Total pages in book: 254
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 240032 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 1200(@200wpm)___ 960(@250wpm)___ 800(@300wpm)
“I am,” I admitted to Glasses. He was the worst of them all, in a way, with his extreme wariness.
“Why?” the cyclops asked, sounding genuinely perplexed.
“You were all being really quiet, so I was pretty sure you weren’t interested in letting us join your community.” My chest felt a little funny, but I figured I might as well keep being truthful. “Some beings don’t always welcome me with open arms.”
That got them to stir, and I took a second to sneak a glance at Henri. That tendon along his throat was strained again. He seemed to be focused on whatever the elders were whispering over.
I turned to Matti and tipped my chin at him. He gave me a thumbs-up beneath the table that I was going to take as a good sign since he could hear their discussion. It took a couple more minutes before they wound down.
“We are a community who intends to preserve the gifts we’ve been given,” Glasses said after a minute. His eyebrows were knit together, giving him a thoughtful, if not uptight, face. “We don’t shun any creature of any kind here.”
One of the women gently cleared her throat. “Beings like you, like you both, are no exception.”
I blinked at the same time Matti kicked me harder than before, and now I was going to have to get Sienna to twist both his nipples. My eyes watered as my leg throbbed.
“We will help you discover what the pup’s origins are and allow you to join the ranch as long as you’re aware of the commitment required to belong to it.”
I kicked my friend back as hard as I could. But visibly, I nodded at the group. “The marrying part. I’m aware of it, and you can sign me up right now as long as I get to choose… don’t I? Who to marry, I mean?” I asked, wanting to see if they were going to pull some arranged marriage on me. I mean, I wasn’t going to be that picky. I couldn’t be. I’d accepted that reality already. I liked an attractive person as much as anyone did, but all the people I had ever liked had great personalities, they had all been funny and likable, and it hadn’t mattered how symmetrical their features were or how many ab muscles they had either. When you’re used to being judged for things out of your control, you learn how to focus on the things that matter sooner rather than later.
I was also pretty sure I could come to love anything under the right conditions, but I still wanted a choice.
Multiple nods answered me from across the table, thankfully.
Henri’s grunt wasn’t subtle at all.
Why was he glaring at the elders all of a sudden?
“You’re all skipping a hell of a lot of fine print right now,” he said in that gruff voice.
Did he have a problem with me wanting to live here?
Henri’s statement got the elders bickering. “Well…,” one of the quieter ones replied as Silver-Blue Hair challenged, “This is a unique situation….”
The man I’d known as a child shut them down with a no-nonsense slice of his hand that had no business being so commanding. “You’re all aware of our rules, and it doesn’t matter how excited any of you might be—”
This was them excited?
“—we aren’t changing the way we go about things. We don’t talk about the ranch. We don’t let strangers in. We don’t talk about the children. And everyone has to go through the trial period.”
I suddenly didn’t like Henri so much.
I was pretty sure from the way my eye was twitching, it didn’t like him much either.
I’d been so worried about what these people were going to say, and he was the one throwing wrenches now? He was supposed to be on my team, wasn’t he? He’d called me Cricket not even thirty minutes ago.
“Come on, Henri,” Matti interjected, but his cousin shook his head.
“No. There are special circumstances, and you were one of them, but that’s also part of the guidelines for living here. Children with no families and minors with relatives who already live here are always welcome. Anyone else has to go through a trial period before any unions happen. The way we’ve done things has worked for a long time, and we can’t afford to put our people at risk,” the big man argued. “No exceptions.”
I blinked.
So there was a trial period before any marrying went on?
Everyone started speaking. They were loud too. It was only Sienna, Duncan, and me that weren’t running our mouths from the sound of it.
I raised my hand, and Henri was paying attention because in a voice loud enough to be overheard despite the voices, he asked, “Cricket?”
I was Cricket again, but I hadn’t been a second ago when he was making it more difficult for me to join this place?