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CHAPTER 1
Yes. Ressler is back in prison. I made sure.
Clary Fiore sighed after reading the text message from Detective Ron Woznick. After arresting him, the New York detective had escorted Gavin Ressler back to where he’d escaped from.
Thank you, Clary typed and sent the reply.
She put her phone down on the kitchen countertop and surveyed what she’d spent over an hour doing.
Plates of chopped carrots, celery, and other ingredients were spread across all the available counter space. The cinnamon buns were already in the oven. She had more dough in the fridge, ready to bake for dinner.
The kitchen was stocked with good-quality olive oil and every seasoning she’d need. All that was left was the actual cooking.
Clary grabbed her phone when it buzzed, then rolled her eyes when she saw who had sent her a message. Pete Laker. The ex-detective seemed determined to get her attention, but she didn’t have time for him. Not today.
It was Christmas Eve, and though she was pretty much set for dinner, there was still a house full of people who would need breakfast.
Seth Anderson and his brothers had packed up and moved in to Clary’s mansion last night. Everyone had decided to stay in the main house instead of the guesthouse out back. Andrea Lowe, her newly hired but extremely capable assistant, was staying on the third floor with her. Zane, Aldric, Elton, and Oliver were staying on the second floor.
Zane and Oliver were sharing a room, and Seth was on the couch in the living room.
Though Seth’s things were in the room across from hers, he’d slept in the living room just in case Oliver sleepwalked. Zane was the first line of defense, and Seth was the next.
So Clary had to tiptoe around the kitchen to keep herself from waking him, especially since he was a light sleeper.
But having to deal with a bomb must have been stressful enough that Seth slept through everything she was doing in the kitchen.
Out of curiosity, she tapped into the text message.
I told you the Andersons are trouble. Shaking her head, Clary put her phone aside and began putting all the food she’d prepped into the fridge.
* * *
Seth Anderson stretched his neck to the side and pressed his shoulders back. It had been a while since he slept on a couch, and it was more uncomfortable than he’d remembered.
As he drew in a deep breath, the sweet aroma of cinnamon and freshly baked bread hit his nose.
Seth’s lips curled, and he sat up.
The white walls around him were pretty jarring compared to the dark walls in his own apartment. They were a stark reminder of what had happened, of how he’d almost lost Clary yesterday.
A bomb.
Despite everything Seth did at work, despite all the projects he was working on that could be harnessed as weapons, he’d never imagined he would ever come face-to-face with a bomb.
Much less having to defuse one.
Pushing those thoughts from his mind, Seth hooked his elbow over the back of the brown leather couch and leaned forward. From where he was sitting, he could see part of the kitchen and Clary shifting plate after plate into the fridge.
Her onyx black hair was pulled back in a messy bun. The shorter strands had escaped, framing her face and annoying her, judging by how she brushed her cheek against her shoulder. She had on a black apron with a large pocket, from which a checkered cloth dangled.
Then the oven dinged, and she turned, slipped on a pair of oven mitts, and pulled out a tray of what he assumed were cinnamon buns.
If anyone had told him a month ago that he would wake up on Christmas Eve to freshly baked cinnamon buns under an Eolenfeld roof, he would have bet his life that it wouldn’t happen.
Well, technically, this Bay Area mansion was Clary’s, but it had belonged to Edward and May Eolenfeld, and Seth still saw it that way.
He grinned when Clary’s lips curved back in a satisfied smile as she put the tray of buns down on the counter. She wasn’t making much noise, but he couldn’t believe he’d slept through her movements in the kitchen.
