Page 62 of The Golden Hour

A footstep behind me precedes Finn’s sardonic words, “Way to have my back, Aunt Mol.”

She waves off his comment, grinning. “Callisto isn’t exempt.” She points a spoon at me. “I’ve seen the way you look at him.”

My face is hot as I turn around. Even dressed in sweatpants and a T-shirt, Finn causes a quantifiable reaction in my body. My pulse kicks up a notch. A needy ache yawns between my legs. I want more of last night. A lot more.

Meeting his glittering blue gaze with effort, I whisper, “She was here last night. In her room.”

The horror on his face would be comical if I wasn’t still feeling it myself.

“What the hell, Molly! Why didn’t you say something?”

Laughing gaily, Molly takes two mugs to the kitchen table. “Are you kidding? Besides, I doubt you two would have heard me knocking.”

A pitiful noise squeaks from my throat.

Molly’s laugh turns to a cackle. “Ah, to be young again.”

“Kill me,” Finn whispers.

“Me first,” I whisper back.

“I’ll get breakfast started while you two have your coffee,” chirps Molly as she returns to the kitchen and opens cupboards. “Go ahead now, don’t be shy.”

Finn and I sit opposite each other. He sips his coffee. I sip mine. We avoid each other’s eyes.

“This is not how I pictured this morning going,” he mutters.

He sounds so disgruntled, a smile twitches my lips. “Oh yeah?”

Looking up, his gaze takes a slow path from my mouth to my eyes. “Yeah.” Eyes darkening, he adds, “Good morning, princess.”

I want to fly over the table and rip his clothes off. And from the gleam in his eye, he knows exactly what I’m thinking. He wants it, too.

What have I gotten myself into?

“Breakfast!” Molly drops a heaping pile of scrambled eggs and sausage between us, along with two forks and a bowl piled high with strawberries and blueberries. “The sausage is microwaved. Best I could do on short notice.”

“It’s great, thank you.”

“Thanks, Aunt Mol.”

She settles in the third chair with her coffee cradled in her hands. “Eat, then we’ll talk.”

I look at Finn and see in his eyes the same knowledge that’s in mine. What we saw at the ranch. My appetite flees.

I manage a few bites of egg and some berries, forcing myself to eat that much. Finn eats only a little more than me before he gives up, too.

“That bad, huh?” asks Molly.

“It’s not the food,” Finn begins, setting down his fork.

At his nod, I tell her what led us to my uncle’s farm. When I’m done, he tells her about the skull.

She listens, coffee forgotten in her hands, and at the end asks, “Dear God, what are we doing to do?”

It’s another three hours and several refills of coffee for all of us before we have a plan we agree on. A good one that ends with Vivian, and most likely my uncles, going to jail for a very long time.

You can’t kill an octopus by cutting off a leg.

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