Dragoncrest Cliffs Lost pearl

oh, it was close — that forbidden instinct she’d fought her whole life against allowing. not family, she reminded it as it settled somewhere in the bowers of her flipping gut.

tousaint was spared none of the hardness in the bite of her gaze; and why should he? he was so very different than the brother she’d come to almost love, made from a clay sobeille refused to acknowledge as her own.

she found no measure of sympathy in him, and in that moment knew mireille would be broken over this. her children, borne of the same salt and blood, stood on two vastly different shores.

maman, and tante, an’ chani. lafayette said pepper fought dem, but ‘e be dead now. another dead name wriggled under her tongue, but she refused to acknowledge it. did you see dem?