Total pages in book: 135
Estimated words: 128061 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 128061 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 640(@200wpm)___ 512(@250wpm)___ 427(@300wpm)
“But that’s…” She grabbed the phone from his hand. “That’s the general business email. I only check that every few days. It’s not even freaking encrypted! What the hell is he doing? This is not at all the protocol that was very clearly outlined for all of them.” She read through the message quickly; the email was poorly crafted and the grammar atrocious.
She swore. He’d assembled all but one of the mages and three of the mercenaries. Given the timeline, he didn’t think they should wait any longer. They’d deployed that morning. There would be no way to reach them now.
“Who put that idiot in charge?” She handed the phone back. “Not you…”
She let the comment linger just enough to hint at a question.
“No. Not me. But you haven’t been able to take a very hands-on approach to this situation because of what’s going on here. We both know that when no one is directly leading, there’s always someone who tries to step up and assume control. They get off on being in charge. Given we had to assemble all this with heavy distractions and zero time, with a less-than-stellar team we dredged up at the last minute, something was bound to go wrong.”
“Bound to go wrong?” She gave him an incredulous look and laughed sardonically. “Did Jessie tell you the gargoyles are leaving?” She pointed at his phone. “That attack is going to take anywhere from three to six days to get here. Given the state of that email and the bonehead’s inability to follow instructions, I’d guess more toward six. The gargoyles will be gone by that time, our status will be in the toilet, so the solo guardians will probably scatter, and we’ll get hit with a big attack without the forces to return fire. I’ve screwed us, Sabastian. I’ve screwed Jessie. I should’ve made more time for this instead of showing an interest in that handsome gargoyle-monster. I should’ve been more hands-on. Damn it.”
“It’s not your fault, Nessa,” he said, moving closer. “I asked the impossible of you.”
“You always ask the impossible of me. I should be able to deliver better than this.” She turned away from him, angry at herself. Angry at that mercenary. Angry that she’d let everyone down so thoroughly.
A couple people glanced her way, and she could read the curiosity in their eyes. They couldn’t hear her, but they could still see her exaggerated movements. She needed to get a grip. She’d screwed up before. This wasn’t the first time.
Speaking of time, they still had some. The gargoyles hadn’t left yet. There had to be a way to make this work.
She calmed herself down, stilling her movements.
“What do we do?” Sebastian asked, seeing that she was done with the blame-game phase of her disappointment. They were a well-oiled machine.
“We figure this out,” she said, chewing on her lip, watching Paul the bartender shake the drink mixer over his shoulder. “There has to be a way to figure this out.”
She just, at present, had no idea how.
TWENTY-NINE
Nessa
“Let me think about it,” she told Sebastian, taking a deep breath. “We have a little time.”
Sebastian nodded, his head down, thinking. “I’m going to get a drink and try to sit next to Niamh. She always picks on me when I’m in this mood. It takes my mind off things.”
“That’s why she picks on you.”
“I know.”
Nessa watched as he skulked off toward a space at the end of the bar, pulling down the spell as he did so.
She didn’t move for a while, clearing her mind and staring at nothing. Now was not the time to panic. It wasn’t the time for rash decisions or grasping at straws. She had to push away that she knew and loved these people and this town and focus solely on cold, hard logic. That had always been the way forward, the method with which decisions stopped being hard or cringeworthy, and she started doing whatever was necessary to complete the task.
“Are you okay?”
Nessa startled at that rough but familiar voice. Brochan stood next to her smelling of pine and sweat, his shirt rumpled and his pants stained. He’d probably just gotten off work, monitoring the perimeter and his people. The same people she was three to six days away from putting in danger.
“Yeah, thanks,” she said, quickly strapping on a sunshiny disposition. Her armor, as Tristan had said. How had he known? “How about you? How are the troops?”
He glanced down at her empty hands. “Do you need a drink?”
“Why? Are you going to buy me one?” She smiled at him devilishly, knowing that if he did, it might be seen by the other shifters as his desiring a claim on her. He’d always been careful not to cross that line. He especially wouldn’t now that they were in a friend zone.