Page 39 of Eclipsed Empire

Brix cursed as he came, but I couldn’t see the pleasure on his face because I was already gone, lost to the sea of sparks and falling. But the best part of it all was that they were there to catch me.

21

WREN

“I’m too old for delivery days,” Dina muttered as she sliced open the box of booze with a box cutter.

My lips twitched. “The hell you are. I saw you put that guy on his ass the other night.”

A grin spread across Dina’s face as she unloaded bottles of whiskey. “He was an asshole. Tried to cop a feel on a girl who very much did not welcome his attention.”

D had kicked the guy’s stool out from under him and sent him crashing to the floor before eighty-sixing his ass. It was beautiful.

And, gods, I loved that the dustup at Arcane was the most drama we’d had in the past two weeks. But the lack of movement on any front made me twitchy. Locke had at least found the identity of the fake fisherman.

Jackson Gilbert.

Man out of Denver. Worked at a car dealership. No wife or kids. And no known link to any of the Arcanes’ enemies or mine.

It was possible he’d simply been a hired gun of some sort, but there should’ve been a trail. We’d found nothing. No one was happy about that.

Still, we’d managed to settle into a routine of sorts. I never went anywhere alone, but I found I didn’t mind it as much as I thought I would. Having Locke, Puck, or Brix with me was comforting. King continued to keep his distance but left little gifts behind for me to find.

It was most often wildflowers, ones I could scent he’d picked himself. There was a vase behind the bar with them right now. Occasionally, it was other things: a new knife that was currently tucked into the pocket of my jeans, a caster’s spell book on wards, a cupcake from the local bakery—things that told me he was thinking about me.

The only thing he hadn’t given me were his words. An honest conversation about what he felt or didn’t.

Ender had avoided me like the plague unless he was tasked with my protection. He was on duty today and chose to spend that time patrolling the block Arcane was on instead of sitting at the bar like Locke, King, and Brix did, or behind it like Puck.

Dina let out a whistle. “Earth to Wren.”

I shook my head. “Sorry. Apparently, breaking down boxes takes me to la-la land.”

Dina chuckled. “I don’t blame you. But there are only two more.”

“There is a God in heaven.”

“I think we deserve a reward after this. Maybe I’ll send Gary to the bakery to get us cupcakes.”

The memory of the lemon blueberry one King had gotten me played on my tongue. “You know he lives for the chocolate peanut butter ones, so you likely won’t get any arguments from him.”

“It’s the triple chocolate for me all the way,” Dina said.

I broke down the final box as she put the last liquor bottle where it needed to be. “Done.”

“Let’s get these out to the recycling, and then it’s cupcake city.”

I wouldn’t argue with her. We loaded ourselves up with cardboard and made it down the hallway.

“I’ll get it,” Gary called, lumbering out of the kitchen where he was preparing for the lunch crowd.

“How do you feel about a mission, Gar?” Dina asked as she maneuvered outside.

“Depends,” he answered warily. “Is it burying a body or a trip to the store?”

A laugh bubbled out of me. “Why do I feel like you’d do better with the body?”

His lips twitched, the gray scruff around them dancing with the movement. “Hate crowds. Don’t mind blood.”