Total pages in book: 134
Estimated words: 127026 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 635(@200wpm)___ 508(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 127026 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 635(@200wpm)___ 508(@250wpm)___ 423(@300wpm)
She swallowed back her unease. It wouldn’t help anything. She needed to have utter certainty to survive the rest of the night. She couldn’t rely on Ford to save her. She was going to have to save herself.
So, she plastered on a smile, thanked the twins, and headed out of the mountain. Clover and Hadrian waited for her before a carriage. And her fake smile turned genuine.
“You didn’t think we’d let you do this alone, did you?” Clover asked.
“Thank you.”
She flung herself into Clover’s arms. Clover chuckled and tugged her tighter. Her cinnamon skin was almost completely obscured in a black dress that might actually have been a flowy set of pants. Her black bob was even more severely cut than normal, and she’d opted for the darkest of red lipsticks that almost looked black. It was still strange to see her out of the Wastes red vest and black button-up uniform. To see her out of Dozan Rook’s colors.
In the year that Kerrigan had been a street fighter for Dozan in the Wastes, Clover had quickly become one of her closest friends. Primarily half-Fae and humans ventured out into the Wastes—a heathen’s den for gambling, drugs, and prostitution. Clover was a card dealer at the establishment. They’d gotten along swimmingly and not parted since.
“And me?” Hadrian asked. He stepped forward, tucking his top hat under his arm, revealing the blue of his hair and his sharply pointed ears.
Kerrigan hugged him next. For so long, Clover had been obsessed with Darby while she and Hadrian had done nothing but snipe at each other. Now, Darby was having her Season, and Clover and Hadrian had found that all that sniping was really attraction. It was complicated by the fact that Darby had never been interested in men, but was marrying for the good of her new noble family. The feelings had never gone away.
Things had been so much simpler once.
“Shall we?” Hadrian asked.
He gestured for them to enter the carriage, and when they were safely tucked inside, they were off. None of them mentioned Darby’s absence or what was about to happen with Kerrigan and March. Their presence was reassurance enough.
“Mind if I smoke?” Clover asked, pulling out a loch cigarette before she could object.
Kerrigan sighed. “If anyone realized what was in that …”
“I know.” She shot Kerrigan a razor-edged smile.
Clover suffered from a chronic illness that resulted in debilitating pain. She was indebted to the king of the Wastes and worked his card tables because loch was the only thing that kept the pain at bay. If she went too long without a smoke, her entire world fell apart.
Hadrian rolled his eyes and adjusted the gold cravat at his throat, indicating his allegiance to Galanthea. He’d been raised on the streets of Kinkadia before joining the House of Dragons, but he was utterly straitlaced. Sometimes, it still amazed Kerrigan that there was anything but animosity between he and Clover.
“Don’t give me that look, sweetheart,” Clover teased, puffing smoke in his direction. “You’ve done loch before.”
Kerrigan gasped. “What?”
Color rushed to his cheeks. “We thought we were dying. That doesn’t count.”
Clover grinned, as if she enjoyed riling him. “Whatever you say.”
“It was during the riots,” Hadrian explained. “We got away through the sewer system. We were both shaken.”
Kerrigan’s face softened. That had been one of the worst nights of her life. Hadrian and Clover had gotten away after the Red Masks boxed them into the streets in the middle of a protest and bombed the nearby buildings. Kerrigan had been arrested for being at the protest and put on probation. The whole thing still weighed on all three of them.
“What are you going to do about Darby?” she asked to change the subject.
Hadrian and Clover exchanged a look. She took another long drag before dumping the rest of the rolled cigarette.
“What is there to do?” Clover asked. “She chose, didn’t she?”
“I suppose she did,” Kerrigan agreed softly. “But …”
“Leave it,” Hadrian argued.
They’d been friends long enough that they could exchange a glance and know what the other was thinking. Their situation was complicated, and putting her nose in it wasn’t going to help anything.
So, she nodded her head and sat back in the seat anxiously. The night hadn’t even begun, and already, she was ready for it to end.
The carriage rolled to a stop before the enormous Row mansion that was hosting the final Season event of the year. The Row was a line of thirty-plus-room manors on the eastern side of the Kinkadian valley, meant for landed money, dating back over a thousand years.
A footman opened the door to their carriage. Kerrigan took a shallow breath to accommodate her tight bodice and then put her hand into the gloved hand of the attendant. But when she took her first step outside, she realized that it was no attendant, but Ashby March.