Total pages in book: 86
Estimated words: 79726 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 399(@200wpm)___ 319(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 79726 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 399(@200wpm)___ 319(@250wpm)___ 266(@300wpm)
Meanwhile, the rest of the family is so fun and engaging. I understand why Remus spoke so warmly about them. Each one of them is such a character.
Abaddon is the gruff head of the family. But then he absolutely melts and becomes a teddy bear whenever it comes to his wife or daughter. Like right now. Baby Raven is perched on his shoulders, grabbing his horns like she’s riding him.
Hannah keeps trying to get her to eat bites of food, but Abaddon is more intent on swinging his head around to make Raven giggle as she rides him. The baby is the size of a toddler, even though they said she’s not even one year old and seems to have the dexterity of a toddler, too. She doesn’t speak yet, but she seems wickedly intelligent.
Kharon is constantly doting on his partner, the very pregnant Ksenia, whom I shared some pleasant words with earlier on the way down the stairs. She seems understandably tired. They said she’s only six months pregnant, but apparently, that’s when Hannah popped. These special hybrid pregnancies work differently.
Which makes me frown. Uh. . . I’m usually so good about using protection, but I didn’t think about it this time, things getting so hot and heavy so quickly between me and Remus. But I’m not exactly ready to be a mommy as cute as Raven is.
Layden spends most of the dinner looking at his phone. He’s the most—I cringe away from the word normal even when I think it—and try to replace it with human-looking of the brothers. It seems that that’s due to some horrific trauma of his wings getting cut off by their father? Jesus. I don’t know the whole story, but I guess after the whole buried-alive thing, he went off and lived among humans for a long time, too?
Anyway, while Hannah bustles off to get dessert from downstairs, I sidle up to Layden. I try to speak low because I can feel Romulus’s eyes on us. “Hey, can I talk to you for a minute?”
Layden’s blue eyes look up at me, startled. “Uh. Sure.”
I nod my head toward the fireplace sitting area, feeling Romulus’s eyes but not wanting to acknowledge him.
“Now?” Layden asks, and I nod.
We leave the table and head toward the couches. “What’s up?” he asks.
“Well, you seem like the guy who knows stuff. And you’ve been around humans more. So you know both worlds.”
He nods, and I feel my cheeks go a little pink. “I noticed there’s a lot of babies around here, and uh—” I wave a hand, feeling embarrassed but also determined to power through. “That’s not really my thing. I don’t suppose there’s some sort of. . . like. . . supernatural birth control?” I whisper the last part.
To his credit, his eyes only widen the smallest bit before he nods. “Yeah. I know something. Come on. My bag’s in my room.”
I feel muscles I hadn’t even realized I’d tensed suddenly relax. “Oh my gosh, that’d be great.”
I start to follow him when all of a sudden, a hand on my shoulder is stopping me. “Where are you going?”
I turn in surprise to see Romulus.
“None of your business,” both Layden and I say at the same time. I smile at him, then glare at Romulus.
I can feel Romulus seething as I follow his brother toward the stairs. He’s only one floor up, and his rooms are nothing like the posh spaces I’ve seen everywhere else. Instead, they’re just stuffed with monitors and computer equipment, along with stacks of dirty dishes.
“Wow, are you a computer genius or something?”
“Oh, nah,” he says, shoving a pile of clothes—I’m not sure if they’re clean or dirty—out of the way so he can pull a bag out of a corner. “I just like to keep a watch on things.”
I nod.
“Okaaaaay,” he says, sitting on the chair in front of what looks like his central monitor and plopping the canvas duffle bag on his lap. He sorts through it, and I hear metallic and glass bottles clanking around inside. His brow furrows as he grabs and then discards things to the other end of the bag. “No, not that. Not that. Where are you?”
He hums to himself under his breath. “Here we are,” he says triumphantly, pulling out a small pink plastic disc. He hands it to me.
I frown at the familiar object, popping it open and looking down at the normal-looking birth control pills. “Um. Am I missing something?”
“Nope. These are—” He winces but then waves a hand and says, “Magic. I hate to use that word, but essentially, yeah. Let’s just say I know some folks who are familiar with beings from other realms. Different realms from the ones my family is from. But you aren’t the first to be concerned about not creating inter-realm offspring.”