My Cheating Mate (Emma and Jeremy) novel Chapter 259

Chapter 259

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Connor joined me at the window. Didn’t try to talk me out of keeping vigil. Just stood beside me, solid and steady while I fell apart.

Mama appeared with Nate. “Grace, sweetheart, they’ll be here soon.”

“I know. I just-“I couldn’t finish.

“I know.” She pulled me into a hug. “Grace, Uncle Cas is going to be okay. Your father wouldn’t bring him home if he wasn’t stable.”

“Stable doesn’t mean okay-”

“It means alive and healing. That’s what matters right now.”

Thirty minutes. I was watching so intently I almost missed the text.

Daddy: *Fifteen minutes out. Grace, he’s asking for you. First thing. Before medical treatment, before rest. He wants to see you.* Relief broke through the anxiety. “He’s asking for me. Connor, Uncle Cas is asking to see me first thing.”

“Of course he is. You’re his niece. His Grace who sends him horse parliament updates and asks about Impressionism.” Connor smiled. “See? Not dying. People who are dying don’t make demands about seeing specific family members first.”

Fifteen minutes.

I watched the driveway. Watched for any sign of vehicles approaching.

Then-headlights. Two SUVS coming up the drive.

“They’re here.” I was moving before I consciously decided to. Out the door, down the porch steps, into the driveway before anyone could stop me.

The first SUV stopped. Daddy got out of the driver’s seat, looking exhausted but relieved to be home.

The back door opened.

And Uncle Cas emerged.

1 stopped breathing.

He looked terrible. Worse than terrible. Bandages visible under his shirt. Moving carefully like everything art. Pale even for a vampire. But alive. Standing. Looking at me with those ancient eyes that held too much emotion.

“Grace,” he said. His voice was rough. Tired. But unmistakably Uncle Cas. “I believe you owe me a lecture about checking in more frequently,”

Something broke in me. I closed the distance between us, wrapping my arms around him as gently as I could manage while still holding tight

“You’re home,” I said against his shoulder. “Uncle Cas, you’re really home,”

“I promised I would be.” He held me carefully, mindful of injuries I couldn’t see but could feel in how he moved. “Gruen, Fai sorry. For the nine days. For not checking in. For-for scaring you ”

“Don’t apologize Just-just don’t leave again. Don’t hunt extremists alone. Don’t “cons’ Dutch Was crying too hard

“I won’t. The Preservation Front is ended. Marcus and Elena are gate. There’s nothing left to band “He pulled fräck so look at my face. “Grace, Frit home. I’m safe. And I’m going to stay that way because I have a ice who

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and discuss art history and it on living room floors during family danera.”

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“I made you something. A painting About-about family being worth coming home to.”

“Then I’d very much like to see it.” He smiled tired but genuine. “But first, your father insists I submit to medical treatment Something about silver wounds and proper healing protocols.”

“Good. You should. You look terrible.”

“I feel terrible. Silver wounds are unpleasant even with eleven hundred years of experience.” He touched my face gently. “But Grace, I’m okay. Really. The injuries will heal. I’m going to be fine.”

I wanted to believe him. Looking at his pale face and careful movements and visible pain-I wanted so desperately to believe he’d be fine.

“Promise?” I asked. “Promise you’re going to be okay?”

“I promise. On fifteen years of being your Uncle Cas. On every Impressionism discussion and art supply shopping trip and moment of sitting on floors to be at your level. I promise I’m going to be okay.”

And somehow impossibly-I believed him.

Uncle Cas was home.

Injured, exhausted, in pain. But home.

Alive and healing and absolutely, definitely home.

That was enough. More than enough.

It was everything.

11

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