In her notes, Alex had started a list of everyone else that she wanted to talk to. She designated a portion of the page to it, but she thought she’d probably have to start a new one before she was finished. Her pen kept moving even while she waited for Seth’s answers, but it paused briefly when he gave them. “That’s unique.” Her voice was distracted, until he pulled her focus entirely back to him when he told her how slowly shifters aged. Alex’s grip on her pen tightened. “Oh.”
Her husband was going to live twice as long as she was. In and of itself, it might have been startling, but it was something she could accept. But it felt like it meant a lot more than just having a few years over her. It made Seth saying that he wanted to give her something real sound like a lie. In one swift, overwhelming moment, Alex wondered how long he’d believed that they didn’t have a future.
It was the whole night. It was just a bad culmination of everything. But Alex honestly thought she heard some of the cracks start to shatter.
Seth’s words filtered through her awareness; of course Fredericka didn’t count, even though she absolutely did, and of course Whitby’s posse was largely vampiric, and of course … “Wait, Crater Lake? That’s… Nests? Is that what they’re actually called or should I just expect you to use a lot more bird terminology now? If so, can we just say they roost? Bats roost. Vampires can have coops.”
If Alex had feathers, to say they’d be ruffled would be to compare a hurricane to a spring storm. When Seth told her about Gabe, she just nodded and dropped her notebook on the couch. “I’ll try not to let it slip.” Walking towards the stairs, Alex avoided his eyes before she started up to their bedroom. The dress that she’d bought with his money was starting to feel too suffocating.