It was an effort not to glance down at her chest, to where the front of her gauzy, pale blue dress plunged to just below her breasts, displaying the star-shaped mark between them. Thankfully, the back was high enough to hide the Horn tattooed there. Like an old scar, the white mark stood out starkly against her freckled, golden-tan skin. It hadn’t faded in the three months since the city had been attacked.

  She’d already lost count of how many times she’d caught her mom staring at her star since arriving last night.

  A cluster of gorgeous females—woodland nymphs, from their cedar-and-moss scents—meandered past, champagne in hand, and Bryce lowered her voice. “What do you want me to say? That I’ll move back home to Nidaros and pretend to be normal?”

  “What’s so bad about normal?” Her mother’s beautiful face blazed with an inner fire that never banked—never, ever died out. “I think Hunt would like living there.”

  “Hunt still works for the 33rd, Mom,” Bryce said. “He’s second in command, for fuck’s sake. And while he might appease you by saying he’d love to live in Nidaros, don’t think for one minute he means it.”

  “Way to throw him under the bus,” Randall said while keeping his attention on a nearby information placard.

  Before Bryce could answer, Ember said, “Don’t think I haven’t noticed things between you two are weird.”

  Trust her mom to bring up two topics she didn’t want to talk about in the space of five minutes. “In what way?”

  “You’re together but not together,” Ember said bluntly. “What’s that about?”

  “It’s none of your business.” It really wasn’t. But as if he’d heard her, the phone in her clutch buzzed. She yanked it out and peered at the screen.

  Hunt had written, I can only hope to have abs like those one day.

  Bryce couldn’t help her half smile as she peered back at the muscular Fae male on the frieze before answering. I think you might have a few on him, actually …

  “Don’t ignore me, Bryce Adelaide Quinlan.”

  Her phone buzzed again, but she didn’t read Hunt’s reply as she said to her mother, “Can you please drop it? And don’t bring it up when Hunt gets here.”

  Ember’s mouth popped open, but Randall said, “Agreed. No job or romance interrogations when Hunt arrives.”

  Her mother frowned doubtfully, but Bryce said, “Mom, just … stop, okay? I don’t mind my job, and the thing between me and Hunt is what he and I agreed on. I’m doing fine. Let’s leave it at that.”

  It was a lie. Sort of.

  She actually liked her job—a lot. The private wing of the Fae Archives housed a trove of ancient artifacts that had been sorely neglected for centuries—now in need of researching and cataloging so they could be sent on a traveling exhibit next spring.

  She set her own hours, answering only to the head of research, an owl shifter—one of the rare non-Fae staff—who only worked from dusk to dawn, so they barely overlapped. The worst part of her day was entering the sprawling complex through the main buildings, where the sentries all gawked at her. Some even bowed. And then she had to walk through the atrium, where the librarians and patrons tended to stare, too.

  Everyone these days stared—she really fucking hated it. But Bryce didn’t want to tell her mom any of that.

  Ember said, “Fine. You know I just worry.”

  Something in Bryce’s chest softened. “I know, Mom. And I know …” She struggled for the words. “It really helps to know that I can move back home if I want to. But not right now.”

  “Fair enough,” Randall chimed in, giving Ember a pointed glance before looping his arm around her waist and steering her toward another frieze across the theater lobby.

  Bryce used their distraction to take out her phone, and found that Hunt had written two messages:

  Want to count my abs when we get home from the ballet?

  Her stomach tightened, and she’d never been more grateful that her parents possessed a human sense of smell as her toes curled in her heels.

  Hunt had added, I’ll be there in five, by the way. Isaiah held me up with a new case.

  She sent a thumbs-up, then replied: Pleaaaaaase get here ASAP. I just got a major grilling about my job. And you.

  Hunt wrote back immediately, and Bryce read as she slowly trailed her parents to where they observed the frieze: What about me?

  “Bryce,” her mom called, pointing to the frieze before her. “Check out this one. It’s JJ.”

  Bryce looked up from her phone and grinned. “Badass warrior Jelly Jubilee.” There, hanging on the wall, was a rendering of a pegasus—though not a unicorn-pegasus, like Bryce’s childhood toy—charging into battle. An armored figure, helmet obscuring any telltale features, rode atop the beast, sword upraised. Bryce snapped a photo and sent it to Hunt.

  First Wars JJ, reporting for duty!

  She was about to reply to Hunt’s What about me? question when her mom said, “Tell Hunt to stop flirting and hurry up already.”

  Bryce scowled at her mom and put her phone away.

  So many things had changed since revealing her heritage as the Autumn King’s daughter and a Starborn heir: people gawking, the hat and sunglasses she now wore on the street to attain some level of anonymity, the job at the Fae Archives. But at least her mother remained the same.

  Bryce couldn’t decide whether that was a comfort or not.

  Entering the private box in the angels’ section of the theater—the stage-left boxes a level above the floor—Bryce grinned toward the heavy golden curtain blocking the stage from sight. Only ten minutes remained until the show began. Until the world could see how insanely talented Juniper was.

  Ember gracefully sank into one of the red velvet chairs at the front of the box, Randall claiming the seat beside her. Bryce’s mother didn’t smile. Considering that the royal Fae boxes occupied the wing across from them, Bryce didn’t blame her. And considering that many of the bejeweled and shining nobility were staring at Bryce, it was a miracle Ember hadn’t flipped them off yet.

  Randall whistled at the prime seats as he peered over the golden rail. “Nice view.”

  The air behind Bryce went electric, buzzing and alive. The hair on her arms prickled. A male voice sounded from the vestibule, “A benefit to having wings: no one wants to sit behind you.”

  Bryce had developed a keen awareness of Hunt’s presence, like scenting lightning on the wind. He had only to enter a room and she’d know if he was there by that surge of power in her body. Like her magic, her very blood answered to his.

  Now she found Hunt standing in the doorway, already tugging at the black tie around his neck.

  Just … gods-damn.

  He’d worn a black suit and white shirt, both cut to his powerful, muscled body, and the effect was devastating. Add in the gray wings framing it all and she was a goner.

  Hunt smirked knowingly, but nodded to Randall. “You clean up good, man. Sorry I’m late.” Bryce could barely hear her dad’s reply as she surveyed the veritable malakim feast before her.

  Hunt had cut his hair shorter last month. Not too short, since she’d staged an intervention with the stylist before the draki male could chop off all those beautiful locks, but gone was the shoulder-length hair. The shorter style suited him, but it was still a shock weeks later to find his hair neatly trimmed to his nape, with only a few pieces in the front still unruly enough to peek through the hole in his sunball hat. Tonight, however, he’d brushed it into submission, revealing the clear expanse of his forehead.

  That was still a shock, too: no tattoo. No sign of the years of torment the angel had endured beyond the C stamped over the slave’s tattoo on his right wrist, marking him a free male. Not a full citizen, but closer to it than the peregrini.

  The mark was hidden by the cuff of his suit jacket and the shirt beneath, and Bryce lifted her gaze to Hunt’s face. Her mouth went dry at the bald hunger filling his dark, angular eyes. “You look okay, too,” he said, winking.

  Randall coughed, but leafed through the playbill. Ember did the same beside him.

  Bryce ran a hand down the front of her blue dress. “This old thing?”

  Hunt chuckled, and tugged on his tie again.

  Bryce sighed. “Please tell me you’re not one of those big, tough males who makes a big fuss about how he hates getting dressed up.”

  It was Ember’s turn to cough, but Hunt’s eyes danced as he said to Bryce, “Good thing I don’t have to do it that often, huh?”

  A knock on the box door shut off her reply, and a satyr server appeared, carrying a tray of complimentary champagne. “From Miss Andromeda,” the cloven-hoofed male announced.

  Bryce grinned. “Wow.” She made a mental note to double the size of the bouquet she’d planned to send to June tomorrow. She took the glass the satyr extended to her, but before she could raise it to her lips, Hunt halted her with a gentle hand on her wrist. She’d officially ended her No Drinking rule after this spring, but she suspected the touch had nothing to do with reminding her to go slow.

  Arching a brow, she waited until the server had left before asking, “You want to make a toast?”

  Hunt reached into an inner pocket of his suit and pulled out a small container of mints. Or what seemed like mints. She barely had time to react before he plopped a white pill into her glass.

  “What the Hel—”

  “Just testing.” Hunt studied her glass. “If it’s drugged or poisoned, it’ll turn green.”

  Ember chimed in with her approval. “The satyr said the drinks are from Juniper, but how do you know, Bryce? Anything could be in it.” Her mom nodded at Hunt. “Good thinking.”

  Bryce wanted to object, but … Hunt had a point. “And what am I supposed to do with it now? It’s ruined.”

  “The pill is tasteless,” Hunt said, clinking his flute against hers when the liquid remained pale gold. “Bottoms up.”

  “Classy,” she said, but drank. It still tasted like champagne—no hint of the dissolved pill lingered.

  The golden sconces and dangling starburst chandeliers dimmed twice in a five-minute warning, and Bryce and Hunt took their seats behind her parents. From this angle, she could barely make out Fury in the front row.

  Hunt seemed to track the direction of her attention. “She didn’t want to sit with us?”

  “Nope.” Bryce took in her friend’s shining dark hair, her black suit. “She wants to see every drop of Juniper’s sweat.”

  “I’d think she saw that every night,” Hunt said wryly, and Bryce waggled her eyebrows.

  But Ember twisted in her seat, a genuine smile lighting her face. “How are Fury and Juniper doing? Did they move in together yet?”

  “Two weeks ago.” Bryce craned her neck to study Fury, who seemed to be reading the playbill. “And they’re really good. I think Fury’s here to stay this time.”

  Her mom asked carefully, “And you and Fury? I know things were weird for a while.”

  Hunt did her a favor and made himself busy on his phone. Bryce idly flipped the pages of her playbill. “Working things out with Fury took some time. But we’re good.”

  Randall asked, “Is Axtar still doing what she does best?”

  “Yep.” Bryce was content to leave her friend’s mercenary business at that. “She’s happy, though. And more important, June and Fury are happy together.”

  “Good,” Ember said, smiling softly. “They make such a beautiful couple.” And because her mom was … well, her mom, Ember sized up Bryce and Hunt and said with no shame whatsoever, “You two would as well, if you got your shit together.”

  Bryce slouched down in her seat, lifting her playbill to block her red-hot face. Why weren’t the lights dimming yet? But Hunt took it in stride and said, “All good things come to those who wait, Ember.”

  Bryce scowled at the arrogance and amusement in his tone, throwing her playbill into her lap as she declared, “Tonight’s a big deal for June. Try not to ruin it with nonsensical banter.”

  Ember patted Bryce’s knee before twisting back to face the stage.

  Hunt drained his champagne, and Bryce’s mouth dried out again at the sight of the broad, strong column of his throat working as he swallowed, then said, “Here I was, thinking you loved the banter.”

  Bryce had the option of either drooling or turning away, so rather than ruin her dress, she observed the crowd filtering into their seats. More than one person peered toward her box.

  Especially from the Fae boxes across the way. No sign of her father or Ruhn, but she recognized a few cold faces. Tristan Flynn’s parents—Lord and Lady Hawthorne—were among them, their professional snob of a daughter Sathia sitting between them. None of the glittering nobility seemed pleased at Bryce’s presence. Good.

  “Tonight’s a big deal for June, remember,” Hunt murmured, lips quirking upward.

  She glowered. “What?”

  Hunt inclined his head toward the Fae nobility sneering across the space. “I can see you thinking about some way to piss them off.”

  “I was not.”

  He leaned in to whisper, his breath brushing her neck, “You were, and I know it because I was thinking the same thing.” A few cameras flashed from above and below, and she knew people weren’t snapping photos of the stage curtain.

  Bryce peeled back to survey Hunt, the face she knew as well as her own. For a moment, for a too-brief eternity, they stared at each other. Bryce swallowed, but couldn’t bring herself to move. To break the contact.

  Hunt’s throat bobbed. But he said nothing more, either.

  Three fucking months of this torture. Stupid agreement. Friends, but more. More, but without any of the physical benefits.

  Hunt said at last, voice thick, “It’s really nice of you to be here for Juniper.”

  She tossed her hair over a shoulder. “You’re making it sound like it’s some big sacrifice.”

  He jerked his chin toward the still-sneering Fae nobility. “You can’t wear a hat and sunglasses here, so … yeah.”

  She admitted, “I wish she’d gotten us seats in the nosebleed section.”

  Instead, Juniper—to accommodate Hunt’s wings—had gotten them this box. Right where everyone could see the Starborn Princess and the Fallen Angel.

  The orchestra began tuning up, and the sounds of slowly awakening violins and flutes drew Bryce’s attention to the pit. Her muscles tensed of their own volition, as if priming to move. To dance.

  Hunt leaned in again, voice a low purr, “You look beautiful, you know.”

  “Oh, I know,” she said, even as she bit her lower lip to keep from grinning. The lights began dimming, so Bryce decided to Hel with it. “When do I get to count those abs, Athalar?”

  The angel cleared his throat—once, twice—and shifted in his seat, feathers rustling. Bryce smiled smugly.

  He murmured, “Four more months, Quinlan.”

  “And three days,” she shot back.

  His eyes shone in the growing darkness.

  “What are you two talking about back there?” Ember asked, and Bryce replied without tearing her gaze from Hunt’s, “Nothing.”

  But it wasn’t nothing. It was the stupid bargain she’d made with Hunt: that rather than diving right into bed, they’d wait until Winter Solstice to act on their desires. Spend the summer and autumn getting to know each other without the burdens of a psychotic Archangel and demons on the prowl.

  So they had. Torturing each other with flirting was allowed, but sometimes, tonight especially … she really wished she’d never suggested it. Wished she could drag him into the coat closet of the vestibule behind them and show him precisely how much she liked that suit.

  Four months, three days, and … She peeked at the delicate watch on her wrist. Four hours. And at the stroke of midnight on Winter Solstice, she would be stroking—

  “Burning fucking Solas, Quinlan,” Hunt grunted, again shifting in his seat.

  “Sorry,” she muttered, thankful for the second time in an hour that her parents didn’t have the sense of smell that Hunt possessed.

  But Hunt laughed, sliding an arm along the back of her chair, fingers tangling in her unbound hair. He seemed contented. Assured of his place there.

  She glanced at her parents, sitting with similar closeness, and couldn’t help but smile. Her mom had taken a while to act on her desires with Randall, too. Well, there’d been some initial … stuff. That was as much as Bryce let herself think about them. But she knew it had been nearly a year before they’d made things official. And they’d turned out pretty damn well.

  So these months with Hunt, she cherished them. As much as she cherished her dance classes with Madame Kyrah. No one except Hunt really understood what she’d gone through—only Hunt had been at the Gate.

  She scanned his striking features, her lips curving again. How many nights had they stayed up, talking about everything and nothing? Ordering in dinner, watching movies or reality shows or sunball, playing video games, or sitting on the roof of the apartment building, observing malakim and witches and draki dart across the sky like shooting stars.

  He’d shared so many things about his past, sad and horrible and joyous. She wanted to know all of it. And the more she learned, the more she found herself sharing, and the more she …

  Light flared from the star on her chest.

  Bryce clapped a hand over it. “I shouldn’t have worn this stupid dress.”

  Her fingers could barely cover the star that was blaring white light through the dim theater, illuminating every face now turned her way as the orchestra quieted in anticipation of the conductor’s approach.

  She didn’t dare look toward the Fae across the space. To see the disgust and disdain.

  Ember and Randall twisted in their seats, her dad’s face scrunched with concern, Ember’s eyes wide with fear. Her mom knew those Fae were sneering, too. She’d hidden Bryce from them her whole life because of how they’d react to the power that now radiated from her.

  Some jackass shouted from the audience below, “Hey! Turn off the light!” Bryce’s face burned as a few people chuckled, then quickly went silent.