“I will,” Emerald said, nodding so hard it was a wonder her head didn’t snap clean off.
Then she was up from the table, the chair shrieking over the slate as she shoved it back, and Bowen and Tamsyn watched her vanish into the dark hall.
“You’re going to be a good dad someday,” Tamsyn said, and the words startled him so much that he almost jumped.
Him, a da.
It was nothing he’d ever thought of before, nothing he’d ever wanted or even thought he could have. Doing archaic magic on a mountain in North Wales didn’t exactly lend itself to babies or small children.
But a child.
One with Tamsyn’s pretty eyes and smart mouth, someone to teach magic to, a cousin for wee Taran.
Oh, Christ, he suddenly ached for it, but then, as always, he remembered Declan.
He had a duty to fulfill to that man, and until it was done, everything else had to wait.
Even Tamsyn.
He didn’t say any of this out loud, but Tamsyn reached over and took his hand before asking gently, “Bowen, has he ever asked you to devote everything to helping him? To put your life on pause until he’s back or released or whatever the end of all this is?”
Bowen squeezed her hand, not answering for a long time. No, Declan had never asked it of him. Had only ever blamed himself for the accident, really. He’d been the one to say the words, after all; the one who wanted to try the spell.
But if Bowen had found the right words to stop him, if he hadn’t sourced the ingredients . . .
If, if, if.
“That’s what you hired me for, isn’t it?” she asked. “You’re looking for some artifact that will reverse it or bring him back, but you’re just throwing spaghetti at the wall right now, and sending me to get the spaghetti.” She shrugged before reaching up to pull another little bit of bark from her hair. “Not that I mind being the spaghetti fetcher, but I wish you’d told me that’s what I was doing. Maybe I could’ve helped or asked around a little more specifically.”
“Maybe,” Bowen acknowledged. “But . . . it’s not always easy for me to open up to people.”
“This is incredibly shocking news,” Tamsyn deadpanned, making him chuckle, and he squeezed her hand again.
“Not like you do a lot of it, either, my girl. I still haven’t heard just why you were so adamant about never getting involved with people you work with.”
“And you still won’t,” she said, leaning closer to lift their joined hands off the table to kiss his knuckles. “Saving that one for when we’re back home. Which . . .” She looked around the rapidly dimming kitchen. Outside, the sun was setting, and there was a delicate lacing of frost forming on the window. “Shouldn’t we . . . I don’t know, be poofed back or whatever by now? I mean, if we were sent back to make sure your grandparents get married, mission more than accomplished, right?”
Bowen had been thinking something similar, but didn’t mention it because it would mean he’d once again have to talk about what he’d seen in that passageway, and he might never be ready for that.
“Of course, I guess we did just see them banging,” Tamsyn mused, and yup, there it was again, the Indelible Image of his grandparents shagging against a wall like their lives depended on it. “Maybe they’re not officially back together yet,” Tamsyn went on. “So we don’t get to go back until that ring is on that finger, you know?”
“Maybe,” Bowen agreed, but it was bothering him a bit, that nothing had changed now that Harri and Elspeth were—graphically—back together.
Unless that was just some sort of Goodbye Shag, and he and Tamsyn still had their work cut out for them.
Or . . .
“You’re still thinking about Carys and Y Seren, aren’t you?” Tamsyn asked, and Bowen glanced up at her from beneath his brows.
“Hmmph,” he said.
“Which means yes,” Tamsyn replied, propping her chin on her hand. “I’ll find a way to ask Lady Meredith about it provided we don’t get poofed back before I have a chance.” Then she leaned back, stretching her arms. “But I don’t think I have to, because I’m telling you, we’re gonna find out it wasn’t just getting them back together, it was getting them married. And that’s not until the solstice.”
“Which will only give us two more nights to figure out what to do if we’re wrong,” Bowen reminded her.
Standing up, Tamsyn came around behind his chair to press a kiss on the top of his head. “Don’t be such a pessimist. Now come on, let’s go get cleaned up.”
Tilting his head back, Bowen looked at her gorgeous upside-down face.
“When you say ‘cleaned up’ . . .”
“I mean I want you to take me back to that big bathtub and fuck me again, yes,” she answered.
Bowen shot to his feet so quickly, he nearly clocked Tamsyn on the chin, making her laugh as she gave an exaggerated stumble backward.
Arms around each other’s waists, they made their way down the narrow, dark hallways to the main staircase, the smell of candles and evergreen strong, and when Bowen glanced out a nearby window, he saw that a light snow was falling.
“It’s really lovely here when there’s not a ghost screaming about everything,” Tamsyn observed, and Bowen nodded, but he was slightly distracted by the figures coming up the front steps.
It was Harri and Elspeth, Elspeth wearing a long white cape with a fur-trimmed hood, Harri in a dark suit.
“What is it?” Tamsyn asked, but Bowen was already tugging her down the hallway.
They reached the main entrance just as the butler opened the door to a laughing and snow-dusted Harri and Elspeth, who both turned wide smiles on Bowen and Tamsyn when they spotted them.
“Oh, you two! Wonderful, you can be the first to congratulate us!”
“Congratulate?” Bowen echoed, and Elspeth held out her left hand, now weighed down by the heavy cabochon ruby that all Penhallow brides wore.
