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I nod, unable to bring myself to tell him that wasn’t what caught me by the throat. I don’t know how or when exactly. I just know that at some point, Azrael became a part of me—a part that I can’t imagine living without now.
The rest of the drive is quiet, and I’m grateful when he parks. I feel like I need to walk off some of this restless energy. But when he gets out and opens my door for me, I realize where we are when I see the shop across the street. It’s Zen Apothecary.
I look up at him in question, and he squeezes my body close to his side. “I thought I should see what you’ve been peddling here.”
The dryness in his tone makes me smile, and some of the tension from earlier ebbs away.
“But first, food.”
He takes me into the shop down the street, where we order one regular coffee, one decaf, and a mountain of beignets to share. By the time we eat, I’m more animal than human when I bite into the warm, chewy dough.
“Oh my god.” I groan. “I don’t remember food ever tasting this good before.”
Azrael watches me, amused, but it doesn’t stop him from scanning the shop every few moments, taking in our surroundings.
The IVI guards who followed us here are stationed outside on the street, and I try to pretend they aren’t there as we polish off the plate of pastries and get on with our day.
When we enter the apothecary shop, Solana, the owner, greets me with a happy smile, but her expression is swiftly followed by widening eyes as she takes in the man beside me. Like most humans of average size, she has to crane her neck to meet his gaze at close range, and I wonder if that’s how I look when I’m speaking to him. He’s well over a foot taller than me, and it’s only now that we’re out in public together that I realize how strange it must seem. It probably looks like my giant of a husband took out his Tinkerbell wife for the day.
“Um, hi,” Solana stumbles over her words. “Willow, can I just… borrow you for a moment?”
She’s already got me by the arm, trying to lead me away, but Azrael is reluctant to let me go. It’s only when I look up at him that I think he even realizes he has such a tight grip on me.
“It’s okay,” I assure him. “I’ll be where you can see me.”
He still doesn’t seem pleased with the idea, but he releases me. Solana promptly hauls me off into the corner, watching him over my shoulder before she leans in and lowers her voice.
“Blink twice if you’ve been kidnapped.”
“Solana.” My words nearly die in my throat as I laugh. “It’s okay. That’s my husband.”
“Husband?” she blurts, all discretion thrown out the window. “You got married and didn’t tell me?”
As she says it, her gaze drifts over my face, pausing to linger on the scars on my forehead.
“Willow?” she croaks out. “What’s going on? You’re scaring me.”
“Everything is okay,” I assure her, wishing I’d put on more makeup to cover it up. “I have a lot to tell you, but not right now. We just came by so Azrael could see the shop.”
We both glance at him then, and I can’t help but smile when I see him sniffing a bottle, his nose wrinkling at the contents inside. It’s a sampler of Solana’s herbal tinctures.
“So, this inhumanly sized man isn’t kidnapping you,” she says, her voice relieved. “Okay, well… in that case, where did you get him, and are there more where he came from?”
“Solana.” I burst into a fit of laughter as Azrael glances up, clearly hearing what she just said. “I thought you were seeing some mystery man you still haven’t told me about.”
“Pfft.” Solana waves off the suggestion, but I see the tension in her eyes even as she says it. She likes to joke about never letting any man lock her down, but I suspect there’s more behind this mystery man than she’s willing to admit.
“Well, Azrael does have a brother,” I confess.
“Unfortunately, he seems to be infatuated with your sister,” Azrael interjects.
“Dammit,” Solana mutters. “I should have known. Men always fall for the Wildblood women.”
“Well, it doesn’t matter because it’s not going to happen,” I say determinedly. But when I look back at Azrael, he doesn’t share my confidence.
“Try telling that to Emmanuel.”
“Oh, no, that’s all wrong for you.” Solana leaves my side when he picks up a bar of soap to sniff it. “Try this one.”
I join them, watching as Solana proceeds to give Azrael an in-depth tour of the shop and all of its contents. He takes a particular interest in the things I made, of which Solana reminds me she needs a restock. By the time she’s finished, he’s seen every piece of jewelry, essential oil blend, and candle that Solana has procured from me.
