any other, backbeforethe convergence.
A hand slides into mine as we watch the couple cut the cake, smiles on everyone’s faces.
“Hey, Father,” Tilda’s voice purrs. “Dance with me?”
I’m helpless to resist.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
?
TILDA
I’m not really one for devious plots and seduction. In fact, I can’t even remember the last time I seduced someone, or even reallywantedto have sex. My last tryst was falling into bed with some other young soldier just after the Convergence, desperate to feel something other than overwhelming dread.
This isn’t like that.
I don’t think I’veeverexperienced something like this.
The night air is thick with humidity on the tail end of the last major heat wave, a light rain having fallen earlier in the day. The clouds have cleared, letting us see the stars in vivid detail as they tumble out of the wild, deep blue of space.
I forgot what the natural night sky was like; how it felt to shimmer with starlight.
Maybe it’s just the booze talking, but I don’t know if I can give this up. Perhaps there’s a place here for Enid and me.
And the ticket to getting in with the pack is standing right in front of me.
Reyes ducks his head and laughs, raking a big hand through his salt and pepper hair. He shakes his head as he brings his dark eyes back to me, a smile on his face. “I don’t know if dancing is a good idea, Tilda.”
“Why not?” I ask.
“Well, if you trying to kill me wasn’t a good enough reason…”
“If I’m remembering correctly, you also bit me against my will, so I think we’re even,” I say. “Come on—it’s a wedding. You can’t just give me one dance?”
The notes drop from Mateo’s guitar and wrap me up in warmth. And there’s that pesky heat again, rippling over my flesh straight from the site of Reyes’ bite.
I thought that was only supposed to happen during the full moon.
He takes my hand, and sensation crawls over my skin like licks of flame.
“Fine,” he says. “Just this once.”
Reyes pulls me into his arms, leading me out onto into the grass where a few other couples are already dancing. I don’t even see their faces—I’m too wrapped up in Reyes, in the way he looks down at me and wraps one firm arm around the small of my back. He’s entirely self-assured, his tongue flicking out to wet his lips and making something pulse between my legs as I remember his kiss.
