Total pages in book: 97
Estimated words: 91002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 91002 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 455(@200wpm)___ 364(@250wpm)___ 303(@300wpm)
He waited for a moment, rewarded with more scurrying. Large, but following the sound patterns of a normal critter. Nothing to worry about.
He tapped his fingers against his knee. Nessa was definitely asleep. She’d gone to bed nearly two hours ago. These days, she didn’t tend to stay asleep, but she could usually conk out pretty quickly.
The minute hand clicked a few more notches. He finally stood and quietly walked into the kitchen. Among the papers in the corner was the pushed aside but not-at-all-forgotten encrypted phone. They had to stay off the grid to avoid detection, and so they couldn’t use it. Besides, Niamh had changed the message style, now delivering incoming texts to their social media accounts or other message centers. Jessie had mostly gone quiet.
For reasons he couldn’t explain, the breath caught in his chest. His hands shook so badly, he had to stop reaching for the phone. He squeezed his eyes tightly and braced against the counter, struggling to control his breathing, to work his way out from under the sudden panic attack. He hadn’t gotten one of these since his sister’s health had started failing.
Not for the first time, and certainly not for the last, he wondered if they were doing the right thing. Times had changed, drastically. They had a new enemy now. A much savvier, more intelligent, more controlled enemy. Their old tricks weren’t working as well, and back then, they’d had guidance from his sister’s visions. Now they didn’t have any cheat sheets, and he wondered if they were actually good enough to get to the goal line. He wasn’t so sure.
A tear slipped from his eye. He wiped it away, straightening up and regaining composure.
“Harden up, Sebastian,” he murmured. His sister had said that to him when she was slipping away. “Harden up. There’s always a rainbow if you look hard enough.”
He reached for the phone. He didn’t care if Jessie and her crew knew where he and Nessa were. He didn’t care if Tristan sent Nessa those gorgeous purple flowers or books to help her learn. He welcomed it, in fact. Her sassy little smile said she rather liked the game, as annoyed as it made her. She liked being the object of the predator’s focus.
Sebastian liked being useful, liked coming up with that broach for Cyra or a new serum to help Edgar cheat in his flower shows. If only he had a magical way to help that vampire with his doily obsession…
“I wonder how his killer flowers are going,” Sebastian mused as he pushed the button on the archaic phone and waited for it to start up.
The screen flashed. The line inched across…and then it went dark.
“Dang,” he muttered. No battery.
He pulled open the nearest drawer. Notepads, pens, scissors—Nessa liked order. She didn’t seem to understand that a junk drawer was supposed to be messy.
The next drawer had wound-up, perfectly arranged electronics cords. He grabbed the one he needed as a snap outside caught his attention. The cord unfurled as he turned that way and listened. Nothing disturbed the silence. The critters had found something to eat…or they hadn’t and had taken off.
He plugged the cord into the socket and turned the phone around as a strange feeling caught in his chest. It felt like…a release, kind of. His panic attack finally subsiding?
He frowned as he pushed the connector into the phone and set it gently on the counter. The symbol for charging lit the screen. In a moment, he should be able to turn it on.
The feeling in his chest happened again, stronger this time. It was then that the silence of the night snagged his attention. Not the stillness—that often happened when the critters had all wandered away. No, the silence. No owls calling to each other from opposite sides of the house. No shrill cry of a coyote or the chirping or trilling of various kinds of frogs from the nearby creek.
His small hairs stood on end, and he straightened, absently pushing the button to start the phone while his mind went back in time. Did he remember silence in the middle of the night?
Near dawn, yes. There was a period where the night creatures went to bed and the day animals hadn’t yet roused. He often went to the porch with a cup of coffee to enjoy the first rays of the sun. In those times, it felt like he was the only one awake in the world.
The phone started to life, but his ears strained to hear the sounds outside. He looked at the nearest window, its blinds pulled. That feeling went off in his chest again.
His wards! Someone was dismantling his wards in a way he’d never felt before. The magic didn’t alert him, but the person—or persons—wasn’t strong enough to completely hide the effects of deconstructing his spell. If he’d been asleep, he never would’ve noticed.