A Warm Heart in Winter (Black Dagger Brotherhood 18.50)

“You’re going to fall off the damn house if this lets go.” Z shook his head. “Just be reasonable. Please?”

Well. What do you know. The magic word.

Balz backed off with all kinds of muttering. And then Z wound the nylon rope around his hands a couple of times and gave it a try all on his lonesome, easing into the full power of his body like a tow truck trying to get a car out of mud. Finally, he sank down into his glutes, his arms and shoulders straining, his lips pulling away from his fangs.

There was a tremendous screech, and then the shutter came down on a oner.

“Oh, shit!”

Z fell back on his ass, the snow catching his body like a baseball mitt, all support, no cushioning. As the rope went lax and flapped onto his legs, Balz swung loose up at the window, one foot fixed, the other free, one hand locked on the track of the next shutter, the other up and out. He recovered quick, velcroing once again.

“You okay?” the Bastard called down.

Z upped to his feet and brushed the snow off his backside. “I told you so.”

“Let’s do the same thing on the next one.”

Zsadist glanced to the other end of the house. Qhuinn and Blay were working on their set of shutters on the lower level, or should have been. The former seemed frozen as he focused on something off toward the tree line.

Z put his fingers between his front teeth and whistled. As the sound traveled, Qhuinn’s focus shifted around.

After a moment, the brother whistled back two short bursts.

“Do they need help?” Balz asked from above.

“All clear.” Z nodded to the next failed shutter. “Okay, Spidey, rope me up with that one. Let’s get this done and see what else is wrong with this old ark.”

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

It was all going to be fine.

That’s what was going through Blay’s

mind as he and Qhuinn reentered the garage with the ladder. The busted shutters were down where they should be and locked into place, the motor lines cut so that there was no malfunction risk when the full electricity came back on. After the storm, there were going to be a lot of repairs, and there would be time to rewire things then. What couldn’t be risked was a daylight retraction.

Just as they were heading back into the house, a muffled roar sounded out somewhere in the distance. And a second. A third.

At which point the lights came back on fully, the generators settling in to a dim, pervasive purr.

“Ruhn is the fucking master,” Qhuinn said as they tilted the ladder against the wall in the mudroom and stomped the snow off the treads of their shitkickers.

The cheer of the doggen in the kitchen was like that of a group being rescued off a deserted island. By a Carnival cruise ship. With a stocked bar and the buffet already set out. And Charo performing on the Lido Deck.

“Such the man,” Blay agreed.

As they walked into the kitchen and were applauded unnecessarily by the staff, Blay unzipped his parka, but kept the puff where it was in case this was just a pause and they would be going out again. In the foyer, people were gathering once more, the check-in happening organically, as if the electricity coming back on required a reckoning—

The crash was loud as a bomb.

And succeeded by shattering glass, a blast of cold air, and a resonant pine smell.

Before anyone could react, Rhage and Butch came running out of the library. The pair of them looked like they’d been in a slap fight, their faces red, noses runny, eyes blinking like they couldn’t see. Snow covered their hair, their shoulders, their shitkickers.

“Tree,” Rhage panted.

Butch grabbed the front of his own parka like he was having a coronary. “Big tree—”

“Coming after us!”