Anarchy (Hive Trilogy, #2)(34)
I gave her an extra squeeze. “You know the saying, babe: the grass is always greener on the other side. You have serious FOMO, but there’s nothing you need to fear you’re missing out on. The Hive is dark and deadly.”
The look on her face told me she was tuning me out again. I forced myself not to bitch-slap her. Despite the fact that I was so happy to see her, she was also pissing me off a lot lately with this moronic stubbornness of wanting to become a stupid vampire.
Pretending the tension between us wasn’t there, she flashed me a smile and linked her arm through mine. Her face was only lightly made up today and she looked pretty, fresh-faced, and healthy. “So Blake is meeting with the Quorum again tonight. Apparently they have conferred with other Quorums, and the international vampire council. They’re the ones who keep track of the world numbers or something. We should have a decision in the next week.”
My mouth dropped open. “Tessa!”
She elbowed me sharply. “Shh, don’t ruin this day. Your mom and I have been planning it for a week.”
I gave an exasperated sigh. The pissed-off was growing, but I didn’t bother to argue with her again. There was almost a hundred percent certainty they would deny the request. It was next to impossible to change humans any longer. The human-vampire truce was on shaky grounds, and we didn’t need more bad publicity, especially with the newly-turned child. Actually, if anything good could come out of that horrible happening, it was that Blake’s odds of being granted permission to turn Tessa were probably now at minus one.
I relaxed as we crossed through the sunny living room and into the open-plan dining area which bordered the kitchen. The extension on the dark wooden table was open, and extra chairs had been brought in. There were already settings out, ten of them by my count, delicate white china which we had inherited from my grandparents. They had passed on ten years ago, but it was almost as if they were here with us when we used their stuff. It wasn’t just the china. Everything in this room held a memory for me. It was home.
My mom wasn’t wealthy like Tessa’s, but we’d always done okay. I loved our furniture, mostly dark wood and antique, rich with age and history. Crossing into the white and turquoise country-style kitchen, topped off by dark timber bench tops, I ground to a halt, before peals of laughter ripped from me.
Holy shit. The sexy six were cooking.
The enforcers were stationed around the kitchen, their hulking forms making the room look positively tiny. Each of them was wearing a frilly and feminine lace apron and my mom had them hard at work with food prep.
I couldn’t stop staring. Ryder and Sam especially had me in hysterics. Both of them looked absolutely lost for words, as if they couldn’t even understand how my petite mother managed to get them into this position. Still, I was happy to see that each of them were making the best of it, Ryder kneading bread, Sam snapping the ends off of green beans. Markus had even started to sing, his Scottish brogue deepening as he basted the turkey. I wonder if he’d been informed that that amazing liquid was a secret concoction passed down from Grandma May. Knowing my mom, he definitely had been.
Jared flashed me a white-toothed smile; he was on cranberry sauce duties, which we made from scratch in this household. Oliver was slicing cheeses, and Jayden stood at his side, sampling the fare and giving orders, sticking to what he was good at.
And my mom, who was totally in her element, was dashing between all of them, giving instructions.
“Is this really happening?” Tessa’s voice was a bubble of amusement. “Or did we just wander into an alternate universe?”
“Let’s hope it’s an alternate universe and we can expect this room filled with sexy man cooks in frilly aprons to stick around,” I murmured. I turned to her and waggled my eyebrows up and down.
We both burst out laughing then, and I was so distracted that I never even noticed Ryder duck around the kitchen island, until he was right in front of me. He looked hot as hell, even with the streak of flour on his cheek and the pink and lavender frilly apron around his waist.
“You’re not laughing at me are you, Charlene?”
Ugh. No doubt he was taking great pleasure in using my full name. He knew how much it grated on my nerves.
Of course I’d give him no satisfaction by reacting. I smiled. “Lace really suits you. I think you should think about incorporating it into the enforcer unif—”
Quick as a flash he lightly palmed my face with flour. My mouth dropped open—damn, no doubt he’d been waiting for the perfect moment to do that. Before he could coat me any further, I quickly tackled him, laughing as he still somehow managed to rub more on my face.
Suddenly Mom was standing over us with a huge grin. “So he’s the one? I was trying to figure out which one of these good looking fellas had caught my daughter’s attention.”
Ryder scrambled to pull me upright, and wiped his palms on his apron.
“It’s nice to officially meet you, ma’am. I’m Ryder Angelson.”
Whoa! Ryder had a last name? Ash and vamps tended to just stick with first names, most of them shedding that last formality of their human persona. I’d never even thought to ask him for a full name.
My mother gave me an approving look. “A boy with manners, I like it. You can call me Jo.” She shook his hand. I could tell immediately that she wasn’t just saying the words, she really did like Ryder. My mom was a great judge of character; she’d already looked past the lead enforcer’s outer persona of tall, dark, and deadly to see the man beneath. Glancing between my mom, Ryder, and around the rest of the kitchen, my heart filled with enough joy to last a lifetime.