Book 17: Dread

Aris

Soren leans against the thick charcoal gray cushions of the L-shaped couch in Blake’s atrocious modern living room. It’s… sunken. I nearly cracked my head open within seconds of appearing in his house twelve hours earlier than I told him I’d be here, but apparently Blake, Soren, and to my surprise, Logan have been expecting me. Or they were getting the party started early. We’ve wasted most of the day. I slept until the late afternoon. Logan cooked dinner, which was surprisingly good, and now?

Blake got the good whiskey out for the occasion, whatever that occasion is, because nothing about succession has been spoken about yet.

Logan, propped on the armrest on the far side of the couch, crosses his arms over his chest and looks down at where I’m sitting on the floor. My back is against the curved base of the wall-to-wall fireplace. Everything