Surrendering (Swans Landing) by Shana Norris Read Free Book Online

exploded.
    “I saw the way you two looked at each other,” I went on. “Why don’t you tell me what happened while I was gone?”
    “What about what you’ve been doing?” Mara asked. “How do I know you didn’t find your own Scottish finfolk like Sailor did?”
    She scowled at me with those golden brown eyes I had thought about for months. I wanted to take back everything. I was tired and had missed her too much.
    “I’m sorry,” I said softly. “I didn’t mean that. I’m just tired.”
    We sat there silent for a long time, before Mara leaned her head against my shoulder again.
    “Dylan is my friend,” she said. “ Just my friend. I’ve waited five months for you to come back to me.” She sighed. “But I thought it would be different when you did. I didn’t think that we’d be waiting for an invasion of finfolk.”
    I slipped my arm around her back and pulled her close to me, kissing the top of her head. The wind lifted strands of her hair, brushing them against my face.
    “I’ll do everything to protect you,” I told her.
    Mara turned her head toward me, smiling up at me. “And what about you? Don’t you need protecting?”
    I laughed. “Are you volunteering?”
    “I’m not a damsel in distress, you know,” Mara said. “If some finfolk king thinks he’s coming here to take over just because he wants to, he hasn’t met me yet. I’m the girl who punched Elizabeth Connors in the face, remember?”
    “I don’t think I’ll ever forget that. You were kind of scary. And awesome. But mostly scary.”
    Mara punched my leg gently. “That’s right. So just wait until these finfolk get here. I’ll make them wish they’d never left Hether Blether.”
    I leaned down to kiss her, enjoying the feel of her warm lips against mine and hoping that she was right.
     
    * * *
     
    My neck felt like I’d slept while contorted into a pretzel. I stared up at a gray sky visible through the skylight high overhead. Crystal prisms hung from fishing line under the skylights, but there wasn’t enough sunlight for them to reflect it anywhere.
    I groaned as I stretched, my feet hitting the end of the couch and my arms hitting the other end. My head was turned at a painful angle and I had to slowly ease myself around into a sitting position. I rubbed at my neck, trying to work out the kinks.
    Voices behind me caught my attention and I turned, blinking as I peered toward the kitchen area. Two figures sat at the island bar, their backs to me and their heads bent together, one red and one brown.
    I padded over to the kitchen, rolling my head around to stretch out my neck. “Morning,” I groaned.
    Sailor and Callum pulled away from each other slightly as I joined them. They had empty cereal bowls in front of them and a box of Corn Flakes on the counter next to a half-empty gallon of milk. Miss Gale was known across the island for her home cooking, so the fact that she wasn’t in here making one of her famous breakfasts spoke volumes about her condition.
    “How are you?” I asked, studying Sailor. She looked better than she had in a long time. Some color had returned to her cheeks and her eyes didn’t show as much exhaustion as they had the day before.
    “I’m good,” Sailor told me. “Hungry though.” She reached for the Corn Flakes and poured herself another bowl.
    “That’s her third bowl,” Callum told me with a smile. “I like a lass with a good appetite.”
    I found a bowl and a spoon and joined them for breakfast. “I hope you slept better than I did,” I said.
    Callum had insisted on taking the love seat and letting me have the longer couch, claiming that he didn’t need as much room as I did. I doubted that was true, since we were about the same height and build, except for the fact that Callum had one less limb than I did.
    “Probably not,” he said. “But I was too tired to care much.”
    My stomach growled as I chewed my first spoonful of cereal. I hadn’t thought about how hungry I was