18. Cove

Chapter 18

Cove

Ivy was delightful.

She brought Fawn and Florian out of their shells so effectively I realized I’d been missing half the picture of their personalities. I’d assumed that Huxley’s absence would do that on its own, but they both blossomed under her attention.

It made Florian even more beautiful, I realized the next morning, as I was headed out to the back terrace for breakfast and saw him sitting with his sister, smiling like he had no problems in the world. His cheeks were flushed pink and healthy, eyes bright, and most important, the lines of his body were...relaxed. He was sprawled across the chair next to his sister, limbs loose and head back, laughing at something she’d said.

I wanted little more than to walk over and kiss him breathless.

Probably not the best plan for before breakfast, but tempting nonetheless.

I opened the glass door, but before I could so much as take that first step onto the slate tiles of the terrace, movement grabbed my attention. My head shot back up, and there, past the table, past the field of orchids behind the house, past the lines of boxwood hedge, in front of an old apple tree in the orchard, was the figure of a man.

Not Kit.

No, his hair was blond, not white, long and blowing in the soft morning breeze. He was wearing green and black, and I had little doubt even from this distance that he was immaculately dressed.

Because that was Huxley fucking Dawnchaser.

He wasn’t looking at me, though. He was looking at a spot to my left. I glanced in that direction and found Ivy, coming out of another back door, one closer to the end of the house. She was smiling at Florian and Fawn, Fawn calling something to her about a favorite pastry for breakfast.

In the second it took me to take it all in, Ivy lost her balance while walking past the fire pit. It wasn’t lit because it was eight in the morning and high summer, but that didn’t make it safe. Quite the contrary, there seemed to be some sort of sharp metal implement sticking out of it that she was poised to fall into. If she fell at the wrong angle, the damned thing could gut her.

She was wearing flat shoes and hadn’t come close enough to the edge to lose her balance with a misstep.

No, this wasn’t Ivy being careless or a mere accident.

This was fucking Huxley Dawnchaser.

So no doubt, she would fall at the precise angle that suited him and rather likely die, assuming that was what he wanted. Since he’d already started killing people, I didn’t doubt it. I didn’t doubt the depths he would stoop to at all.

For myself, I had a choice. I could use Iri or Haim and freeze him in place, keeping him stuck until I could reach him. With Iri, I could freeze time around him and he wouldn’t even be aware and able to use Soz to change my luck.

But I couldn’t do that and stop Ivy from falling at the same time. Some people might be able to use the powers of two stones at once, and maybe I’d been remiss in not spending more time trying to practice it, but I couldn’t freeze two people that far apart at the same time.

Ivy or Huxley.

Helping someone who needed me, or justice for the already fallen.

As much as it annoyed me, it wasn’t even a real question. Oberon wasn’t going anywhere. His justice could wait. I gripped Haim’s power in my mind and froze Ivy in place, rushing to her side and helping her balance.

She was trembling and turned to look up at me as I wrapped my arms around her waist, pulling her away from the edge of the pit. Gasping for breath, eyes wide with fear, she grabbed at my shoulder. “Huxley.”

I nodded, which was apparently enough acknowledgment for her, since she didn’t say any more. Once I was sure she’d righted herself, I looked up, hoping I could still catch the bastard, but the space in front of the apple tree was empty.

Still, I had to take the opportunity.

I ran.

Vaulting over the top of the wrought iron railing at the edge of the terrace, dashing straight through the orchids, probably crushing more than a few of them, past the hedges, toward the orchard. I was tall and in decent shape, so I ran pretty damned fast, but by the time I got to the place Huxley had been standing, there wasn’t a single sign of him other than the ghost of his cologne on the breeze.

Although...cologne. What man in hiding had the ability to put time into his bathing routine? It was Huxley, so I wasn’t shocked he wanted that, but the fact that he had it was something else.

Was someone helping him?

The locals, likely. Florian had more than once expressed the opinion that the Dawnchaser authorities wouldn’t question his father’s right to do anything he pleased, so it shouldn’t have surprised me.

Still, I liked to think that the authorities in Moonstriker lands wouldn’t just let me get away with murder. No one was above the rules, particularly not rules that were as deeply ingrained in society as murder being wrong. If someone wanted to argue against taxes, that was a little different from killing a person because you thought you were entitled to their stone.

I sighed and shook my head. No point in standing around staring at apple trees that weren’t hiding Huxley. He was long gone. The only good thing about this was that I got to picture him running away, like the cowardly bastard he was.

Annoyingly, when I got back to the terrace, the family had been joined by...not just Coral and Frost, but by those asshole Dawnchaser cousins as well. Adger and the one who was related to Afton.

Adger, who was sitting on the railing, glaring at Ivy like she’d shat on his bedsheets while she stood across from him, arms crossed over her chest. “I don’t see why you’d be allowed here when we’re not. Is that Moonstriker menace trying to make you the next head of the family?”

“Not allowed to be here?” Ivy asked. She turned to me, one eyebrow quirked. “Did you ban the cousins from the house? I can leave if?—”

“Not at all.” I went and held a chair out for her on Fawn’s free side, then went to sit on the other side of Florian, between him and Frost. This time, the chair I took was, indeed, at the head of the table. Funny how that didn’t matter to anyone sitting at that table until there was a threat present. “Florian is the master of this house, and he’s been quite clear that you’re welcome here, Ivy.”

“And yet you’re the one who kicked us out,” the one who looked like Afton said, his tone whiny, and it scraped against my eardrums like fingernails on a chalkboard.

Ivy lifted a brow at that. “And why might that have happened, Courtney? I’m sure the two of you knocked on the door with your hats in your hands and humbly asked entry? Checked in on Fawn and Florian and expressed your well-wishes?”

He made a sour face at her and didn’t bother trying to respond to her comments, only his continuing worries about ownership of the manor. “This is our family’s home, not his.”

“This is Florian’s home.” I didn’t yell, but the garden went silent, even the birds and insects stopped chirping at the icy tone in my voice. “Huxley’s worldly goods are forfeit because of his actions. You are correct about one thing, though. The lot of you barged in and attempted to challenge me, if quite poorly, and then regrettably, I told you to leave when I didn’t have that right. I should have waited for Florian’s orders on the matter.”

“Cousin Huxley isn’t dead yet,” Adger argued. “You can’t give his things away.”

“Was he somehow unclear?” Ivy asked, and the chill in her voice could compete with mine. It was fucking impressive, and I was glad it wasn’t aimed at me. “Huxley committed a murder. The other family lords have decided that he’s finished. He owns nothing. His worldly possessions go to Florian, as they would in any line of succession.”

“Florian couldn’t possibly bond Soz,” Adger argued. “He’s a priss. A whiny little brat who can’t even stand up to the Moonstriker when he comes to take what’s ours.”

“Mine,” Florian corrected.

Unlike Ivy and me, his voice was soft when he spoke, not sharp and cold. But the look on his face...well, if these two continued to underestimate him, I thought they might not live long enough to regret it.

“You’re implying that Cove has come to take what’s mine. That’s simply not true. You’re the ones who’ve come trying to take what’s mine. Cove came here to end a murderer. It’s an admirable goal, and I intend to help him see it done in any way I can. No one in the Summerlands is more important than the law. Not me, not the two of you, and not my father.”

He picked up the napkin that had been in his lap and stood from his place at the table, meeting first Courtney’s eye, then Adger’s.

He’d told me that Adger had been his biggest childhood bully, I remembered. Florian had beaten him in a duel. Quite clearly he was drawing on that memory now as he met the man’s eye steadily. Intensely.

Fuck, I wanted him. He was beautiful and soft and sweet with his sister, yes, but this Florian? The one who was still soft, but calm and deadly instead of sweet? I wanted this Florian. Wanted him to climb atop me and...ahem. Not what I should be thinking about at breakfast, let alone with his jackass cousins there.

“Since Father can no longer lead the family, and will soon be dead, that leaves everything to me. This estate belongs to me. The cars, the money, the manor, the gardens. All of Father’s other things. Mine . Cove Moonstriker isn’t trying to take them from me, and you’re not capable of it. Now, leave us alone to eat our breakfast, or I’ll ban you both from the grounds altogether.”

He tossed his napkin down on the table and went to take a step forward.

Adger took one back. Clearly, he hadn’t forgotten the lost duel any more than Florian had.

Apparently, Frost was also aware of it, as he smiled up at Florian, and casual as you please offered, “I left my dueling sword in my room since I haven’t needed it in my time here, but I can go get it for you if you’d like. Or Uncle Cove has his right here. He never leaves it behind.”

Courtney huffed, coming around the edge of the table to grab the arm of Adger’s jacket and tug him away. They went off together, Courtney muttering something about ways to skin a cat, which wasn’t especially heartening, but at least they were gone.

Still, I’d have to be careful. People who thought they had a right to the belongings of others were dangerous. Huxley, for example, and we all knew how that had ended. I didn’t have a single doubt that either of them would happily slip a knife between my ribs when my back was turned, and that wasn’t how I intended to die.

Wouldn’t let that happen , Haim said with a put-upon sigh, sounding like the depressed donkey on a children’s show.

I know , I answered. But just because I trust you to have my back doesn’t mean I’ll stop keeping an eye on it myself.

But he knew that. We’d learned it from hard-won experience, and neither of us would ever trust that we were entirely safe again. Not ever.