“Welcome to my world.”
“The other part of me hopes it is true because that means the gates will come down eventually, no matter what.”
“Positive thinking is the way to go.” She leaned back in her seat. “Now, let’s go back to the tour. You have a casino here, right?”
“We do.”
“I want to see that.”
“What about the gate room?”
“It’s been there for centuries, right? That means it’ll be there in another hour. We can wait.”
Since she was right, I gave in to her demands. A stop at the casino couldn’t possibly hurt.
Well, probably.
SAMI WAS WAITING FOR US WHEN WE returned to Grimlock Manor that afternoon and she was a screechy teenage mess.
“You’re not the boss of me!” she yelled at Zoe as we crossed into the foyer.
Zoe, surprisingly, remained calm. “I see your father told you the good news.”
One look at Aric’s hangdog expression told me something had indeed gone down in our absence.
“I told her she won’t be coming to the party with us tonight,” Aric confirmed. “I explained our reasoning for wanting her to stay here but she disagrees that it’s a good idea.”
“Of course she does,” Zoe said dryly as she shrugged out of her light coat. “She gets that from you.”
Aric shot his wife a dirty look. “No, she gets that from you. I’m willing to take the credit for some of her crap — like that crazy thing she does during the full moon where she runs around the yard yelling at all the trees for being too loud — but this is all you.”
Zoe looked as if she wanted to argue but ultimately she shook her head and focused on Sami. “There’s a rational reason for you staying here. Would you like to hear it?”
“No, I don’t want to hear anything you have to say.” Sami folded her arms across her chest. “You’re going to need me. I heard Mr. Grimlock talking. He thinks the whole house is going to be full of enemies. You need someone who can fight.”
Cormack was rueful as he padded into the room behind Sami. The look he shot Zoe was apologetic. “She heard me talking with Redmond and Cillian. We thought she was with Lily in the game room but ... well ... it turns out she wasn’t.”
Zoe waved away the apology as if swatting at gnats. “This was going to turn into a fight regardless. It’s not your fault she sneaks around eavesdropping. We’ve warned her it’s going to come back and bite her eventually if she’s not careful.”
Aric snorted. “She gets the eavesdropping from you, too. Need I remind you of the engagement ring fiasco? You were eavesdropping then and assumed I was going to run off and marry some pack member and try to keep you on the side. You’re the reason our kid is nuts.”
Zoe pinned him with a dark look. “We’re both high-strung sometimes. Not all her bad behavior is because of me.”
“Nobody cares which one of you gave me my really loud voice,” Sami snapped.
“That was your mother,” Aric offered.
Sami ignored him. “I need to go with you. More importantly, you’re going to need me. It’s a mistake to leave me behind.”
Zoe shook her head. “You can’t go, and it doesn’t matter how much you whine, you’re staying here. We need you here.”
“Because you think I’m a baby.”
“No, it’s because Lily is a baby and we want her protected. Your father is going with me. Izzy is going with me. The Grimlocks are strong but not magical. They need you.”
“Yeah, but ... .”
“Sami, you have to keep the people who are remaining behind safe.” Zoe was matter-of-fact. “That’s your job. We all have jobs if we expect to pull this off, and that’s yours. Izzy’s aunt is coming to help. She’s magical, too. If something happens, and this Grimaldi guy decides to send another army to move on this house, you’re going to be needed here. That’s all there is to it.”
Sami cocked her head and I could tell she was running the statement through her mind. Before she could speak again, Aric joined in to double down on her.
“Aisling, Griffin, Jerry, and Maya are going to be here with you,” he said. “All of you are going to work together to protect Lily. She’s too little to protect herself. It’s absolutely necessary that you stay here. If someone attacks, you can protect everybody under a dome until help arrives.”
Sami’s shoulders drooped. “But ... what if you can’t take down the gates without me?”
“Then we’ll have to figure it out,” Zoe replied. “We need you to protect the people who aren’t going into the Grimaldi house. That’s your job and I expect you to carry it out.”
Sami heaved out a defeated sigh. “Fine. I want to be ungrounded, though. I’m pretty sure you can’t leave me in charge of everyone and still have me be grounded.”
Zoe’s lips quirked. “If you do as instructed and keep everyone safe tonight without causing any problems, you can be ungrounded.”
“Really?” Sami brightened considerably, all earlier misgivings about being cut out of the action disappearing. She jutted out her hand. “I agree to your terms. I’m going to want one of those omelet bars for myself when we get home as a reward, too.”
Cormack chuckled. “If everything goes as planned, I promise you’ll get an omelet bar here tomorrow. You just need to hold it together for a few hours.”
“I can do that.” Sami’s smile was sly. “Maybe we can even have an ice cream bar with the omelets. I know those two things don’t usually go together but I think it would make a worthy experiment.”
Cormack’s grin was expansive. “You’re definitely my favorite today.”
“I have a way about me,” Sami agreed.
“If this works, you can have both bars. You have my word.”
“Then I will willingly stay here and be the babysitter.”
“You’ll be the protector,”
