I dropped back, thinking the shirt was perfect—even if it looked odd on him. There was the faint click of the front door opening, and Ivy’s soft murmur followed by the thunking of Trent’s cast on the old oak. My tension spiked. Trent was in my church. Why?

“She saved the garden,” Bis said as he looked at himself in my dresser mirror. My perfumes were scattered about his feet, and he didn’t hit one as he shifted and turned. “Took over the fight. Told everyone what to do. Kept the lines from breaking until Jih could help. No one got hurt except Belle. She took an arrow in the leg.”

Alarmed, I turned to Jenks. “I thought you said no one was hurt!”

“A fairy?” he said in disbelief. “Since when are you worried about a fairy?”

“When one saves the lives of your children,” I said, and Trent thumped to a halt at my door. My eyes fell from Trent’s, and I slammed my suitcase shut. “Jenks, you’re ugly when you talk like that,” I said, then turned to Bis, hesitating at the sight of him in a bright red shirt. “Where’s Belle?” I asked, imagining her broken and bleeding somewhere in the garden.

“Uh, the kitchen,” he said, glancing at Jenks as if the pixy was going to protest.

A last hard look at Jenks, and I started for the hallway. Trent was standing in the doorway with Lucy, smelling of fresh baby powder and baby wipes, and his injured hand gently patted her as he rocked. I jerked to a stop when he didn’t get out of my way fast enough, my eyes dropping to the floor as I flushed. “Come on in,” I said softly. “I don’t think we have anything but water, but you’re welcome to it.”

He awkwardly edged back, and I breathed easier. “Ivy?” I called as I strode to the kitchen. “Belle’s been hurt!”

“Belle?” came from her room. “Is she okay?”

“I think so. I’ll let you know in a minute.”

Jenks’s wings were clattering, and Bis was a bright spot as he crawled along the ceiling to get there before me. His expression worried, Jenks dusted at my shoulder, not coming to rest there like he might have otherwise. “Ivy knew, too?” he asked, and I realized his somber mood wasn’t because he felt bad but because he was the last to know.

I flipped the bright kitchen lights on, squinting. Bis had said he’d talked to her; she had to be awake. “Jenks, if a fairy can hide in your garden for three months, then have the grace to help your kids survive an attack, don’t you think you should rethink your attitude?” I turned to him, and his defiance faltered. “You’re going to live to be forty years old. You’re going to have to grow up. It’s a small world after all, or didn’t you go on that ride?”

Wings silent, Jenks hovered dead center in the doorway, at a complete loss. Trent edged in around him, taking in the kitchen as he stood between Ivy’s farm table and the center counter. My annoyance at Jenks vanished in a flash of memory: a memory of Trent standing in my unreal kitchen, confused, irritated, and attractive as all hell as he tried to save my soul with a kiss. And then the kiss itself, burning its way through me, kindling my chi back to life. I’d been mortified when I’d woken up and discovered that the kiss had been real—which didn’t negate how good it had felt, but did lead me back to Trent standing with Lucy in his arms, his eyes roving over my kitchen as if comparing it to his memory.