“You two got married and neither of you told me?” She stomped her foot, shimmering eyes on fire. “That’s so wrong! I should’ve been a part of it.” She spun around. “Where is she? I’m seriously going to hit her again.”
“Whoa.” I chuckled as I grabbed her arm. “Can you wait to hit her again until we make sure she’s okay?”
“Oh yeah, probably a good idea.” Then she whirled around and threw herself at me, circling her long arms around my neck, and I stumbled back a step. “You two really did it?”
Dee’s lips trembled into a small smile and not the kind I’d seen on her lately. Not cold. Totally her. “That’s amazing,” she whispered as she pulled free. “I’m happy for you—for her. But I’m still going to punch her. After we make sure she’s okay. Oh God.” Her face fell. “What if she—?”
“It’ll be okay.” I placed a hand on her back, steering her out of the living room.
First person I saw was Archer. Of course. And he wasn’t looking at me at all. Oh no. His face was pale, his eyes wide and pupils dilated. Shaken up. I’d never seen him look quite like that before, and I sure as hell didn’t want to acknowledge why.
“She’s outside,” he murmured, staring at Dee, who was also staring at him, and they were like two people who had never seen another person before. Damn. “She’s okay.”
Dee was staring at Archer, and I bit back a curse. Her voice was low in her throat. “Go.”
At least she’d forgotten about hitting Kat. I resisted the urge to warn Archer to do . . . well, to not do anything, but as I walked toward the doorway to the foyer and stopped to look back at them over my shoulder, what I saw should’ve had me going off like a rocket.
I hadn’t heard either of them move, but they were standing toe to toe, and Archer was touching her cheeks with only the tips of his fingers as he gazed into her eyes. There was something sort of poignant about the moment. Yeah, I sounded like I’d be writing love sonnets by the end of the year, but in a moment of empathy and maturity I really hadn’t realized I was capable of, I didn’t lose my cool.
She needed this—she needed Archer, and who in the hell was I to begrudge her the solace when I had my Kat?
Blowing out a breath, I headed toward the front of the house and cringed when I saw the front door across the room. Oh, Lore and Hunter were gonna be pissed.
Kat was sitting at the top of the steps, curved slightly inward. As I walked around her and down the steps so I was in front of her, she slowly raised her head and her gray eyes met mine, reached right inside me, and squeezed my heart.
“She’s okay.” It wasn’t a question but a statement.
I nodded as I knelt in front of her. “Because of you.”
She shook her head.
“Yes. She told me what you did. She could’ve killed you, Kat.”
“I know, but . . . I didn’t want you to have to fight your sister, to have to hurt her. I didn’t want you to have to ever make that choice and live with what happened.”
It made me love her more than I thought possible. I placed my hands on her knees and leaned in, pressing my lips against her forehead. “Thank you. That’s not enough, but thank you is the best I got.”
“You don’t even need to say that.” Kat rested her forehead against mine and whispered, “I love you.”
I moved up to sit beside her, wanting to pull her into my arms, but I resisted because I could tell she was hurting. “Where?”
She knew what I was asking. “I’m really okay.”
“You look like you’re in pain. Come on. You know I’m going to heal you. Don’t fight me on this.”
For a moment, she stared at me, and then she stuck out her tongue, which caused me to grin. “Pretty much everywhere, especially my ribs. She threw me through a wall.”
I breathed around the flash of anger, telling myself Dee hadn’t known better so I didn’t get all “rage face,” as Kat would say. Carefully, I touched her sides and let the healing begin. “Well, I need you back to perfection, because Dee’s probably going to hit you again.”
Kat winced. “Do I even want to know why?”
“Sit still,” I said. “I told her we got married. She’s happy, but she wants to punch you because she didn’t get to be a part of it.”
“Oh.” She laughed and then cringed. “Was she happy about it? I mean, was she okay?”
“Of course.” As the heat of my ability started making its way through Kat, her eyes drifted shut and her cheek ended up on my shoulder. I liked it. Kind of made me feel warm and fuzzy with her all cuddled up against me. “She’s thrilled, actually. Just wait until I tell her we plan on doing the big, real ceremony. She might not hit you then.”
When she laughed softly, this time it didn’t end with her wincing in pain. Moving my hand to cup her cheek, I took care of the bruises there. “She’s in there with Archer now,” I said.
Kat sighed. “He’s not a bad guy.”
“He’s an Origin.”
She rolled her eyes. “Archer may be an Origin, but he’s still a good guy, and he cares about her, Daemon. He really does, and he’s been worried about her this entire time.”
Ugh.
“You know he can protect her. And he’ll be good for her, so—”
“I’m letting them be. I know she needs him, especially right now when she’s . . . Well, she’s got a lot going on in her head that she’s dealing with.”