Page 34 of Snag (Conduit #2)

I make a noise to let her know I’m listening, but not wanting to interrupt.

Zaya was always open and trusting, eager to trade stories and even more eager to seek out information or new experiences.

But the reincarnated Zaya — if that’s even the proper term for coming back from the dead but still inhabiting the same body — is closed off. Not secretive, but intensely private.

Zaya’s gaze shifts to the photographs propped on the windowsill, tapping the journal lightly against her chin. “I wanted to match the dates.”

“Between Disa’s journals and Mack’s photographs?”

“Yeah. It gave me a starting point. ”

“And … ?”

“Couldn’t find them.” She looks at the armoire, then shudders as if abruptly cold. “There’s something in there,” she whispers. “Something that belongs to me.”

I rub my hand up and down her spine without thinking about it.

Zaya turns to look at me, head tilting and hair trailing over one bare shoulder. If she dropped that shoulder just a little more, the gown would simply slide off … maybe even so far as to expose her breast to my greedy gaze. And if I took a taste then, she couldn’t blame me, right?

Zaya’s focus drops to my mouth, then back up to peer directly into my fucking aching soul.

I keep my gaze on her face, even as I see her nipples hardening against the lightweight silk of her dress. She only has to shift her leg a bit to the left to feel the ready budge of my cock.

Her gaze flicks to my mouth again, and she lists toward me. Then, blinking, she catches herself, straightening her spine.

I open my mouth to tell her she can kiss me, that I want nothing more than to kiss and cuddle as the morning becomes day, but she looks back down at the journal.

“Actually.” She quietly clears her throat. “I found another picture yesterday … or rather, the day before yesterday … I’m not keeping perfect track right now.”

“Understandable.”

She quirks a smile at me.

My heart squelches, then picks up its pace. Its lust. It has to just be all-consuming lust and the staticky bond between us. Because I don’t know this Zaya. I don’t know this Zaya enough to love her. Again.

She allows the journal to fall open in her hands. “I found this in the cemetery where Mack was digging when he died. Oh —”

Zaya flinches, and the journal slides off her lap, falling to the floor in a flutter of pages.

“Don’t do that without warning!” she practically shouts.

I stiffen, raising my hands. What the …?

“Not you,” Zaya snaps, huffing at me. “I’m with Rath in the tower. You don’t need my permission.” She shakes her head, looking at me. “Why would he need my permission to join us?”

I hear Rought’s chuckle from the lower hallway, then his rapid footsteps on the stairs.

“He’s … can you communicate telepathically?”

Zaya twists her lips, playing at being peeved about it even though she’s practically glowing. “Apparently. I thought it might just be with the gryphon.”

Rought, wearing nothing but jeans like he just rolled out of bed and realized he shouldn’t wander around the house naked, all but bursts up the stairs onto the upper floor of the tower, grinning madly. “Not just the gryphon!”

Zaya opens her mouth to protest, but Rought lunges around the desk, cups her face, and kisses her robustly.

Robustly enough to press Zaya against my chest. Her sweet ass is now very suddenly nestling my rapidly hardening cock.

I stifle a moan. But I don’t quite manage to stop myself from gripping Zaya’s hip and grinding up into her. Just a little.

Rought releases her. She’s panting lightly.

I manage to loosen my grip on her hip, but she doesn’t shift away from my cock .

“We’ll have to test that further,” Rought says with a grin.

“Which part?” Zaya teases back.

“All of it, from start to finish. Over and over again.”

She laughs huskily.

Grinning, Rought steps back and picks up the fallen journal. “What are you two doing up here?”

“Research,” Zaya says playfully.

Then she fucking wiggles in my lap.

And I’m definitely no longer just sporting a semi.

Rought chuckles, bending down a second time to retrieve a loose piece of paper that’s fallen from the journal and ended up half under the desk. He glances at it. The smile instantly falls from his face. He flips it over to read the other side.

It’s a photograph.

Zaya says, “I found that in —”

“Where the fuck did you get —” Rought overlaps her.

They both pause, Rought pale and frowning, Zaya stiff in my lap.

“What is it?” I growl.

Rought passes me the photograph, shaking his head. “What … that’s …”

I look at the photo. It’s Disa with three shifters. For a brief moment, I think one of those shifters is Reck. Which makes no fucking sense because the photo looks as if it was taken in the eighties.

“What the fuck?” I snarl, flipping it over and reading the inscription on the back.

Oso, Ward, Disa, and Ari. Summer 1989.

A visceral emotion more akin to fear than surprise knifes through me. “Why do you have a photo of our fucking father …”

“And our uncle?” Rought adds.

“What?” Zaya reaches for the photo.

I hold it just out of reach, staring at it so hard, visually documenting every detail, that I’m pretty sure I’d set it on fire if I wielded that power in either of my forms.

“That’s the Outcast and the Cataclysm, Zaya,” Rought says, his tone way softer than mine. “With Disa. Ari and Oso.”

“And who the fuck is the third guy?” I ask, finally ceding the photo to Zaya.

Staring at it, she slides off my lap and takes a few steps away from me.

Even completely distracted, I mourn the newly imposed distance between us. And not just our physical proximity. We didn’t need another complication, and that photo —

“Ward,” Zaya says thoughtfully. “If he’s the only one of the three unaccounted for … then he’s the one whose ashes are interred in the Gage family mausoleum. Along with a sacrificial knife with blood somehow preserved on the blade.”

“What the fuck?” Rought snarls.

He and Zaya both turn to look at me.

I’ve already got my phone in hand, punching in my uncle’s number.

“Rath,” my uncle answers, sounding like I’ve woken him up. I don’t put the phone on speaker. “It’s early.”

“We’re coming over,” I snarl. “With Zaya. Who, yes, is still fucking alive.”

My uncle sighs heavily.

For just a moment, I feel like a complete asshole.

The Outcast dropped just a few weeks ago from a massive heart attack.

Also, I’ve had ample opportunity to inform him of Zaya’s return, including at the Outcast lieutenants’ meeting yesterday, and I haven’t broached the subject.

Though I don’t doubt that Grinder has been more forthcoming.

But I look down at the photo and up at Zaya, and I’m so fucking incensed that I can barely speak. “You’ve got secrets, Uncle. Secrets that directly affect us. Did you know that Zaya was fucking alive?”

The Outcast inhales deeply. Then he simply says, “I’ll get breakfast sorted,” and hangs up.

Riding a wave of utter disbelief, I drop my hand to my side, phone dangling from my fingers.

“That wasn’t a no,” Rought says, sounding as betrayed as I feel.

“That wasn’t a no,” I murmur, agreeing.

We both turn to look at Zaya. She blinks as if tuning back into the room, which makes me wonder if she was sensing things on a different level than the rest of us can see or hear.

She grimaces. “I’m going to have to change.”

“I like that dress,” Rought says, suddenly grinning again. “Does it come in other colors?”

She huffs at him playfully, crossing to the stairs. “I found it in my aunt’s closet.”

“And why were you digging around in there?” I ask, even though this isn’t remotely the conversation we should be having.

Zaya smirks at me, shrugging one shoulder and nearly dislodging the dress precariously hanging from it. I zero in on that point of connection, but alas, the dress holds. “There’s a fireplace. And the bed is even bigger. Sturdier.”

She gathers the dress in one hand and crosses down the stairs without further elaboration .

Rought shouts a laugh. “Thinking you’ll need a bigger bed soon, goddess?”

Zaya doesn’t answer.

My brother turns his grin on me, but without Zaya in the vicinity, his amusement fades. “Fuck me. You think he knew?”

“I think outright saying no would have been easier, cleaner.” I scrub my hand over my head, then my face. “I know you’re busy tracking the dire awry.”

“Coda’s on that. At least for the extent of this conversation.”

“Precious stays here.”

He nods.

“I mean it. You need to back me with Zaya.”

“It’s not going to be an issue. Presh is still asleep.”

“Zaya caves to everything and anything our little sister wants.”

Rought’s grin returns, sloppy and soft around the edges. “Just as it always should have been. Zaya loves that fiercely.”

That statement, that proclamation, is like a knife to the gut.

It’s also the utter truth. And we almost missed out on all of it.