"I want to take you somewhere," Ezra said the next morning, appearing in the kitchen doorway with an energy Lucien hadn't seen from him in days—not the coiled, watchful readiness of a man expecting danger, but something looser, almost boyish, entirely out of place given everything still hanging unresolved over both their heads.

"We have a meeting with Roan at noon."

"Roan can wait until this afternoon. Cole gave us a pause, and I intend to use part of it for something that isn't strategy or survival." Ezra crossed the kitchen and took both his hands, something earnest and a little nervous in his expression that Lucien found unexpectedly disarming....