[Sera]
The bell above the door chimes.
I don't look up. I'm mid-pour, steaming milk into a latte for our last regular, and my brain's still half on the grocery list for tomorrow. Eggs. Diapers. The good crackers Lulu demolishes by the fistful.
But my body knows before I do.
It's not the bond. The bond's dead. It's something older, dumber. The way your hand jerks off a hot stove before your brain catches up. Pine. Fresh snow. That deep, electric undercurrent of power that doesn't belong in a coffee shop in a quiet Seattle neighborhood.
My hand stalls on the milk pitcher. A drop of foam slides over the rim.
I turn around.
Killian Voss is standing in Vance's like a glitch in the matrix. Dark wool coat, rain-damp at the shoulders, tailored to the millimeter. All that polished brutality
