The Badger in His Burrow (Beyond the Veil Book 8) by KM Avery

Author:KM Avery [Avery, KM]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: KM Avery
Published: 2024-12-21T00:00:00+00:00

I woke up, groggy, achy, and stiff—and not in a fun way—when Elliot got up, sometime after dawn. I wasn’t coherent enough to say anything to him as he shuffled out of the room, blinking blearily before managing to grab my glasses off the nightstand. By the time I staggered out of the room, leaning heavily on the wall on my way through the door, he’d disappeared, presumably back into his bedroom.

My knee was throbbing, and my back was so stiff I hadn’t actually managed to stand fully upright before I shuffled down the hall toward the kitchen and, hopefully, coffee. I could hear Elliot’s shower running, and I knew he was going to want coffee when he got out. I started the coffee maker, then shoved my clothes from yesterday into the wash, then went to shower myself.

I spent a lot longer in the shower than usual, although that hadn’t been my intention. But once I had hot water beating down on my back, I really couldn’t make myself hurry. So by the time I finished and pulled on the sweatpants and t-shirt Elliot had lent me last night, it had probably been a half hour, maybe longer.

Elliot had put my wet clothes in the dryer and left a mug out beside the coffee pot. I spooned sugar into the mug, added almond milk, then poured in the coffee, letting the hot liquid mix all three together. I’d taken three sips before the caffeine woke me up enough for me to wonder where Elliot was. I listened—I couldn’t hear anything.

He wasn’t stupid enough to have gone outside—was he? I walked down the hallway, checked in the garage, opened the door to the basement.

“Elliot?” I called, looking down the stairs into darkness.

“Right here,” came his reply from behind me.

I turned, a frown on my features.

His nose was red, his cheeks flushed. His hands were dirty, and he held some sort of root.

“You went outside,” I accused. “Elliot.”

He scowled at me. “It’s my fucking yard,” he snapped back.

“Yeah, well, some asshole skinned a badger in your fucking yard,” I retorted.

“I’d have smelled anyone approaching,” he told me.

“Are you sure? Even upwind?”

That earned me a glare, but I was pretty sure my point had been made.

“That was stupid, Elliot.”

“Am I supposed to stay in the house for the rest of my life? Or only go out when someone can act as my fucking escort?”

“It’s been less than twenty-four hours,” I pointed out. “You could give the police a chance to figure out who did this.”

“And it’s unlikely that they’ll come back within twenty-four hours, especially with all the fucking yellow tape still out there.”

This time he was the one with the valid point.

I was trying to figure out what to say when the timer on the dryer went off. “I need to go pull up the plaster casts,” I told him, turning to reclaim my clothes from the dryer.

He didn’t follow me.

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