Page 156 of Boys Who Hunt

“We’ll take care of it,” I reply.

A smile lifts her face, and my heart beats faster at the sight. “Really?”

“Tomorrow,” Silas grumbles.

“Thanks,” she says. “For everything.”

I lower my eyes. “We just did what comes natural to us.”

She folds her arms. “What, protecting people?”

Silas smirks. “Murder.”

All the blood drains from her face, so I slap Silas on the back. “Time for us to go to our own beds.”

“What, with all this blood still caking my skin?” Silas says, tugging at his shirt.

“Go wash up,” I tell him.

“Don’t tell me what to do, bitch,” he spits back.

“Silas!” Ivy hisses, eyeing Cora. “There’s a kid.”

Silas just throws around an awkward look and sticks his hands in his pockets. He really doesn’t know what to do with this, and I have never seen him so uncomfortably weird as he is now.

“Right, good night.”

“Sleep well,” Max says.

“Doubt it,” Silas replies, waltzing off.

“What’s his problem?” Max asks Ivy.

She shrugs. “I don’t know. It started when …” She gulps and withholds the words she was going to speak. “Never mind. It’s not important.”

She stretches and yawns.

“I think it’s time for us to leave her to do her thing,” I say.

Still, Max won’t look at me, even when he says, “Yeah.” He grins at Cora. “You gonna sleep through the night all by yourself?”

“Yes!” Cora exclaims. “I’m a big girl now.”

Ivy’s laughter fills the room, and it makes my heart swell once more, and I physically have to grab my own damn body to keep me from swaying closer.

“Thank you, Max. Heath.” The looks she gives both of us makes me feel like there are so many words left unspoken, but I don’t have a clue where to start. “Good night.”

Max approaches Ivy and grabs her hand, squeezing tightly. “Sleep tight. We’ll talk again tomorrow, okay?”

She nods and leans up to grab his face to peck him on the cheek, and it turns him into a beet. Goddammit.

“Thank you for helping,” she says. “I mean it.”

“Anything for you,” he replies.

Anything for her …

Of course.