Total pages in book: 84
Estimated words: 81808 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 327(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 81808 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 409(@200wpm)___ 327(@250wpm)___ 273(@300wpm)
“I get it.”
“And I know it hurts. I just melted down all over Mere; that’s why I look like somebody punched me in the face.”
“I’m sorry,” Evan replied, trying to give Cole a bit of a smile. “And yeah, I’m really sorry to lose a part of my family, but as long as I’m with you, I’m okay.”
Cole reached out and cupped his brother’s cheek.
“I know you have that business meeting tomorrow, the day before Thanksgiving, and normally Narah would pick me up after school when you can’t, so who’s gonna—”
“Me.” Ondine walked into the room, her hair now falling to the middle of her back in auburn waves with highlights of mahogany, yawning, and headed for the coffee maker, which was filled with more of the chicory blend.
“You’re gonna get me?” Evan asked her, his face lighting up.
“Yes. I drive a sky-blue Volkswagen van, so you can’t miss me,” she informed him, first going to the cabinet and grabbing an enormous mug, before walking to the coffee maker, patting it, telling it what a wonderful machine it was, and filling her cup.
“You have a car?” Cole asked her.
“Van,” she corrected him as she walked over to the refrigerator, found the cream, and filled it to the rim. The fact that she had to slurp it to carry the mug with her made her seem less mythical creature and more a hungover twenty-year-old. Of course she banged the fridge door shut as well. She always did.
“You know how to drive?” Cole sounded stunned.
She turned her emerald-green death stare on him.
“Sorry, I’m sorry.”
“The only one here who can’t drive is Mere,” she said, taking a seat at the butcher block table in the kitchen.
“I can drive,” I argued.
“You can go very short distances, like down a hill or around a corner, and only here in town. When was the last time you were on a freeway?”
“I can’t seem to recall.”
She snickered. “Let’s talk about four-way stops.”
“It’s only polite to let other people go first.”
Cole started chuckling as we all joined her at the table.
“It’s not funny.”
“And to answer your question, I drive well, and the van is pristine. Also, I have decided that until your challenge on Thanksgiving, I will watch over Evan when he’s not in school.”
“Really?” I asked her, more than a bit surprised. “You’re going to be around?”
“Yes.” She met my gaze steadily.
“Well, since I have to work, and Cole has to work, and since Evan likes you better than both of us—”
“Hey!” Cole was indignant.
“––we really appreciate that. I can’t think of anyone safer than you.”
“Of course you can’t,” she said haughtily, then turned to Evan. “And I applaud your decision to not see them after the challenge, but if you change your mind, I would be willing to go with you then as well.”
“I’m worried about you getting hurt.” Evan sniffled, a couple of stray tears rolling down his cheeks. “I don’t want you or Cole or Mere to be in danger because of me, but I don’t think just staying here, hiding on Mere’s land, is a good idea either.”
“It’s not,” she assured him, reaching out to brush away his tears. “But keep in mind, I’m harder to kill than you think. And Mere…” She turned to look at me. “I looked it up one time, and as, technically, a mythological creature, can you even be killed?”
“I would have to decide to end.”
“That’s right, and you’re not doing that until you have an heir for your land so it will always be a sanctuary for all your freaky little friends.”
“Freaky?” Evan asked her.
“She means Teague.”
Evan looked at her. “What’d he do?”
She glared at him. “He called me a mermaid, as though I were common.”
As Ondine launched into another tirade about Teague and mermaids, Cole reached out and took hold of my chin, turning me to face him. “You can simply decide when you want to die?”
“It’s not death for me. I’ll simply rejoin the universe like I never existed.”
“Okay, I hate that.”
I smiled at him.
“Will you age with me?”
“I will. I have to in every lifetime, leaving my land to the next link in the chain.”
“Which is always just you, right?”
“That’s correct.”
His eyes narrowed. “Tell me how old you are.”
“Do you want to discuss this to take your mind off everything else?”
“Partly, yes. But also, I just want to know.”
“Well, I’ve never seen a dinosaur,” I teased him.
He shook his head at me. “How long? A hundred years?”
“It’s hard to say, really, because I wasn’t aware of time at first. I was focused on what I was made to do.”
“Which was to punish.”
“Yes.”
“But then you changed.”
I smiled at him. “It was a slow realization that if the child could be saved, then the adult they became would not need to be punished for their sins.”
“Clever of you.” He moved his chair closer to me and ran his knuckles down my throat. “So, a thousand years old?”