Page 3 of King’s Kismet

I nodded. “I suppose you’re right. It just feels like everyone knows something that I don't know about this job. I can’t shake the gut instinct that there’s more at play.”

“Do you have reason to believe they’re lying to you?”

“I don’t believe they would send me into more danger than I can handle,” was my nonanswer.

I saw the way Franklin’s cheeks rounded as he left without another word.

But did I think my parents were lying?

I couldn’t stop the thought from rolling across my mind.

They were the best people I knew, not that I kept many others around to have a decent baseline. I would give them the benefit of the doubt, because I had no reason to believe they would deceive me.

If they weren’t telling me the full truth, then they had a good reason. They were extraordinary creatures with more age under their belts than I could comprehend.

I’d learned to shoot a gun from a wolf who had fought in the Revolutionary war. I’d been nursed back to health by a vampire who had walked the streets of Europe during the bubonic plague. And the devil himself had taught me how to wield a sword.

So, I could kill a few people for them while saving their friends.

It was no sweat off my tits.

The hellsteed’s chuckle rolled through my mind. “That’s not how the saying goes.”

“That’s the way it goes now. Get out of my head, Jack.”

“Then close the fucking door,” my best friend snarked.

Nail Gun Fun

Thursday, July 16th

Noon

The repairs after our showdown with Alric’s army were still underway. But we were getting so close to finishing them. York, Briggs, and I had been working for the last three weeks to get the holes in the house closed up and ready for siding to be replaced.

The hole I blew in the dining room…

And the hole that spanned the corner of the second and third floors from one of the dragons.

Which one? I never asked.

But it was too small to be Sarge. So, either Joyner or one of Alric’s dragon friends.

The specifics no longer mattered to me.

The point was… Today, we were working inside.

The new windows had been installed in the dining room a week ago, which meant we could begin hanging drywall. And we’d had a productive day until I’d asked for Palmer and Novak to help us.

York had been with me through some of the improvement projects I’d done when I first moved into this house, so he understood the pride and effort I put into making this empty shell a home.

He and Briggs were hard, hands-on workers. They didn’t worry about getting dirty, and I was enjoying the shirtless, sweaty, dust-covered view. My wolf was covered in drywall mud from fingertips to elbows with the occasional streak in his hair. York had clean circles around his eyes from his safety goggles…

They were so fucking sexy right now.

My mage and my vampire, though?

They were the opposite.