Page 43 of Another Damned Storm

He let his hand fall. “Yeah? Well, when I was a teenager my only real family was ripped out of my world with a demonic shadow inside her. Believe me, I know what it feels like to let my emotions run my mouth.”

“I take it you gave Lily a tongue-lashing once or twice?” I asked, trying to shift the conversation.

He rolled his eyes. “She gave it right back.”

I bet she did.

“But that’s in the past,” Matt said, rolling his shoulders back. “Just like this disagreement will be, soon enough. In the meantime, we should get the introductions out of the way.” He stretched out a hand to Hook. “I’m Matt, Never’s brother.”

Hook took his hand and shook it firmly. “Atlas, Never’s…” he let the statement drift.

“Mate,” I supplied.

“Mate,” Hook echoed, with satisfaction surging through our connection.

They broke apart, and Matt glanced between us. “If your name is Atlas, why does she call you Hook?”

“Because he’s a pirate,” I said, remembering the day I blinked awake on the beach to see him looming over me. His whole get up was something straight out of a pirate movie.

“And a god?” Matt asked. “Because I have to say, you don’t look like I would imagine a god looking.”

“How should a god look?” he asked.

“Bigger, for one,” Matt said. From the lift of his brow and the curve of his lips, he was baiting him for fun.

“I see. Would it be better if I were in a flowing robe and with a long beard too?”

“And maybe a magical staff.”

Hook chuckled. “If all gods looked like that, how would we ever tell each other apart?”

That piqued my brother’s interest. “How many gods are there?”

“Hundreds.”

“Seriously?”

“Indeed,” Hook confirmed.

Matt glanced toward the park before turning back to Hook. “I thought you were cursed to that other realm. How did you get here?”

Now that was a good question. I’d only been in the park for a few minutes, and I was still trying to find the best place to summon him when he’d materialized right in front of me.

“I found a way around the rules.” Hook gave me a look that said we’d be having that discussion later, when we were alone.

“How did you know how to find Never?” Matt asked.

“I followed my heart,” he said quietly. Warmth and affection washed over me, but it was clear my brother wanted a betterexplanation. “What matters is that I am here, she is here, and you are… much older than I remember.”

“Twenty-six years,” I said. Hook just nodded as if that were totally normal. “I know you said time moves differently between realms, but jumping decades in a few months? That seems a bit extreme.”

“It slips and slides, love. There’s no predicting it.”

My stomach sank. “How long ago did I leave?” I almost added ‘you’ but clipped the question short. It wasn’t like I’d had any desire to leave him. Between needing to make sure my brother was okay and my love for Hook, my heart was slowly being torn in two.

“A matter of days,” he said. A flutter of relief loosened the vice squeezing my chest before he added. “And every one felt like an eternity.”

Damn him.He knew just how to make it hurt, always in the best way.