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Maybe it came from years of wearing robes, but she didn’t like tight clothes. Which was fine with her hellren, because he liked her in his.

“That color looks perfect on you,” he drawled as he watched her plait her hair.

“You like the lavender?” She did a little twirl for him and his stare flashed brilliant yellow.

“Oh, yeah. I like. Come here, Chosen.”

She put her hands on her hips as the piano started playing down below. Scales. Which meant Selena was up. “I have to go downstairs before Layla burns the house down.”

Phury smiled that smile he sported when he was picturing her very, very naked. “Come here, Chosen.”

“How about I go and come back with food?”

Phury had the audacity to throw the tangled sheet away and put his hand on his hard, heavy sex. “Only you have what I’m hungry for.”

A vacuum cleaner joined the chorus of noise coming from downstairs, so it was clear who else was up and about. Amalya and Pheonia drew straws every day to see who got to use the Dyson. Didn’t matter whether the carpets in Rehvenge’s great camp needed it or not—they always got vacuumed.

“Two secs,” she said, knowing that if she got within range of his hands, they were going to be all over each other again. “Then I’ll come back and you can feed my mouth, how about that.”

Phury’s massive body trembled, his eyes rolling back into his skull. “Oh, yeah. That’s . . . Oh, yeah, that’s a very good plan.”

His phone let out a reminder beep, and he reached over to the bedside table with a groan. “Okay, go on now, before I don’t let you out of here for another hour. Or four.”

She laughed and turned for the door.

“Dear . . . God.”

Cormia turned around. “What is it?”

Phury sat up slowly, his hands holding the phone as if it were worth more than the four hundred dollars he’d paid for it the week before.

“Phury?”

He held it out to her screen-first.

The text was from Zsadist: Baby girl, two hours ago. Nalla. Hope you’re good. Z.

She bit her lip and then gently put her hand on his shoulder. “You should go back to the house. You should see him. See them.”

Phury swallowed hard. “Yeah. I don’t know. Not going back there . . . I think it’s maybe a good thing. Wrath and I can do what we need to over the phone and . . . Yeah. Better not to.”

“Are you going to return the text?”

“I am.” He covered his hips with the sheet and just stared at the phone.

After a moment, she said, “Would you like me to do it for you?”

He nodded. “Please. Make it from both of us, ’kay?”

She kissed the top of his head and then texted, Blessings upon you and your shellan and your young. We are with you in spirit, love, Phury and Cormia.

The following evening, Phury was tempted not to go to the NA meeting. Very tempted.

He wasn’t sure what made him go. Didn’t know how he did it.

All he wanted was to light up so he didn’t have to feel the pain. But how messed up was it that he was hurting? The fact that his twin’s young had come into the world healthy, that Z was now a father, that Bella had lived through it, that the young was all right . . . you would figure he’d be thrilled and relieved. It was what he and everyone else had been praying for.

No doubt he was the only one who was fucked in the head over it all. The rest of the Brothers would be busy toasting Z and his new daughter and pampering Bella. The celebrations would be going on for weeks, and Fritz would be ecstatic with all the special meals and ceremonies.

Phury could just see it. The grand entrance of the mansion would be draped in bolts of brilliant green, the color of Z’s bloodline, and purple, the color of Bella’s. Wreaths of flowers would be hung on every single door in the house, even the closets and cabinets, to symbolize that Nalla had come through to this side. The fireplaces would stay lit for days with sweet logs, those slow-burning, treated pieces of wood whose flames would burn red for the new blood of the darling one.

At the start of the twenty-fourth hour following her birth, every