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He cleared his throat "Sari went to call Renata She finally got aup his scarf on the back of the door "I think so Yes"

Ava checked her work e-mail for the first ties froazines she’d worked with occasionally And another fro on her own She liked their subscription nuraphers had won several prestigious awards last year Things wereonline, and she didn’t want to be left behind

A fewher hu Malachi around the world She didn’t knohat they would do, but they’d be together That dreae she’d been learning from Orsala, the skills she’d learned from Mala, with a little preparation and a lot of caution, Ava thought she could probably have her old life back At least a little bit After all, what else was she going to do? Hunt the Grigori who had killed her en had shown her the foolishness of that Join some war she didn’t understand for a race of people she barely belonged to? She had no ties here No fa in a dream world in more ways than one That wasn’t real life

She needed her can back to Antarctica was an option The Galapagos The Brazilian rain forest was probably Grigori-free

And if it wasn’t, oh well

"Damien," she asked, "where area small one with you?"

"I need ear in Oslo"

Maybe instead of taking one of the assign with her dad on his tour Take pictures of the rockhis last tour of Asia, but their relationship had been too new Too raw It was still aard to think of hiularly… well, if every six ular

He said he wanted to know her ht be the perfect opportunity

Damien sat down beside her "You see happen?"

I woke up froave up pretending I was anything special

"Nothingmail I need to call my dad"

"You talked to your mother last week, didn’t you?"

"She inforht now"

"Hnored hio batshit insane if she talked to hi her dad on tour But he wasn’t her boss Sure, they said she was family, but she wasn’t Not really They had a political war to fight that didn’t include her She didn’t even want to get involved There were other girls like her out there? Fine She’d survived They would, too

"I know you’ve been cooped up in here Do you want to go out for a walk?"