Page 54 of Incoronate
I stepped into the kitchen with Tessa right behind me.
“It’s good to see you back, Jackie,” I said, and was a little surprised by how much I meant it.
Jaqueline’s eyes lifted to mine, the careful composure cracking slightly at the edges. “Thank you, Jemma.” Her throat worked as she swallowed. “I wasn’t sure that you would still want me here.”
The vulnerability in her voice was so far removed from the woman I knew that I almost didn’t recognize the cadence of it. Jaqueline didn’t apologize. She didn’t ask for permission. She marched into rooms and reorganized them to her liking and informed everyone of her decisions on the way out. Tessa was a lot like her. But to see her sitting there now, waiting to find out whether she was still welcome at her own daughter’s table, hit me harder than I’d expected.
“You’re family,” I said simply, because that was the truth and the only one that mattered. “Of course you’re welcome here.”
“It wasn’t your fault,” added Tessa, her voice carrying an even note that surprised me. Coming from her, it was practically a vow. “You’re here now and that’s all that matters.”
Jaqueline’s eyes shifted to Tessa and something softer passed between them. A look that had history behind it. Whatever they’d talked about before I’d come downstairs, it had ended better than I’d dared to hope.
I crossed the rest of the way to the table and dropped into the empty seat beside Trace. His hand found my thigh under the table the second I sat down, his thumb tracing a slow linealong the inseam of my jeans like he needed the contact to confirm I was still there.
Tessa hesitated for a beat before sliding into the chair across from me, next to Gabriel. He shifted his arm along the back of her chair without looking at her, the gesture so natural and unconscious that I knew neither one of them had noticed.
But I had.
I tucked the observation away for later and reached for the spoon Isa had set beside my bowl.
The soup was the kind that Isa made when one of us was recovering from something. Rich, slow-simmered, the broth gold and faintly herbed. There were half-sandwiches cut on the diagonal arranged around the rim of the plate and a small pile of fresh fruit in a porcelain bowl in the center of the table. The whole spread was the closest thing to a love letter Isa knew how to write.
“Thank you, Isa,” I said as she set a glass of orange juice down in front of me. “It looks amazing.”
“Oh, it’s nothing.” She waved my compliment off like she hadn’t been the one keeping us all alive for the last several weeks, even as her entire face lit up at the praise. “Eat. You need it.”
I dug in immediately, the warmth of the broth spreading through my chest like medicine. After days of barely being able to keep anything down, it felt good to actually want food again. To be hungry in the simple, uncomplicated way bodies were meant to be hungry. Not gnawed at from the inside by a force I couldn’t outrun.
It was the smallest thing. And somehow, it felt enormous.
I lifted my eyes in between swallows and bites and noticed Tessa was staring at her plate without touching it. Apparently, breaking the chokehold that gluttony had had over her also took her appetite right along with it.
Gabriel was watching her too, his expression mostly neutral but his eyes betrayed him. There was something almost desperate in the way he looked at her, like he wanted to reach out and make her eat. To fix whatever was broken. To take care of her the way he always had.
“You should try the soup,” I pushed her gently. “It’s really good.”
Tessa’s gaze flicked to mine for a beat before returning to her plate. She picked up her spoon slowly, like it was made of lead.
“Tess, you need to eat if you’re going to—”
“I’m eating,” she quickly cut in before I could finish, her eyes darting to our mother.
It took me a second to realize what was going on and remember that Jaqueline still didn’t know about Tessa’s pregnancy. Knowing this wasn’t the way my sister wanted her to find out, I pressed my lips together and dropped it.
Jaqueline, on the other hand, hadn’t taken her eyes off me from across the table since I sat down and started eating. I knew she had questions, but it felt like an eternity before she finally spoke.
“Gabriel mentioned the anchoring spell was successful,” she said, her tone careful in that way she got when she was trying not to push too hard too fast.
“It was.”
“And the anointment?”
The question dropped into the room like a brick onto glass. I felt Trace shift beside me, his hand stilling against my thigh. Across the table, Dominic’s gaze sharpened, his glass pausing halfway to his mouth before he set it back down on the table without taking the sip. Even Tessa’s spoon paused halfway to her mouth before she set it back down without taking the bite.
“That’s a separate matter entirely,” answered Dominic before I could, his voice as smooth and composed as ever. He set his tumbler aside and leaned back in his chair, his dark eyes finding mine across the table in that quiet way that always made me feel like he was right beside me whether he was or not. “The anchoring is helping her carry the overload of power in her body so it doesn’t overwhelm her system. It’s keeping her alive. But it has not broken the anointment, nor was it ever intended to.”
“So the compulsion will still come,” surmised Jaqueline, her voice flat.
