Revenant's Claim (Sins of the Revenants Book 1)

Chapter 1 Hales POV The house was too quiet. Not peaceful quiet. Not the kind that came after rain when the windows were cracked and the whole place smelled like damp dirt and tomato vines and the world felt settled for five minutes. No. This was the kind of quiet that had teeth. The kind that sat in the corners and watched you realize there was nobody there to need anything from you. No little voice calling, Mom, Karson stole my tablet. No cartoon soundtrack from the living room. No thud of tiny feet racing across old farmhouse floors that had not known a moment of mercy since 1912. Just the hum of the refrigerator, the ticking wall clock, and me standing in my kitchen staring at my phone like it had personally offended me. Three unread texts. None of them wanted. One from my book editor, Trace, asking if I had looked at the revised mock-up for my next cover. One from my friend, Jules, sent twenty minutes ago: Don’t you dare put on ratty pajamas. I mean it. And one from my soon to be ex-husband, Jack that just said: Kids are fine. Karson cried for ten minutes. Kyra settled him. That was it. No smiley face. No thanks for packing the dinosaur blanket because our son wouldn’t sleep without it. No maybe you can stop checking your phone like a lunatic now. Just Kids are fine, as if he were filing a police report. I set the phone face down on the counter and reached for my glass of water like I was terribly mature and not at all one missed text away from committing crimes. The farmhouse always felt bigger when the kids were gone. Bigger and meaner. Every room looked like it had something to say about my life choices. The kitchen island had a stack of mail on one end and my laptop on the other, covered in sticky notes in six colors because apparently my creative process looked like I’d been attacked by office supplies. The sink was empty. The counters were clean. The dishwasher had been unloaded. The chicken coop out back had been shut. The garden had been watered. I’d done all the useful, wholesome, grounding things women were supposedly meant to do when they were rebuilding their lives. I still felt like roadkill in leggings. I took my glass and wandered into the living room, if only so I could dramatically suffer on a different piece of furniture. My farmhouse wasn’t fancy. It was old and drafty and full of things I’d found at flea markets or inherited or rescued because I had a weakness for chipped wood and ugly little ceramic rabbits. The couch was deep enough to swallow a person whole, which was helpful. The blanket tossed over the back still had grape jelly on one corner from Karson. There was a Barbie shoe under the coffee table that confused me. My daughter hadn't played with Barbies for years. Kyra had left a chapter book open facedown on the armchair like she was trusting the world not to betray her place. I sat down and tucked my feet under me, staring at that tiny pink shoe on the floor. Too much. Not enough. That had been the rhythm of my marriage in the end. Too emotional. Not emotional enough. Too tired. Too distracted. Too focused on the kids. Too focused on work. Too independent. Too difficult. Too quiet. Not fun anymore. Not grateful enough. Not easy enough. I had spent years trying to hit a target that moved every time I got close. By the end of it, I wasn’t even sure what shape I was supposed to be anymore. I just knew I was failing at it. The cruel thing was that I hadn’t even realized how bad it had gotten until I was already bone-deep miserable. At first it had been small. Little comments. Little cuts. The kind that sound ridiculous when you repeat them out loud. You’re really wearing that? Why are you making a big deal out of this? She’s just a kid, Hales. Let it go. That last one had become a favorite. I closed my eyes, and like an i***t, my brain immediately served up a memory I had not requested. Jack’s oldest daughter from a previous relationship, Kaye, standing in the kitchen two years ago with her arms folded across her chest, all hot pre-teenage outrage and spoiled cruelty. She’d been eleven then, old enough to know exactly where to stick the knife. “You’re not my mom,” she’d snapped. I hadn’t even corrected her. I’d learned by then that defending myself only made it worse. “I didn’t say I was. I asked you to rinse your plate.” She’d laughed in my face. Actually laughed. “Dad doesn’t even listen to you. Why would I?” And there had been Jack, leaning against the counter with a beer in his hand, watching the whole thing like it was a mildly interesting show he hadn’t decided whether to turn off yet. “Jack,” I’d said, already humiliated. “Can you please—” “She’s a kid, Hales.” That sentence had followed me through years of swallowing my pride. When Kaye rolled her eyes at me in my own house? She’s a kid. When she spoke over me, ignored me, deliberately did the opposite of what I asked in front of my daughter, Kyra? She’s a kid. When she screamed that she hated me because I wouldn’t let her go to a party with eighteen-year-olds and Jack just sighed like I was exhausting him? She’s a kid. Rinse. Wash. Repeat. Until one day I looked around and realized I was the only full-grown adult in the room expected to regulate everyone else’s feelings while nobody gave a damn about mine. That was the moment something cold had settled in my chest and stayed there. Not rage. Rage would have at least been energizing. It was clarity. I opened my eyes and huffed a laugh at myself. Amazing. Nothing says sexy Friday night like a trauma montage on the couch. My phone buzzed on the cushion beside me. Video call. Jules. I answered with, “If this is about the pajamas, I’d like you to know I’m considering the oversized T-shirt with the hole in the armpit out of spite.” “Hales,” Jules said, in the tone of a woman addressing a hostage negotiator. “Put on a bra.” “No.” “That was not a request.” I looked down at myself. Leggings, one of Jack’s old college sweatshirts I had stolen years ago and never returned out of principle, and socks with tiny lemons on them. “I’m thriving.” “You look like a woman one inconvenience away from joining a cult.” “That depends on the cult. Do they garden? Will they leave me alone?” She snorted. “See, this is exactly why I’m not letting you stay home.” “I’m not staying home. I’m…” I glanced around my empty living room. “…communing with the silence.” “The silence is kicking your ass, babe.” I hated that she was right, mostly because she was right in that smug, well-moisturized way of hers. Jules Mercer owned a boutique downtown, which meant she had the energy of a woman who could sell you a silk blouse, a scented candle, and a better version of yourself in under six minutes. She had somehow made being aggressively put together into a personality trait. I loved her deeply and sometimes wanted to throw a shoe at her. “I don’t want to go out,” I said. “Yes, you do. You just don’t want to put effort into going out.” “That is a completely different thing.” “It is, but it’s also fixable.” I rubbed at my temple. “Jules.” “Nope. I’ve already decided. I’m ten minutes away.” My head fell back against the couch. “You are insufferable.” “And yet, your favorite.” That, unfortunately, was also true. I heard the slam of a car door, and then a few minutes later, my front gate. Jules never just arrived anywhere. She made an entrance at all times, probably in her sleep. She let herself in without knocking because boundaries were a flexible concept in our friendship. She swept into the living room in heeled boots and a fitted black top, smelling like expensive perfume and confidence. Her honey-brown hair was curled. Her makeup was immaculate. Her earrings alone probably cost more than my first car. She stopped dead when she saw me sprawled on the couch. “Oh, absolutely not.” I held up one finger. “Before you start, these are premium leggings.” “You look like depression opened an Etsy shop.” I laughed despite myself. “That’s hateful.” “It’s honest.” She dropped her purse on the chair and planted her hands on her hips. “What have you eaten?” I blinked. “Toast.” “It’s seven-thirty.” “Okay, well. Time is fake.” “Jesus Christ.” She headed for my kitchen like she lived there. “Do you have string cheese?” “In the drawer.” She came back with two cheese sticks, tossed one at me, and sat on the couch beside me with a sigh dramatic enough for theater. For a minute neither of us said anything. She peeled her string cheese into neat little strips because she was civilized. I bit mine like a raccoon because I was in a season of my life. Jules leaned back and studied me. “You want the nice version or the real version?” “I’d like a third option where you leave and I become one with this blanket.” “No.” She nudged my knee with hers. “When’s the last time someone looked at you like they wanted you?” I looked down at my mangled cheese stick. “That is rude.” “That is not an answer.” I let out a slow breath. “I don’t know.” Her expression softened, just a little. That was the thing about Jules. Beneath all the gloss and attitude, she loved hard. “Hales.” “I know.” “No, you don’t. You know how to survive. That’s not the same thing.” She tilted her head. “You are thirty-one, not dead. You’re gorgeous. You’re funny. You’re smarter than everyone in a five-mile radius on your worst day. And you’ve been walking around like your life ended because Jack had the emotional range of a thumbtack.” “That is offensive to office supplies.” She barked out a laugh. “There she is.” I smiled, but it faded fast. “I have kids.” “Yes, and you remain a person. Tragic, I know.” “I'm not even actually divorced yet, just separated.” Ugh. I hated that damn word. Separated. Like what she did with her string cheese just a few moments ago. “Also true.” “He still makes everything feel…” I searched for the word and hated that I found it so easily. “Complicated.” Jules watched me for a moment. “Then let me uncomplicate tonight for you.” “That sounds fake.” “It’s not fake. It’s simple. We go have one drink. We sit in the back. We make fun of men with neck tattoos and fragile egos. We drool over the president of the Revenants from a safe distance like we always do. And then we leave.” I stared at her. The Revenants’ bar sat just far enough outside town to feel like a bad idea and just close enough to be irresistible. We’d gone a handful of times over the past year, usually after one of Trace’s events or when Jules decided we both needed to see something tattooed and dangerous to reset our standards. We’d never stayed long. We’d sip one drink, do a quiet inventory of the room, exchange deeply respectful thoughts about the club president’s face, and get the hell out before anyone interesting noticed us. It had become a joke between us. Our little ritual. “The president?” I asked. “That’s your selling point?” “It’s a strong one.” “It is,” I admitted. Jules grinned. “Exactly.” I looked toward the window over the sink. Outside, the last of the evening light had faded behind the tree line. The yard was dark. The garden beds were dark. The chicken coop was dark. The whole farm looked like a photograph of someone else’s life. My phone sat silent on the counter. Kids are fine. That was all I had tonight. The empty house. The old memories. The silence that bit. Jules leaned closer. “Come on. When’s the last time you wore eyeliner for a reason that wasn’t a book event?” “That sounds disturbingly specific.” “Answer the question.” “Last spring?” She made a wounded noise. “I’m calling the police.” I laughed again, quieter this time. “You really think one drink at a biker bar is going to solve my problems?” “No. I think one drink at a biker bar might remind you that you still exist outside of them.” That one landed. I looked at her. Really looked. At the certainty in her face. At the way she was already here, already making room for me to be messy without letting me drown in it. I loved her so much I could have cried, which of course meant I immediately turned sarcastic. “If I go, and some terrifying biker murders me, I want you to know I’ll haunt you specifically.” “Please. If one of them tries, I’ll hit him with my purse.” “Your purse weighs nine pounds.” “Exactly.” I pushed up from the couch with a groan. “You’re a menace.” “And you,” she said, smiling like she’d already won, “need to shower off the scent of sadness and put on something that says recently separated but still hot.” I paused in the doorway to the hall and glanced back at her. “That is a very narrow style category.” She crossed one elegant leg over the other. “Good thing I own a boutique.” I shook my head and headed for my bedroom. My room still didn’t look fully mine. Some of that was practical. Some of it was emotional. I’d stripped Jack out of the house in pieces, like removing shrapnel. A framed photo gone here. An old hoodie donated there. His side of the closet emptied. His books boxed. His boots disappeared from beside the door. Still, ghosts had a way of lingering in the shape of things. I opened my closet and stared at the options. Jeans. Black top. Sweater. Another black top. The leather jacket I wore for signings hung at the far end. It always made me feel like a woman who had her life firmly by the throat. Maybe I wanted to borrow her for an hour. From the living room, Jules shouted, “If you come out in beige, I’m leaving.” “I don’t own beige,” I called back. “Good. Keep it that way.” I changed with the speed of a woman pretending not to care while caring quite a lot. Dark jeans. Boots. Fitted top. The leather jacket. I braided my hair over one shoulder, then undid it and clipped half of it back instead. A little mascara. A little liner. Tinted balm. I stood in front of the mirror and looked at myself. Same face. Same body. Same soft middle. Same full chest. Same dark eyes that had spent too many years learning how to look down first. But not quite the same woman. I liked the way I looked but I wasn't quite comfortable with it. So I changed from the fitted top to a flowing tank and swapped the leather jacket with a black cardigan. I let my hair loose and it fell in long waves. Maybe that was enough for one night. I grabbed my earrings from the dresser and muttered to my reflection, “One drink.” Then I walked out to let Jules inspect her work.