“Why? Why did you stay away so long?”
“I’m sorry. I kept meaning to come, but there’s always another case.”
She’d taught me to be honest, to stand tall, to be a good person, and I’d left to become a manipulator, a liar, and a thief. Okay, so the stuff I stole was usually already stolen, and the people I retrieved more often than not had been taken, but the world I inhabited was a far cry from the one I’d been raised in, and to bring the taint here would be like casting a dark shadow over the warm, buttery reality Matron had created for these lost and abandoned children. They’d learn about the real world soon enough, they’d see the depravity, the death, and the pain in due course. Why trek it across the threshold?
She was looking into my eyes in that intense way of hers again. “I’m proud of you, Wila,” she said finally. “So proud of who you’ve become. Of the aid you give to those in need, and the manner in which you take care of yourself.”
A lump formed in my throat. She couldn’t really mean that. “I’m a bounty hunter, a thief, and a master liar.”
“And if you weren’t, then we’d be dead right now.” She smiled softly. “Your skills saved our lives, and I will forever be grateful.”
My eyes pricked, and I blinked back the tears. “The kids? Are they okay?”
She exhaled. “Confused, scared, but I gave them all some herbal tea. They’ll be right as rain in the morning.”
“Ah, Matron’s famous herbal tea.”
She tapped the side of her nose. “Cures all ills.”
And as a child I’d had my fair share of tea—it had made me feel better, almost like magic, and who knew, it probably was. Matron was an enigma, a woman with a huge heart and an abundance of love and patience.
“Will you come see us again soon? The children would love to meet you.”
“Me?” Most of the children I’d grown up with had moved on to their own lives. I’d kept in touch with only two. “Why would they want to meet me?”
Was that a blush staining her cheeks? “Oh, I may have woven some tales about my famous foster daughter who rights wrongs and metes out justice.”
Was she quoting my promotional pamphlet? My lips twitched. “I’ll come by, I promise.”
“Good.” Her brow furrowed. “How did you know where we were?”
“Adam Noir.”
Her brows shot up. “Of course.” She pressed her lips together. “I’m sure he’ll be along shortly to check on his progeny.”
The disapproval was etched onto her handsome face. “You think he should claim her?”
“I think he should tell her the truth.”
“The truth?”
“She doesn’t know he’s her father. He comes by every few weeks with gifts for all the kids and plays the generous benefactor, he’s careful not to give her too much attention, but she’s beginning to suspect something regardless. They share many of the same physical features, and one of the other children remarked on it recently.”
“He’s afraid the Arcana will find out.”
“Yes, I know. But the longer he leaves it, the more damage the lie will do. He wants to be a part of her life, and yet he can never claim her. Better to cut her loose, less damaging in the long run.”
“Have you told him this?”
She rolled her eyes. “So many times. The man is as stubborn as a mule.”
“I should get going.”
“Yes. Go get some rest.” She smoothed my hair. “I’m glad you made it out unscathed.”
Unscathed but not unfettered. “So am I.”
She retreated into the house as I climbed down the steps. The porch light winked out, and Azren stepped out of the shadows.
“She raised you?”
“Do you even have to ask? Haven’t you trawled through my mind enough?”
He flinched as if I’d slapped him. “I read you for lies, as is my duty. I ascertained your purpose at the Keep, but that is all. I would never be so intrusive as to delve deeper without your consent.”
“How noble. But you know what’s even nobler?”
He stared at me blankly.
“Not invading someone’s privacy in the first place.”
“Maybe you should take your own advice.”
“I’m not going to apologize for saving children from becoming a dragon aperitif, so you can just fuck off.”
“You curse too much.”
“Yeah, get used to it.” I climbed into Mini and started the engine.
“Do we hunt now?”
“No. Now we go get some sleep.”
The engine started with a soft purr. How long had it been since I’d taken a guy home? Oh, yeah, like never, and I was about to break my streak with a Shedim. Trevor was going to throw a fucking fit.
“No. Uh-uh, he can’t stay here,” Trevor said. He stood in the hallway leading to the stairs. “He’s one of them, have you seen his teeth? He could slaughter us all in our sleep.”
“I could slaughter you right now,” Azren said. “Strange little abomination.”
“Pomeranian. I’m a Jack Pomeranian cross.” Trevor bristled with indignation, then turned to me. “I bet they eat dogs.”
Azren took a step forward and bared his teeth in a feral hiss.
Trevor scampered up several stairs. “If he stays, I go.”
There was no way Trevor was going anywhere. Aside from the fact that I’d never let him leave, he had nowhere else to go, and he knew it. But there was no way I’d be calling his bluff. My friends were my family and they came first. Always.
“Stop it!” I grabbed Azren’s shoulder and attempted to yank him back. It was like trying to shift a mountain. “Elora said I had to employ you, she never said I had to house you too. So unless you want to spend the night on the street, you will apologize to Trevor, and you will assure him that you will not be slaughtering any of us, asleep or otherwise.”
He blinked at me in surprise. “You wish me to give you my word?”
What was with the emphasis? “Yeah, sure, do that.”
He exhaled through his nostrils and then stood up straight, placing a hand over his left pectoral. “I give you my word, I will not slaughter you or your little abomination.”
Ah, his word.
“Trevor,” Trevor barked. “Say it, say my name.”
Oh, man. This was the weirdest exchange ever.
Azren arched a brow at the canine. “I will not slaughter Trevor.”
Trevor’s tiny, tense body relaxed. “Good. That’s good. But he’s not sleeping on the second floor.”
So, that left my floor or the fourth, which was a mess of furniture, dust, and boxes. I’d been meaning to get that place cleaned out for ages ... “Azren, you can have the fourth floor, but I’m afraid you’re going to have to tidy it up a bit.”
He inclined his head. “Hard work is not a deterrent to my kind.”
“Great!” I clapped my hands. “Now, let’s all get some fucking rest.”
Azren winced. “Must you curse with every other sentence?”
“Must you work for a villainous dragon overlord that likes to eat babies?”
He snapped his mouth closed.
“He does have a point,” Trevor said.
“Shut it, Trev, or I’ll release him from his word and get him to eat you.”
Trevor gave me the stink eye before turning his back and bounding up the stairs to his floor. My boot hit the first step, and the shrill ringing of the phone cut through the air. Seriously? It was gone midnight. Who the heck could that be?
“Head up to the fourth floor. I’ll be there in a minute with blankets and stuff.” I headed for the office where the old-style phone was practically vibrating in its cradle. Another antique purchase that made everything seem more authentic.
I grabbed the receiver on the tenth ring. “Hello?”
“Miss Bastion?” The line crackled but Adam Noir’s dulcet tone was unmistakable. Seriously, the guy could make millions in the telephone sex trade. Heck,
he could bottle that voice and sell it on the black market.
“Yeah. It’s me.”
“Thank goodness. There was some excitement at the celebration, and then some key Draconi seemed to vanish. The rumor was that something was stolen. I was worried you’d been captured.”
“I was.”
Silence. “What?”
“I was captured. But I managed to get out of an extremely graphic death sentence by agreeing to work as a hunter for Elora and employing one of her Shedim to help me.”
“Are you serious?”
“Deadly.”
“How can you be so flippant about this?”
“Believe me, once I get into bed, I intend to cry myself to sleep, but right now I’m barely holding it together, so if there’s anything else you need to speak to me about, can we please do it in the morning?”
“The kids are safe?”
“Yes.”
“I’ll see you in the morning.”
I hung up. Time to tuck a demon into bed.
Azren stood staring at the dust-filled hallway. His large, powerful frame looked lost and forlorn in such unfamiliar surroundings. Each floor had its own hallway and a lounge area with rooms leading off that. There was barely space to move here. The only indication that he was aware of my presence was a shift of muscle beneath that tight-fitted shirt of his.
“Here.” I held out a bundle of bedding and a pillow. “There’s a bed in the room to the left.” God, I was evil for sticking him up here, but despite what I’d said to Trevor about Azren not slaughtering us, and even though he’d taken an oath not to, having him on the same floor as me was not an option. In fact, my door would be firmly locked tonight.
He took the bundle. “This will do nicely.”
“It will?”
He offered me a close-lipped smile. “It has much potential.”
“Yeah? Well knock yourself out, big guy. Make it comfortable, but not too comfortable. I plan to net these rogues fast, and then you’re out of here.”
“Yes. Tomorrow we will begin the hunt.”
His lips parted and his teeth glinted in the moonlight streaming in from the curtainless bay windows. The scar that ran across his face seemed harsher in the silver rays, and the glamour he was using to soften his feral features slipped to reveal the monster beneath. His eyes flared to life with bloodthirst.
My stomach twisted as the memory of his fingers digging into the back of my neck flooded my brain, reminding me that he was a predator just like Elora, and he’d be sleeping under my roof, shadowing my every move. He was a predator who’d given me his word that he wouldn’t kill me, but he could hurt me if he wished, and the look in his eyes at that moment spoke of the desperate desire to inflict pain.
I backed up and fled down the stairs to the floor below, but I didn’t stop there; instead, my feet took me down to the ground floor and into the kitchen where I grabbed a beer from the fridge and then headed through the cellar door down into the basement. The steps creaked beneath my feet, and the air hissed in welcome. Grabbing the string dangling from the ceiling, I pulled and bathed the space in anemic light. There was a torch down there too, just in case the bulb went. There was no way I was getting trapped down in the dark. Fucked up how one childhood experience could leave a long-term scar. An hour locked in a wardrobe courtesy of Gareth, the pimply fucker. I’d broken his nose for that, and Miss Hamilton had punished me by making me clean out the library with her. Not really a punishment considering I’d loved spending one on one time with her. But yeah, claustrophobia was now a thing for me.
Boxes and broken shit littered the basement, but my attention was on the door, the metal-reinforced door built into the brickwork at the far end of the room. Several locks kept the thing closed. A lone chair was placed a few feet from the door. I parked my butt, popped the cap on my beer, and took a swig.
The knot in my chest tightened, and my throat pinched. “Hey, you awake?”
A despairing sigh drifted through the door. “You wouldn’t be down here if I wasn’t.” The voice was male with a perpetual sarcastic lilt to it.
“Today was pretty shit.”
“Really? Did you get to leave this house?”
“Yes.”
“Well, in that case, your day was better than mine.”
“Guilt won’t work on me.”
“And yet I keep trying.”
My lips twitched. “You could just tell me what you are.”
“And spoil the surprise. I hardly think so.”
The first time the voice had spoken to me I’d almost lost my shit. He’d begged to be let out, of course, but my gut had denied the request. Someone had gone to a lot of effort to lock whatever he was up, and then that same someone had left him to me. I’d spent the next few months getting to know my mystery house guest and was no closer to figuring out what he was than on our first meeting. Gilbert refused to have anything to do with it, steering clear of the basement at all costs, and urging me to do the same. When we’d first discovered the Voice, Gilbert had tried to slip through the metal, but it was impervious to spirits. Trevor wouldn’t go anywhere near the cellar door. But for me, for some reason, just being here, just talking to whatever was behind the door, helped when things got crazy. There was an instinctual foreboding, a gut feeling that both repelled and drew me to him. I guess curiosity was my bane. Why was he here? Who put him here? Was he a gift from my benefactor? Was this some kind of test that would suddenly dissolve the privacy clause in the will?
Another sigh. “Why don’t I get my notepad out, and you can tell me all about it, hmmm?”
“Funny.”
“I do try. I’d try even harder if you let me out.”
“I almost died today.” Silence greeted my declaration. “I almost died and now the thing that probably would have been responsible for making sure my execution was carried out is sleeping under my roof.”
“And why is he here?”
“I’ve tied myself into a blood contract and he’s part of it. I have to find some rogue Shedim, and he’s been sent to help me hunt.”
“So, what would hurting you achieve aside from preventing you both from meeting your objective?”
“Nothing, I guess.”
Hurting me would just mean that hunting would be off the agenda, and that was counter-productive. I was safe. I’d dodged a bullet, and now it was safe to expel the fear. My stomach quivered as the emotions I’d pushed down rose to the surface and spilled silently from my eyes.
“You’re safe. For now.”
“Yeah, I guess, but there’s something seriously wrong with me. I smart-mouthed the dragon liege.”
“And you survived.”
“I got lucky.”
“Maybe. Or maybe you just showed the monster that you’re worth more to her alive, that fear does not cripple you. You used your humor as a shield.”
He was right. Humor was my shield, my go-to place when things got tough, and damn if it hadn’t saved my arse on more than one occasion. You couldn’t think straight when having an emotional meltdown, and humor was the key that kept that shit locked up until it was safe to vent, except once we’d gotten out of the Keep, once we’d been in the night air, not even humor had been able to keep a rein on the aftershocks of terror. If Azren hadn’t pissed me off, then ... wait, had he pissed me off on purpose? He was so stick-up-his-arse and loyal to the wrong side, but he’d taken a step back at The Gables, given me a moment to decompress. It would be so easy to tar him with the same brush as Elora, to hate him for what he represented, but he was just a soldier following orders, and hating him wouldn’t get me anywhere. As long as he kept his talons to himself and followed my lead, we’d work together just fine.
“These conversations would be much more comfortable on a couch, or on a bench even,” the voice said. “The conditions in here are terribly cramped, and I’m parched. You couldn’t just open the door a crack and throw in a bottle of water, could you?”
“Nice try.”
I took a long swig of my beer. The knot was still there, emotion that needed expelling, but this trip had been for the mind, not the soul. For the rest, I needed to be alone.
“Nice talking to you too,” he called out as I climbed the steps.
Back in my pink and white haven, it took ten minutes to wait it out. The knot loosened and melted away. I was alive. I was safe, and as long as I honored my contract, I’d stay that way.
A light knock on the door was followed by the scent of Earl Grey.
“I thought you might need some tea,” Gilbert said.
A cup floated across the room and landed on the bedside table. “Is it decaf?” I sniffed.
“At this time of night, of course. What kind of monster do you think I am?”
My sniffs turned into a chuckle. “Thank you, Gilbert.”
“My pleasure, Wila. Do you want to talk about it?”
The talking had been done. “No. I’m good.”
“In that case, there will be pancakes for breakfast.” Pressure on the top of my head told me he’d just patted me. “Sleep tight.”
A soft breeze blew past me and then the air grew still. Gilbert was gone. Changing quickly into my pink rose-bordered pajamas, I slipped under the duvet and picked up the cup of tea. The residual tightness in my chest retreated with each sip because tea meant home, safety, and normal like nothing else. Azren had been right: the sooner we found these rebels, the sooner he could go home and we could both get on with our respective lives.
8
Trevor sat at the kitchen table, canine body stiff and alert. The Daily Vine sat beside his plate. He usually liked to browse the headlines before breakfast, but this morning he hadn’t cracked a single page. Not like Trevor at all. “Collective Cracks Down on Lupin’s Use of Subzero Drug as Talon Coating,” the headline screamed. The Lupin had evolved from pack-led, instinct-based neph to upstanding members of society, business owners, and entrepreneurs no less, but you couldn’t take the beast out of a wolf man. And this headline said it all. Urgh.
A stack of pancakes sat on a plate in the center of the table. Trevor often said if the curse had given him the limited digestive properties of a dog, as well as the body, he would have killed himself. The man loved food, and pancakes drizzled with chocolate sauce were his ultimate favorite, so the fact that he hadn’t made a move to eat anything was doubly telling, but one look at the demon sitting opposite my canine friend and the reason was clear. Azren was tucking away pancakes as if they were going out of fashion, and Trevor, the resident piglet of the house, was captivated. He caught my eye and blinked slowly, then went back to Azren-watching. Had to admit, watching the demonic spirit shoveling golden delicious into his mouth with all the easy abandon of a child was kind of mesmerizing. In that moment, he wasn’t a beast that could kill me with a single talon swipe. He was merely a man enjoying a meal. A chuckle rose up my throat, but I swallowed it. Azren was not a friend. He was a necessary evil, not a member of the team. He’d given his word not to slaughter us, but if Elora asked him to, there was no doubt in my mind he’d break it. Best not to make him too comfortable. Best not to let my guard down. Wary was safe, but the fear from our first encounter was gone because right now he needed me.
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