by Vivian Wood
“What ever are you all up to?” Gabriel asked, walking over and taking an empty seat at the bar.
“Yer lady’s teaching us to make gumbo,” Rhys said. Gabriel repressed a smirk at the Scot’s pronunciation of the Creole word, making it sound utterly foreign.
Cassie met Gabriel’s gaze and gave him the briefest of smiles, then looked back down at her pot.
“Whisk!” she chided Rhys. “Don’t let your roux burn.”
“Echo, you’re not getting in on the competition?” Gabriel asked. “You’re a local. Isn’t everyone from New Orleans born knowing all the Creole classics?”
Rhys let out a snort of laughter which he tried – and failed – to hide as a cough. Echo stuck out her tongue at him before responding.
“As it stands, I’m not much of a cook.”
“She burned soup last week,” Duverjay informed everyone, earning his own glare from Echo. “Canned soup.”
“Cream based soups require a high degree of attention, and I got distracted by a certain someone,” Echo protested, giving Rhys a resentful glare. “It wasn’t my fault.”
Aeric made an amused sound, which was about his usual level of interaction in social situations. Gabriel gave the blond Guardian a moment’s attention, wondering how he’d come to be so insular. Cassie grabbed his attention almost immediately, though.
“Okay, okay!” she cried, elbowing Rhys. “Whisk faster! Duverjay, bring the vegetables. It’s time for the holy trinity.”
“I’m sorry?” Gabriel asked, leaning forward to peer at the contents of Cassie’s pot. “Are you going to pray over soup, then?”
“First of all, gumbo is not soup,” Cassie fired off, whisking madly. She paused to let Duverjay dump a half a cutting board’s worth of chopped vegetables in the pot. “Duverjay, we’re going to need wooden spoons now. And Gabriel, the holy trinity is onion, bell pepper, and celery. It’s the base for every Creole recipe.”
“No garlic?” Echo asked, watching as Rhys accepted a similar load of vegetables from Duverjay. The butler handed Cassie and Rhys each a spoon.
“Stir, but slowly,” Cassie instructed, showing Rhys how it was done. She glanced up at Echo with a soft smile. “Garlic can’t go in too early, or it overpowers everything else. We’re going to cook this for two hours, just like my mom used—”
Cassie stopped and cleared her throat, ending her sentence abruptly. Silence thickened in the room for long moments until Echo broke it.
“At least you can cook!” Echo said, her voice a hair too bright. “I am in awe of you right now.”
“It smells good,” Aeric added.
Gabriel had to agree. He’d only had gumbo once since his arrival, but it hadn’t been nearly as good as Cassie’s unfinished concoction smelled.
“Two hours before it’s ready, huh?” he said, disappointed.
“I think Duverjay has some charcuterie set up for us,” Echo told Gabriel. Everyone stared at her in confusion, and she clarified, “Meat and cheese and crackers and stuff. Olives and jam and grapes and stuff… Look, I don’t know, I didn’t name it!”
“I think we can add some chicken stock and let everything cook down now,” Cassie said. “My arms are getting tired anyway. I should make gumbo every day, keep my arms toned.”
“If you guys are done, maybe let Duverjay take over stirring and stuff. He looks like he wants to help,” Echo said, earning a grateful glance from the silent butler. “We should move into the living area.”
After Cassie and Rhys surrendered their wooden spoons to Duverjay, the group moved to the sprawling couches in the living room. An ottoman made a good place to lay out the massive charcuterie tray and several plates, so they gathered around it and chose seats accordingly. Aeric grabbed the only solo seat, and Echo and Rhys claimed the larger couch, cuddling closely together without a hint of remorse.
After a moment of intense eye contact and a brief pause, Gabriel and Cassie ended up on a love seat together. Cassie’s wide hips and full skirt combined with Gabriel’s brawny frame meant that they were nearly plastered to one another. The second their thighs touched, Gabriel sucked in a deep pull of Cassie’s sweet scent, and he lost the thread of the conversation entirely.
“Did you try this one?” Cassie asked, nudging Gabriel’s knee with her own and pointing to a crumbling piece of cheese on her plate.
“No. Should I?” Gabriel asked, raising a brow.
Cassie pulled a comical sour face and shook her head.
“It’s reallllly strong,” she said. “The candied pecans are good, though.”
“This reminds me a little of London when I was growing up,” he said, pointing to a sharp English cheddar. “Farmer’s breakfast, they called it. A piece of bread, a piece of cheese, and a pint of ale.”
“I didn’t realize that everyone was so well fed,” Cassie said. She froze a second after she said it, clearly realizing how bad it sounded, but Gabriel just chuckled.
“We weren’t, believe me. But my sister had a way about her…”
Duverjay brought a tray of wine glasses, and Cassie and Gabriel each accepted one. Duverjay poured them a dry red wine, but neither sipped it right away.
“People just gave her food?” Cassie asked, looking surprised.
“Ah, no. She was a lightfinger. She could steal almost anything that wasn’t bolted to the floor,” Gabriel reminisced with a smile.
“That’s amazing. I mean, not amazing, but… I’m glad she provided for you both. What did you say your sister’s name was?” Cassie asked.
“Caroline,” Gabriel said, the name sticking in his throat a bit.
“Well, here’s to Caroline,” Cassie said, clinking her wine glass against Gabriel’s. “She sounds awesome. Family is… well, I don’t have one of my own yet, but it’s the most important thing in the world.”
“I lost my parents at a young age, and Caroline was all I had. She was amazing, but I always wished…” Gabriel couldn’t quite finish his statement, unsure where he was headed.
“I didn’t have much in the way of parents, either,” Cassie said with a sympathetic glance. “I’ve always thought… I don’t know. I’ll do better with my own family, you know? That’s all I can do.”
“Indeed,” Gabriel said, shifting in place. Talking to his supposed fated mate about the family she wanted to have one day was uncomfortable, mostly because Gabriel himself desperately desired the same thing. Still, they were too new, too uncertain, for this particular talk. One day, perhaps…
Gabriel nearly groaned at his own indecisiveness. He wanted her, he didn’t want her. He wanted to fuck her, then he was thinking about his future children… It was ridiculous. He needed to get his act together and stop behaving like a lovesick boy.
Cassie was just a girl, like any other girl. Perhaps she was more beautiful, more beguiling than most. And the way she smelled… yeah, Gabriel was hard for her every moment of the day.
But that didn’t mean a lifetime of commitment, did it? That didn’t mean he could let Cassie rely on him, when he’d only eventually let her down.
The conversation swirled and shifted around him, and he took a few moments to soak it all in. He had a beautiful redhead at his side, pressed so close he could feel her warmth. He had his fellow Guardians to watch his back. He had a job, and a home. He had a butler, for God’s sake. He should feel like the luckiest man in the world, especially considering his humble beginnings.
So why did he feel so lacking, so unfinished? And why, oh why, did the very thought of being incomplete draw his gaze straight to Cassie?
Sipping his wine, Gabriel forced himself back to the conversation, unwilling to consider the topic for even a moment more. Cassie was beautiful and entertaining and kind, but she was nothing more. Not for him.
Gabriel would never take a mate, for her sake as much as his own.
Chapter Seven
“If I can just… find…” Cassie mumbled to herself, gently spreading a crumbling map out across the massive libra
ry table in Gabriel’s study.
Over the last week, she’d started to make herself at home in Gabriel’s guest bedroom and his sprawling living area. It consisted of a couple of desks crammed up against the window, a pair of dusty armchairs, and a labyrinthine collection of research materials. Gabriel had filled almost every usable inch of the room with wall-to-ceiling bookshelves, racks of maps and scrolls, and tables cluttered with every type of magical instrument known to man and Kith alike. The massive window was covered with blackout curtains, making it nearly impossible to find anything; it took Cassie over an hour to find the document she was currently examining, and that was after days of learning Gabriel’s “system” of organization.
“Aha!” Cassie said, picking out a tiny point on the map and tapping it with a fingertip.
“What’ve you found?”
Cassie whirled around at the sound of Gabriel’s deep, warm voice. He was leaning up against a bookshelf as he watched her, wearing a tight white t-shirt and a pair of low-slung gray sweatpants. His shirt was damp in places from perspiration, clinging to every defined inch of Gabriel’s arms, shoulders, and torso. The barest bit of skin was exposed between the hem of his shirt and his sweats, and Cassie had to fight to keep from staring at it.
No man should ever look so good or smell so good fresh from a workout, but Gabriel did. Damn him.
“Ohhh…” she said, giving herself time to recover and not drool like an idiot. “I was researching the Gates of Guinee, the supposed portal into the spirit realm. Pere Mal is obsessed with the Gates, and I started to think… If they were real, maybe they correspond with some other places of power.”
“Like where?” Gabriel asked, crossing his arms. The hem of his shirt hitched up another fraction of an inch. A very noticeable fraction.
Cassie took a moment to smooth down her brightly-patterned Alice + Olivia sundress and tug at her arm-length white lace gloves, wondering if she’d ever be able to dress casually again. Gabriel was just too hot in any kind of clothing, and Cassie couldn’t stand the thought of being less put-together than him. Of course, that meant that she spent a lot of time primping… but then again, she also liked primping and feeling girly.
“Cass?” Gabriel prompted.
“Hm? Oh, uh… I pulled up a bunch of different maps of New Orleans online. Crime maps, cemetery maps, old riverboat maps that show how the city used to be set up. Here, look,” she said, reaching for a sheaf of papers she’d printed from the internet. She spread them out for Gabriel to see. “I’ve made marks here on the crime map where paranormal crimes are the most frequent. On this map, I marked where the Kith first settled, around the French Quarter and along the river. And here, on the cemetery map, you see where some of the most prominent Barons and priests and priestesses were supposedly buried.”
“These points are the same on every map,” Gabriel said, his brow hunching as he absorbed her findings.
“Yeah. So look at this one,” she said, moving to the big map she’d examined earlier. “This one shows where the old money families settled here, when New Orleans was still surrounded by plantations.”
“How do these fit together?” Gabriel asked.
“Well, I did a little research about Pere Mal. He’s obsessed with his personal history and that of his ancestors. So I dug a little, nudged a couple of Gray Market vendors I know, asked around for whispers about where his people are from. I cross-checked some of the older plantations with the places he and his family were rumored to have lived and worked, then I compared that to the list of properties Ciprian gave us.”
Gabriel studied her for a moment, looking a little surprised.
“What?” Cassie said, pretending offense. “I’m not just a dumb fortune teller, you know.”
“I’ve never thought that for a moment,” Gabriel promised, his lips curling up into a smile. “So? What did you conclude?”
“So, look,” Cassie said, pointing out the same spot on five different maps. “Right here, on what’s now Prytania Street. Pere Mal’s mother was said to have worked at the Foucher Plantation. There’s a cemetery very close by with a bunch of important graves, maybe even Baron Samedi himself.”
Gabriel raised a brow.
“Baron Samedi is the one who made up the riddle about the Gates of Guinee. ‘Seven nights, seven moons, seven gates, seven tombs’, remember? You really gotta keep up,” Cassie sighed. “Anyway, within the same few blocks there is also a paranormal crime hot spot, a house where the first Vampires that arrived in New Orleans kept their coffins, and a freaking Indian burial ground.”
“And Pere Mal’s addresses?”
Cassie dropped her finger onto the closest map, beaming with pride.
“Right smack in the middle of it all, of course,” she crowed. “He has a number of properties in the area, but public records say this is one of the oldest standing homes in the city. I think it’s more than an investment. I think it’s personal.”
“And you think… what, that he’d put the new Birdcage somewhere close to his heart?” Gabriel said, putting the pieces together.
“I think Ciprian said he’d pick somewhere with a lot of security, well protected. I think he’d protect someplace he cared about a lot, right? Especially if you already ran him out of the first location.” She paused to take a breath, thoughtful. “Actually, Alice did that. She’s the one that sent up the flare.”
“A friend of yours, I presume?”
“Probably my only real friend,” Cassie admitted with a shrug.
“That’s not true. You’re friends with me. And Echo and Rhys,” Gabriel said. “And for some reason, Cairn seems drawn to you. That bloody cat doesn’t like anyone but you and Mere Marie.”
Cassie suppressed a giggle when Cairn rose from where he was curled up atop a bookshelf, right behind Gabriel. Cairn gave Gabriel a haughty look and reached out a paw, knocking a heavy-looking book off the top shelf. Gabriel jumped and spun to glare at the cat, who slunk off out of sight.
“Careful about him,” Cassie warned with a grin. “He’s sneaky like that.”
Gabriel muttered a low curse and shook his head.
“Well, this is excellent work. You really should think about doing research professionally,” he said. “Uh, not that you need a job.”
Awkwardness bloomed between them and Cassie almost groaned aloud.
“Thanks,” she huffed. “So can we go get Alice from the Birdcage now or what?”
Gabriel frowned for a moment.
“I’ll have to talk to the other Guardians. We don’t go in without a strong plan, and we don’t take our…” He paused, and the word mates hung in the air between them before he corrected himself. “The Guardians go in alone. We don’t want to have to defend you and attack Pere Mal’s guys at the same time.”
“I resent that! I can pull my own weight. Or the Oracle can, at least. She’s not about to let me get hurt, I assure you.”
“I’m afraid that’s not nearly enough reassurance for me,” Gabriel said with a bemused smile. He stared at her for a second too long, his gaze dropping to her chest before he cleared his throat and reached out to give her an awkward pat on the arm. “Nice work on the map, though.”
Cassie blew out a breath, frustrated by his brief touch. He’d been like this all week, checking her out when he thought she wasn’t looking, then the next moment pretending that he was all business. After the way he’d touched her at Bellocq, Cassie had thought that maybe he’d at least be interested in something physical growing between them. But no. Not so much as a kiss on the cheek since then.
Never mind the fact that Cassie had caught Gabriel adjusting himself to hide his arousal countless times in the last few days. She screwed up her mouth, deciding to test him, see just how professional his feelings toward her really were.
Gabriel turned to leave the room, but Cassie stepped right up to him and caught the hem of his t-shirt, tugging him to a halt.
“Wait,” she said softly.
Gabriel t
urned back, his expression shifting from surprise to hunger to guilt in the space of a few seconds.
“Cass,” he said, wrapping his fingers around her hand. He stared at her hand for a few moments, looking uncertain, then raised it and placed a kiss on her wrist, just where her pulse pounded. When he released her, Cassie turned the tables on him, grabbing his wrist and jerking him toward her body.
Of course, his greater size meant that Cassie mostly pulled her body against his, but it didn’t matter. She threw her arms around his neck and raised up on her tiptoes, pressing her lips to his. Gabriel was still for a fleeting instant, and then he responded with a groan, taking the kiss deeper.
They were breathless in moments, clinging to one another, hungry for each other. It nearly killed Cassie to pull her lips from Gabriel’s, but she needed to understand what was between them.
“Why have you been avoiding this?” she asked, scanning his face as she tried to catch her breath. “I know you want me this way.”
She brushed her hips against his, conscious that he was hard and wanting.
“Cass, Cass,” he said, desire just as plain in his eyes. “I— I don’t know that I can have a mate. It’s… I can’t…”
Cassie brushed another kiss over his lips.
“I don’t need forever,” she said. “Maybe I’m not a forever kind of girl.”
Gabriel reared back, his expression darkening.
“Don’t say that,” he growled. “You’re not some casual…”
Cassie would have laughed at his lack of words to describe her if she wasn’t so frustrated with him just now.
“Maybe you’re the one who’s not casual!” she snapped, then she gave a bitter laugh at her own words. “Actually, I take that back. According to Cairn, you’ve had a revolving door for hookups since the second you arrived in New Orleans.”
Gabriel had the decency to look a little abashed.
