Page 5 of Snag (Conduit #2)

“Gigi, my friend,” I say for Rought’s benefit— and just a little pointedly. “Let’s get you settled. There are scalloped potatoes and a warm fire awaiting you in the main house.”

“Fine!” she huffs playfully.

“Can you back it in?” Rought asks, gesturing toward the back side of the barn beyond the garage.

The combat mage gives him a withering glare, slams the truck into reverse, expertly spins the wheel, and somehow manages to back the trailer up without taking off the side of the barn.

She even manages to avoid the low eaves — low compared to the height of the trailer, at least — plus all the gutters, downspouts, and overfull rain barrels.

I’m fairly certain that the barrels are supposed to be feeding into a watering system for the garden and greenhouses, not all backed up. But I don’t have it within me to do more than just note the issue.

A combination of energies shift behind me, and a more specific brush prickles up my neck and the side of my face.

I glance back toward the main house to find Rath exiting through the front door.

His gaze is on me as he casually pops the last quarter of a purloined muffin in his mouth.

Apparently, he wandered up from the beach house while I was otherwise distracted, just in time to steal my food before attempting to intimidate my guests. My invited guests.

Presh, swathed in double-layered blankets and also holding a muffin, hovers in the doorway behind him, blinking as if she’s just woken up. Realizing I’ve seen her, she gives me a tentative, questioning wave.

As if she’s the one worried about her welcome, rather than the other way around.

She should hate me. For not saving her friend Kris from being manipulated and then killed by a dire mage.

Shouldn’t she?

With all but the front of the truck tucked away behind the far side of the barn, Gigi jumps from the driver’s side as if leaping for freedom.

“Thank the fuck!” she cries, slamming the door behind her and striding toward me.

“You know you have some asshole Authority staked out at the top of the drive, right?”

I twist my lips in acknowledgment. “You left them alive, didn’t you?”

She laughs, sharp and bright. “Yeah, alive and even unmaimed. Unfortunately, they’d already seen me. You know how dialed in those fuckers are with their stupid automated reporting system. But I didn’t want to bring any shit down on your head.”

Energy flickers across my shoulders — the only warning of Muta’s sudden appearance as the snake twines possessively around my neck. With his broad head and eyes fixed in Gigi’s direction, the bushmaster flicks his tongue to scent the air.

Gigi’s step hitches, her fingers twitching as she instinctively readies a defensive spell. Then, recognizing the snake decorating my neck, she covers by pressing that same hand to her chest. “Muta! You sneaky fucker!”

“A little late, aren’t you?” I say teasingly to the massive gold-and-brown bushmaster— my sometimes guardian, but mostly just a pain in my ass. “Was the fireside just too compelling?”

Muta cinches tighter around my neck, clearly sulking.

He’s not a fan of rain, not even the current light mist. He could easily avoid it by transforming into his solid gold-and-bronze topaz-bracelet aspect — usually worn around my forearm disguised as a piece of jewelry — but he enjoys the freedom his snake form offers.

No need to hide or be circumspect on the vast estate, though there are usually fewer people around that he’s allowed to terrify.

Gigi takes the last few steps to close the space between us, stopping just short of touching me — eye to eye, mostly due to her short-heeled boots.

Her printed silk top flutters loose around her hips, instantly soaking up the misty rain.

Her designer blue jeans are so bleached they’re practically white, artfully ripped and worn at the knees.

Muta slithers down my arm until he’s twined around both my and Rought’s wrists, because we’re still holding hands.

I raise my free arm to Gigi, offering an embrace. She steps into me. Her blond curls twist wildly in the breeze as she just barely brushes her right cheek against my right, then her left cheek across my left. She releases me as quickly as possible, stepping back and not quite looking at me.

My energy is usually seriously off-putting, or at least quite intense. Not that I’m generally so demonstrative. Or offering to be demonstrative.

“Thank you for coming,” I say.

“Anytime,” Gigi says, meaning it .

“Coda?”

She jerks her chin back toward the trailer. “Plugged in as usual. Last I bothered to check. I need a break … where’s the nearest fucking spa?”

“We’ll get you sorted,” Rought says.

Gigi finally acknowledges the shifter, glancing down at our entangled hands and Muta all but binding our wrists and arms together.

“I wouldn’t expect anything less from you, AD.

” ‘AD’ meaning ‘Adonis dick.’ That was Coda’s nickname for Rought.

Because he looks like an idealized Greek god, not because the awry hacker successfully hunted down actual dick pics.

Rought frowns deeply. I’m so accustomed to him smiling that I’m a little shocked, and admittedly just a little turned on, by the pure, focused intent threaded through his abrupt displeasure.

“Gigi, Rought,” I say. “Rought, Gigi.”

Gigi tilts her head coyly. Her shoulder dips just enough for the silk blouse to slip low enough to expose a sexy flash of her lacy, bright-red demi bra. “My pleasure … Rought,” she purrs.

Rought deliberately looks away from her, utterly dismissive and practically seething with indignation. “I’ll get the trailer hooked up.” He squeezes my hand, then loosens his hold.

Muta releases Rought, settling fully — and way too heavily — on my wrist. Ignoring that I feel instantly untethered without Rought’s steady touch, I cradle all of Muta against my chest. Even though he hates being cuddled like a pet. “What have you been eating?” I mutter to the weighty death god.

Muta hasn’t yet taken his full focus off Gigi, but he spares my comment a pissy flick of his tongue.

Rought crosses toward the truck and trailer without acknowledging the combat mage again. My long-lost soul-bound mate …

I’m not certain I’ve completely managed to wrap my mind around it all yet. So I just snuggle Muta against my chest, against that warm ball of energy that might be the beginning of a new bond —

“Singularly focused,” Gigi murmurs, though likely still loud enough for Rought to hear.

“Good.” She knows he’s a shifter — the tenor of his essence factored in with his physical size would be unmistakable to a mage of her caliber — though she doesn’t know about the extra powers that come from his gryphon. Yet.

I sigh, shaking my head at the combat mage, even though I’m still watching Rought walking away. Watching him as if I can’t bear to tear my eyes from the breadth of his shoulders, or the taper of his waist, or the remembrance of his mouth on mine, his grip on my —

“Goes both ways, I see,” Gigi says, eyeing me now and slightly amused. “That’s good too.”

Rought disappears from my sight around the truck and the side of the barn.

I can still feel him, though. His presence is potent even within the energy of the intersection point.

Almost as if the gryphon shifter feeds into that energy, and it into him.

That’s another of the revelations to be explored when my mind, my soul, doesn’t feel quite so … threadbare.

Muta writhes around my wrist and forearm, tucking under my sleeve as he transforms into the gold-scaled, dark-brown topaz bracelet. Too many people, maybe. Or maybe the misting rain is finally too much for him.

“Introduce me to the rest?” Gigi asks almost gently. Her gaze levels on the front patio of the main house over my shoulder. “We should warm up and eat, yes?”

I follow her gaze, taking in Presh, still swathed in blankets and nibbling on her muffin, and Rath, huge and forbidding, standing watch like he’s some ancient guardian. A guardian in dark-gray sweatpants and a ridiculously tight black T-shirt.

And fuck.

The celestial dragon sharing a body — and a soul — with the imposing shifter actually is an ancient guardian.

So that’s two.

Two of my supposed soul-bound mates transform into mythical guardian beasts.

The third is a creature even more terrifying.

If the mythology is built on truth, Reck’s beast, the cu-sith, is a type of grim reaper — the personification of death, aka a demigod.

And based on what I saw of it last night, the cu-sith is nowhere near as well contained as the death god currently twined around my forearm.

“Is this one a problem?” Gigi asks, eyeing Rath with narrowed eyes.

The dragon shifter glowers right back at the combat mage, crossing his arms and widening his stance.

“No,” I say with a sigh, starting for the house. “He’s mine as well.”

Rath’s amber-bright gaze shoots to me. Surprise or some similar emotion eases the tension threaded through his shoulders.

“I just didn’t know it,” I add.

“Okay, then,” Gigi murmurs, just a little doubtfully. “And the little one is Precious?”

I smile at that, locking eyes with the young awry intently watching me approach.

The purple in her eyes marking her as awry is more obvious today, even against the gray light.

She manifested a lot of unanchored power last night, so I’m not surprised that it’s all settled close to the surface. “Yes. She is Precious.”

“I see that.” Gigi picks up her pace, jogging up the stairs to the patio ahead of me and grinning down at Presh. “Hello, darling. I’m Gigi.”

“Hi,” Presh says shyly, glancing over at me.

“Gigi and Coda are old friends,” I say, mounting the stairs.

“Yes,” Gigi says. “Friends.”