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A Fae with messy dark brown hair and brown eyes so dark they were nearly black appeared on the screen.

“Tessie?”

She had the phone angled so Theon wasn’t on the screen, and that was fine for the moment.

“Hi, Dex,” she said, a small, sad smile pulling at her lips.

“How are you calling me?” he asked, a mixture of relief and suspicion in his voice.

She cleared her throat, glancing at Theon out of the corner of her eye. “I am borrowing his phone.”

“Borrowing?” the Fae repeated skeptically.

He appeared to be walking down a hallway of some sort, and he stopped at a door, knocking twice.

“He knows I am using it,” Tessa answered, glancing at Theon side-long again.

Understanding flashed across the Fae’s face. “How long?”

“Thirty minutes.”

A grin filled the Fae’s face. “That’s more than enough time.”

Tessa’s brow furrowed. “For what?”

The door the Fae had knocked on opened then, another Fae appearing, and Tessa’s face lit up. The Fae’s sky-blue eyes blinked once in surprise as Dex flipped the phone so he could see Tessa. The new Fae had hair so blonde it was nearly white. His surprise was replaced by a wry smile a moment later.

“Hiya, Sweetheart,” he crooned with a wink.

“Hi, Lange,” she breathed excitedly, sitting up a little straighter. “Corbin?”

Another Fae appeared over the blonde Fae’s shoulder. This one had warm, brown skin, shaggy brown hair, and hazel eyes. He was slightly shorter than the blonde one, and he rested his chin on Lange’s shoulder.

“Tessa? Are you all right? We’ve been worried,” the Fae said, far more serious than the blonde Fae had been.

Theon propped his elbow on the arm of the sofa, steepling his finger along his temple as he watched Tessa. He could still see the screen for the most part, and while he had wanted a visual of her so-called family, he also wanted to observe her with them and them with her.

“I miss you all,” Tessa said in answer to his question.

Theon could see the brown-haired male—Corbin she had called him—about to say something else when Dex’s voice sounded.

“She’s not alone. Someone call Brecken and Oralia, and tell them to get their asses over here fast. She only has thirty minutes.”

Corbin disappeared, and Dex entered the room as Lange snatched the phone from his hand. The Fae moved to a sofa as he said, “Did you catch the Chaosphere game the other night?”

Theon rolled his eyes. Fucking Chaosphere.

But Tessa was shaking her head. “I was…out and missed it. Fill me in?”

Theon tuned out Lange’s run-down of the game, his eyes bouncing from Tessa to the phone and back. He watched her relax more and more with each passing minute. Watched that smile never leave her face. Watched a side of her come out he’d never fully seen before, only glimpsed on a Chaosphere field earlier that day.

Corbin had returned, sitting close to Lange. Lange’s arm came around him, settling on the back of the sofa. A couple of some sort then. Tessa had been smart about that, at least. The odds of those two ending up even remotely close to each other was slim. Tessa had said she wouldn’t sleep with other Fae because she didn’t want that kind of relationship until she’d been assigned to her kingdom. How had she worded it? No attachments made, and no feelings required.

Lange was still going on about the game, Tessa clinging to every word and laughing at his animated play-by-play, when there was commotion in the background.

“Give me that,” came a female voice, and Theon leaned in a little to see the female that had appeared. She was pretty with pale blonde hair similar to Lange’s, but her eyes were as dark as Dex’s. “Tessa?”

“Hi, Oralia,” she said with a smile.