A Warm Heart in Winter (Black Dagger Brotherhood 18.50)

“Bitty!” Blay called out. “Hey, Bitty—”

The girl came skipping over in her bright yellow party dress, all flounces and smiles. “You’re mated!” she exclaimed as she threw herself at him. “I’m so happy!”

Blay hugged the young and set her back down on her patent leather Mary Janes. “I just wanted you to know, I think you did a great job with the planning of all this.”

“And Uncle Blay, we have a wedding cake!” She pointed to where the five-layer, chocolate- and vanilla-frosted creation had been set on a platform. “This is your wedding, and that’s the cake, so that’s a wedding cake!”

Blay smiled. “You are awesome, do you know that?”

“My dad tells me that all the time.” She frowned. “And I better go make sure Lassiter’s okay. He was worried about the cake—that you wouldn’t like it because of the two-colored frosting. So I’ll let him know it’s just fine.”

“It’s perfect. Tell him it’s perfect.”

“Roger that.”

The girl danced off, skipping around Phury and Cormia, dashing by Manny and Payne, dodging past Wrath and Beth, who were sharing a kiss over L.W.’s head.

“Hey, hellren.”

Blay started to smile even before he turned his head. Qhuinn had come up right next to him—and it was weird. Even though nothing had changed, the formality, the carvings in the back, the whole process of confirming their love in front of their community, made it all feel so different. In a good way.

“Hi, hellren.”

And then they both smiled like idiots.

Absolute idiots.

“Hey listen, can you come over here,” Qhuinn said. “You know, to the bathroom—and no, not for nookie.”

“Yeah, right.”

“No, I mean it. It’s not for… you know.” As Blay laughed, Qhuinn tilted forward and jogged his brows. “But the nookie’s coming later today. All day.”

“I can’t wait.”

As they went around the base of the stairs, and ducked into the guest powder room together, Blay wondered what was going on. And then they were sitting together on the bench.

When Qhuinn took a deep breath, Blay got anxious. “Is something wrong?”

“No, no. Not at all. This is the best night of my life. But there’s something I wanted to do privately. Just for you and me. I mean, not that other people shouldn’t and won’t see eventually, but I just…”

Blay stroked Qhuinn’s arm. “What is it?”

Qhuinn shifted his weight to one hip and winced, as the carvings across his shoulders undoubtedly stretched. And then he held up something that glowed with gold.

“Remember when you gave this to me? At that bar?” he said.

Blay instantly recognized what he was being shown. “My signet ring. Of course.”

“Here, you take it now.”

“Are you giving it back to me or—” Blay stopped talking as Qhuinn flatted his other hand to reveal, in the center of his palm, something that took the breath away. “Oh, God…”

It was another gold signet ring, and Blay knew whose it was even before he picked the heavy weight up and noted the crest.

Luchas’s ring. The one that had been given to him the night after his transition. The one that had been on his finger when he’d been found in that oil drum—which was the only reason they’d been able to identify him.

The one he’d turned over to Qhuinn.