I put two hands flat on the desk. “I came here willingly and you’re making me a prisoner? What happened to no guards?”
He rocked back in his chair. “Why is your phone going to voice mail?”
I swallowed so loudly that I thought Butch might hear me across the room. My phone had gone missing last night, along with my memory, and damn if he didn’t know it.
But that might be useful right now. “I lost it. I was trying to go out and get a new one when your man stopped me.”
“When did you lose it?” he snapped back quickly.
“Last night.”
“You lost it while you were sitting in the condo all night?” he asked, eyebrows rising.
I was really beginning to hate when his eyebrows rose. “Before I got there.”
He paused before he said, “Very convenient.”
“Yes, my life has been so convenient.”
He’d been trying to track me through my phone. Only way he knew exactly when it had gone missing. He’d probably tried to pinpoint me after Butch had called in that they’d lost me.
Had I dropped it on purpose, just as I’d disappeared? What was going on? Maybe Kane was right—I was a monster. Maybe my personality had split and my other half was so atrocious that I couldn’t bear to know her.
Kane stood, jarring me from horrible thoughts as he walked into a closet off his office. He came back out with a phone in his hand. He placed it on the desk in front of me. “I’ll have it turned on shortly. Make sure it’s charged and stays that way. As long as you have Butch or Leon with you, you’re free to go wherever you want.”
“So I need a babysitter?” How was I going to tell an escort that I wanted to dig around in the rubble of the explosions for incriminating evidence against myself? That if I found some, I might not be coming back, because everyone would rightfully want to kill me?
“Yes,” he said, no hesitation. “You’re mentally unhinged. You don’t know where you were for months, and we have the small issue of buildings blowing up on the night you disappear again, while you’re comfortably in bed.”
He stood a foot away from me now, daring me to refute what he was saying. His words condemned me. I was glad this wasn’t a court of law, because if I were the jury, I’d have declared me guilty too. It looked bad. I knew it, which was why I had to get the hell out of here and figure out what was happening before anyone else did.
But still, he was calling me crazy. Even if I was, I couldn’t just accept that. “I’m not mentally unhinged.”
He shrugged. “Not knowing what you did for months certainly means something. If I were you, I’d check the mentally unhinged box. The other option doesn’t have a good ending.”
I leaned a hip against his desk, crossed my arms, and raised an eyebrow. “Being mentally unhinged would at least explain one thing that doesn’t make sense.” I kept my eyes locked on his. He was a smart man. He’d know I meant getting involved with him.
“If I didn’t have an aversion to liars, I’d be tempted to prove a point.”
For ice-cold eyes, he was throwing off a massive amount of heat. Or maybe that was me? It was a good thing I didn’t like this man, or I might want him to prove all the points he needed.
Butch cleared his throat in that way made it sound like he was choking on unsaid words. “Still here.”
I took a few steps away from Kane, grateful for the cold water that Butch had thrown on the moment. And where had that even come from? All our foreplay must’ve been really good, so good it was lingering in my lost memory.
Leon walked into the office, headed straight to the Keurig. He paused halfway there, took one look at Kane and I, then turned to Butch. “Ah shit. Is this a bad time?”
Butch rolled his eyes and nodded.
I gave them my back and turned to Kane.
“Fine. Give me one of the Thug Brothers.” Then I’d lose him. I didn’t care how long it took. I needed to get to the explosion site. And more, I needed out of this place and away from Kane for a while.
He walked back around his desk, reclined, and kicked his feet up. “I don’t have anyone available.”
“Really?” I hooked a thumb toward the Thug Brothers, who were both sipping coffee.
“Actually, we have pressing matters,” Butch said. “I can’t work without caffeine.”
“Vanilla-flavored caffeine,” Leon added.
“And don’t punch us. It’s not our fault,” Butch said.
Why did everyone think I was going to punch them? I turned, wanting to get out of Kane’s office more than I wanted to argue. “Find me when you have someone available.”
Chapter Ten
I spent the morning and into the afternoon up in my rooms, waiting for an escort. By three, I’d decided the wait had ended and no one was going to come. As I’d sat brewing for hours, it occurred to me that there might be another option to find out what happened. The witches. They’d replayed my memories once; they could do it again.
But I’d have to choose wisely. If they saw something incriminating, they’d probably run right to Kane with the information. And if whomever I picked saw me letting crawlers into the world, they’d be scared enough that it might be hard to keep them quiet. I’d be scared. Thinking about it, I wasn’t sure I wanted to find out, but I had to. My life probably depended on me finding out what was happening before anyone else did. I needed one I could intimidate, someone smaller. I wasn’t exactly a big girl at five feet four, so that might be tough. There were definitely some smaller witches, though.
It took about ten minutes to spot one in the Underground and then follow her into the hall. I had to wait until a vampire walked by. The blonde was about to get on the elevator when I grabbed her arm and dragged her toward the stairwell door.
“What are you doing?” She yanked on her arm but couldn’t lose me. I was latched on to her tighter than a starving dog on T-bone steak.
I didn’t answer until the door shut. “I need you to do me a favor.” It wasn’t exactly a favor, but presentation mattered.
She made a face, her skin crinkling so much that a pug would’ve been jealous.
“I’m trying to be civil about this.” I let go of her arm. “See? Civil.”
“You dragged me down the hallway.” She rubbed the skin where I’d grabbed her, like it actually hurt.
“And I let you go.”
She took a step back and glanced toward the stairs behind her, since I had the door blocked. I’d tackle her if she took one step.
“Look, I’m trying to do this peacefully. I’m sure you’ve heard what I can do, and grabbing your arm is the least of it.” Or so I’d heard. Hopefully enough gossip had trickled down to the witches that she’d be wary.
“I don’t care what—”
I threw my hand up over her mouth, muffling her yelling. She backed away from me. I followed her until her back hit the stair railing.
Hand firmly clamped below her owl eyes, I said, “Can you please keep your voice down? If you’d listen to me, you’d know this needs to stay between us.”
The door creaked open behind me. Who was taking the stairs? I hadn’t seen anyone come this way since I’d been here. I dropped my hand quickly. I didn’t need any questions. I’d chase her down after they left.
“What are you doing?” Kane asked as he came and stood beside us.
Damn it. I should’ve known it was him when the little crawler on the landing above disappeared.
The little witch didn’t waste a minute. “She’s threatening me.” Her eyelashes fluttered so fast that it looked like she was trying to take flight.
A fat tear ran down her cheek. Was that a spell, or had she trained herself to cry on command? It made me want to punch her in the nose to see what her real tears looked like. Except I didn’t punch people, no matter what everyone else thought.
“I didn’t threaten you. Theatrical much?” It was ridiculous. I hadn’t been able to get the threat out yet.
She reached out an
d clung to Kane’s arm, as if me merely speaking to her was harmful. If she fluttered those lashes one more time, I wouldn’t punch her, but I might accidentally poke her in the eye. Then we’d see how pretty her tears were.
“Why were you threatening her?” Kane asked, as if there were no doubt I was the one at fault.
“I didn’t threaten her.” I might’ve been about to, but it was still insulting that I never got a trial.
Butterfly Lashes smirked, her body now positioned halfway behind Kane, as if she needed him to protect her. Actually, she might if she clung to him a little harder.
Kane turned toward Lashes. “What was the threat?”
“I don’t know. She didn’t get to it yet.” She stared straight at me as she poked her head clear of his arm. “But it was coming.”
The entire encounter went from frustrating to so worth it when Kane shook his head. He let out a short sigh and took a step away from her, extricating himself from her clinging hands. “I’ll handle Ollie. You should leave.”
Butterfly’s smile lit, and the lashes set to fluttering. Figured she’d misinterpret that as him taking her side, as opposed to him wanting to lose her. She walked out of stairwell, but not before she beamed a smile in my direction.
The door shut behind me, and I was fairly certain I wasn’t getting out of the stairwell as easily as Lashes had.
He took a step toward me, tilting his head down. “What were you trying to get from her?”
“I heard I’d had problems with the witches. I was trying to clear the air.”
His eyebrows rose, as if to say, Bullshit.
I shrugged. “You don’t have to believe me.”
He walked toward me, and as much as I told myself to hold my ground, my feet moved a few steps back until I got control of them.
He didn’t stop until his shirt was grazing my long-sleeve t-shirt. “That’s good, because I don’t. You’ve had lots of problems with the witches, and you never cared if you cleared the air with them or not. Don’t do something stupid.”
The last thing I wanted to hear was how he knew what I did, or what I cared about, even if it might’ve been true.
“Stop expecting me to be her.” Her. It was such an odd way to phrase it when “her” was me. But the things they told me about the person, the time I couldn’t remember, it was as if they were telling me about a stranger. It galled me that everyone thought they knew her better than I did.
I put both hands on his chest and shoved, anger spilling out over the fact that I’d let him intimidate me into stepping away from him. How he believed the witch, even if she was actually right. Fury that he hadn’t done something to stop this whole this situation before it blew up. I’d warned him something was coming, and he’d done nothing! Who was he to judge me at all?
I shoved again, anger boiling up in me. This time, instead of standing still in front of me, he put his hands under my arms and walked me back until I had the wall at my back and him at my front.
“I’m not your enemy.”
“You’re certainly not acting like my friend, either.”
“Then talk to me.”
And when he said it like that, so calmly and like he really cared, I almost told him that I’d lost another chunk of memory. How I was terrified of what I might’ve done and would maybe do again.
Then I thought about how he’d barged into the apartment as if I had blood on my hands. I might’ve been involved with him once, trusted him enough to reach out for help. Believed in him. But I wouldn’t do that again. Look how that had turned out.
Fool me once…
I shoved at his shoulders, and whatever softness I’d thought I’d seen hardened. He stepped back a few inches, and I slid out from between him and the wall.
I opened the door, and right before I left, he said, “Don’t bother going after them again. The witches can’t retrieve your memories. I’ve already tried.”
Figured he would’ve already tried that.
Shit.
Chapter Eleven
The second I walked onto the main floor the next morning, Butch and Leon waved me over to the booth. I didn’t hesitate. I needed one of these guys to get out of the building. I made my way across the room, ignoring the people who watched me, as I slid into the booth.
“Still alive,” Butch said, with a huge, hopeful smile on his face.
“Yeah?” I cleared my throat, wondering if he was going to say something more that would clarify it.
Leon coughed and looked the other way.
Butch leaned forward, his eyebrows both angling up. “Really? You forgot that too?” He sounded like I’d taken away a favorite toy.
I was tempted to lie, but I didn’t know what to lie about. What was the importance of “still alive”?
Leon looked over at Butch and patted him on the shoulder. “You knew she wasn’t going to remember.”
Butch’s gaze dropped and then shifted to the crowd. “I know. I keep hoping something will click. I just don’t know how to do this.”
“It’ll be okay. She’ll remember us. Eventually.”
“What if she doesn’t?” Butch asked, turning to Leon.
“She—”
“I gotta go. I forgot about something.” There was no way I was going to be able to get them to take me out today and then purposefully lose them. I wasn’t sure what my alter ego might be capable of, but I couldn’t. Even the prospect of eating breakfast with them was too much at the moment. I had a bag of chips in my room. It would suffice.
Butch gave me a halfhearted wave, and Leon nodded, eyes down.
I made my way across the Underground and to the hall, where the elevators were. I’d meant to go to the elevators but found myself turning left instead, as if I were following a well-worn path.
I wasn’t sure what the worst part of not remembering was. Having a list a mile long of things you didn’t recall, having people know you who you’d just met, or feeling like there was an alien directing your actions. Sometimes it felt as if I were filled with urges that made no sense.
I made it to the first landing when a gargoyle popped in front of me. She had a side pony, perfect nails, a pink leather skirt with zipper up the side, and stilettos. “I hope you’re ready to get back to work after disappearing on us all.”
“Huh?” I jumped back. Here I went again. Someone who knew me, whom I didn’t recognize. Although I had my suspicions this was Zee, the gargoyle I’d heard about.
Her side pony swung as she tilted her head this way and that. “I’ve been hearing all sorts of crazy talk.” She looked as if she were about to go off on a tangent when she looked closer. “Are you kidding? It’s true? I can understand you going daft, but you forgot me?”
I was too tired to deny something she already knew. “It’s nothing personal. I’ve forgotten everyone.”
“Me? Zee?” Her eyes narrowed and dust fell from her forehead. “Shit. This whole thing is stressing me out so bad I’m sweating.”
She took a step away from me and appeared to be mumbling a pep talk to herself. She took a few steps to the right and then walked back again, occasionally glancing my way. I eyed up the door a half a flight down. Did I leave? She didn’t appear to be done, but she wasn’t speaking to me, either. Was this how that witch had felt? Nah, I wasn’t this scary.
I edged a foot back, while watching to see if she noticed.
She spun back around. “How bad is it, exactly? Do you remember any of the stuff in your head, or is that all gone too?”
So, she knew I was shadow kissed. Everyone seemed to know about that, though. Didn’t mean I’d been friends with her, did it?
“Nothing. I’ve heard that there’s stuff in there, but I…” I waved a hand at my head and then shrugged. I inched back a little further. If this was what went down in the stairwells, I couldn’t imagine why I’d wanted to come this way. Definitely taking the elevator from now on.
“Look, you might not remember, but we’ve got office space. We were about
to be very profitable. You can’t quit.”
“I’m not quitting. I can’t start. I don’t know anything.” Then her words “very profitable” sank in. If I was guilty of what I feared, I was going to need money to disappear. A lot of it, and maybe quickly. I’d move to some island that was barely inhabited, so empty that the crawlers wouldn’t have anything to blow up. “What exactly do you need me to do?”
Her eyes sparkled like newly buffed marble. “I’ll bring some of the girls to our shop and you can experiment on them. Gargoyles are a hard bunch to kill. You can set us on fire, throw acid on us, it won’t be a problem.”
“What if I can’t find anything in there?”
A noise near the first-floor door had us both waiting for someone to enter, but no one did. Still, Zee nudged me toward the next flight up. At least this time I wasn’t the only one looking for secrecy.
“It’s there. You’re shadow kissed. That doesn’t go away.” She wrapped one very heavy arm around my shoulders as she kept me moving. Her arm jerked away suddenly, startling me.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“Let me touch your head.” She didn’t wait for me to answer but backed me up against the wall as two massive hands with pink claws reached out.
Both palms landed on the top of my head, but instead of being crushing, they were quite gentle—and weirdly warm. Her eyes were closed. Since it wasn’t hurting, easiest thing seemed to be to wait it out. And never take the stairs again.
Her hands dropped, and she’d lost the sheen to her marble.
“What is it?”
“We’ve got problems.”
“What are you talking about? What problems?” Holy hell, did she see something in my head? Did she know what I’d done? Had I really helped those crawlers? I measured the distance between myself and the second-floor door, wondering if I was going to have to run for it now. Maybe I shouldn’t run at all but let them kill me. If I’d had something to do with it, maybe I deserved death?
Zee didn’t notice my panic as she eyed up the back of my head, then my back and my legs, examining every inch, it seemed. She backed up finally, and I waited for the verdict.
Kissed by the Dark Page 7
