by Chloe Neill
She put a hand over mine. “I am happy.”
“For me,” I said. “And I appreciate that. But there’s more to it. What’s going on?”
Mallory shook her head as if to clear it. “Nothing. This is your bachelorette party, and we are not going to worry about me.”
I used the same look I’d given Helen, stared at her with narrowed eyes. “Mallory Delancey Carmichael Bell.”
“Nothing, Merit.”
“Mallory.”
She tipped back her head, let out a frustrated sound. “It’s just—I feel weird.”
“Weird? What’s wrong? Are you sick? Are you sleeping? You look tired.”
“I’m not sick, and I’m not pregnant, since that seems to be the other frequently asked question.” She shook her head. “I have . . . a malaise?”
I frowned. “About the wedding?”
“Oh Lord, no. You and Ethan were made for each other, even if he did have to wait four centuries to find you. Which, if you ask me, is probably good for him.” She winked. “Makes him more grateful.”
“Then what kind of bad feeling?”
She shrugged. “I don’t know. It’s just this vague magical feeling. A kind of unease, I guess?”
“From what? From where?”
“I have no idea. There’s nothing specific in it. Not even a speck of what I could call a thing, or a threat, or a looming damn cloud.” Her words picked up speed with the rise of her frustration. “Just unease. Catcher’s being supportive, but I know he doesn’t feel it. And that makes me feel like I’m being paranoid.”
“So, let’s assume you aren’t being paranoid. What could be bothering you? Not You Know Who.” That was as much as I wanted to mention the woman who’d tried to control us.
“No,” she said. “It’s been four months, there’s been no sign of her, and the city’s warded even if she did come back. Other than that, I don’t know.”
Mallory looked at me, and the concern in her eyes was even deeper than I’d thought. Whatever this was, she wasn’t done with it.
“What if I can’t do happy, Merit? I mean, I’m married, and you’re getting married, and with the exception of the world’s most idiotic ghost hunters, no supernatural drama. No River nymph infighting. We haven’t been thrown to the wolves by the mayor or anyone else looking to use us for political fodder. I should be freaking thrilled. Instead . . .” She sighed, shrugged.
I took her hand, squeezed it. “Mal, you are the happiest person I know. The brightest person—except when you were evil.”
“Except for that.”
“And even then, you crawled out of it. So if you tell me something’s off, I believe you. Have you talked to the Order about it? I thought you guys were on better terms.”
“They already think I’m crazy.”
“Well, what about Gabriel? Maybe the Pack’s felt something similar.” Although I hoped Chicago’s resident shifter alpha would have come to us if he’d believed something was wrong.
“I don’t even know what I could tell him. ‘Gabe, I know you’re busy being hot and wolfy and all, but all this peace and prosperity is making me antsy’?”
“Then I’m officially out of ideas.”
“So you think I’m crazy, too?” She must have heard the rising panic in her voice, as she held up a hand. “Sorry. I’m sorry. This is just wearing on me.”
I put an arm around her, squeezed. “We’re going to be fine, Mallory. Everything is going to be fine. I’m going to get married, and Ethan and I are going to have a wonderful week in Paris.”
“You’re right. I know you’re right.” She shook out her hands, her shoulders, obviously trying to loosen up. “What’s going to happen is going to happen, and there’s no point in worrying about it now. Let’s just have fun.”
“Let’s just have fun,” I agreed, and clinked my glass against hers.
Because, paranoid or not, the other shoe was bound to drop. It always did.
• • •
“All right, ladies!” Lindsey said, standing on a chair in her bare feet, ringing her glass with a spoon. When the crowd quieted, she glanced around the room. “We’ve reached the, ahem, climax of tonight’s Bachelorettetravaganza!”
“How many names does this thing have?” I whispered to Mallory.
“I think seven? We threw out ‘Merit Does Chicago’ and ‘Sullivan Two: The Resullivaning.’”
“Good call.”
“Colin,” Lindsey said, gesturing to the bartender. “If you would?”
The overhead lights dimmed, but the spot on the small stage in front of us brightened on a single black chair that sat in front of a microphone. Music began to play, a jazz song with a playful, flirty rhythm.
As Lindsey sat down to join us, a man walked out of the back room, onto the stage.
Tan skin, dark hair, dark beard, his hair in a very well-executed knot at the top of his head. His eyes were green, his lashes as thick and dark as his beard, his mouth a long line that turned up at one corner. He wore jeans, boots, and nothing else. The terrain of his body was all smooth skin and hard, curving muscle, his left arm marked by a complicated monochrome tattoo.
The room went absolutely silent.
“Well,” Margot said quietly. “He is . . . rather attractive.”
“Attractive,” Lindsey said, tilting her head as she stared at his biceps. “And well-defined.”
“A dictionary couldn’t do it better,” Mallory said, eyes glassy as she stared at the man.
I glanced at Lindsey. “I can’t believe you hired a dancer. Ethan is going to kill you. Or me. Or both of us.”
“Oh, honey,” Lindsey said. “He isn’t here to dance.”
Regardless, with the grace of a dancer, the man spun the chair around backward, took a seat, and pulled a thin, worn paperback from his back pocket. He looked up at me, smiled. “Your party?”
I nodded, suddenly nervous.
“Cool. Lord Byron work for you?”
I actually felt my face warm. “Sure?”
Beside me, Lindsey snickered, the sound full of satisfaction.
He nodded, thumbed through some pages. “Ladies,” he said, meeting our gazes. And then, looking down at the page, he began to recite.
“She walks in beauty, like the night / Of cloudless climes and starry skies; And all that’s best of dark and bright / Meet in her aspect and her eyes.”
Every single woman in the room sighed.
• • •
I wasn’t sure whether he was a grad student, poet, actor, stripper, or brilliant combination of all those things. But the man knew Lord Byron, and he knew words. He knew the rise and fall of sentences, the way to pause, the moment to look up, catch our gazes, smile. He knew emphasis and speed, pacing and clarity. He was a prince of poetry, and he had us mesmerized.
Champagne was uncorked and dunked into gleaming silver chalices of ice, then poured into tall, thin glasses while we listened, legs crossed and perched forward in our chairs.
“Is it better if we’re objectifying his body and his brain?” Margot asked, lifting the thin straw in her gin and tonic for a sip.
“I don’t much care,” Mallory said. “He gives good word.”
I couldn’t have put it better myself.
CHAPTER THREE
FIVE SECONDS OF (SUPERNATURAL) SUMMER
We left Temple Bar about two hours before dawn, dropped Mallory off in Wicker Park, then headed back to the House.
We separated on the first floor. The foyer was quiet and empty, the desk closed down for the evening, the supplicants home again, their issues addressed, or to be back in line to see Ethan another night. There was only so much one vampire could do.
There wasn’t a single box or candlestick or willow branch in sight, which meant everything had probably made it onto the truck and over to
the library. Or Helen had gotten sick of all of it and hosted a bonfire in the backyard. That seemed unlikely, so I’d just assume the wedding would go forward as planned.
“The wedding would go forward as planned,” I whispered with a smile.
There’d been more showers, brunches, and cake tastings than I’d have thought possible—and still more than I thought was reasonable. Ethan had enjoyed the process, the preparations for our life together, so I’d humored him, and now the bachelorette party had been the last of them. The last hurdle before the wedding, before we took vows of fidelity—for an eternity. Nothing stood between us now but the rise and fall of the sun, and even Sorcha Reed couldn’t change that.
That was when the nerves set in. Not fear, but anticipation. Excitement. Tendrils of desire, possibly stoked by a little too much time with Lord Byron.
The hallway was dark—Malik’s and Helen’s offices were dark, as was the cafeteria at the end of the hall. Ethan’s light was still on. I doubted he was back yet; it seemed more likely they’d enjoy whiskey and cigars until the last possible moment. Probably the cleaning crew had forgotten to turn the light off, or maybe Helen had forgotten some last-minute bauble for the wedding.
I could leave him a note. A message to say good night, that I’d be thinking of him during our vampire-imposed exile, and that I’d see him tomorrow at the library, books optional.
That I thought that was funny probably said more about the gin I’d enjoyed at Temple Bar than about my comedic skills.
I walked into the office, headed for his desk . . . and didn’t realize I wasn’t alone until I caught the flicker of movement across the room.
He stood in the conversation area, a man in jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, the fabric mottled with dirt and ratty on the edges. His pale skin was smudged with grime, his dark hair tufted from what looked like constant pulling by the hands that now scratched nervously at the legs of his jeans. The House was still saturated by the scent of wedding flowers, but I caught the odor of unwashed male beneath it.
He was a vampire. Older than most I’d seen, but the faint, effervescent magic proved his supernaturalness. His magic did have a different sense about it—a chemical smell, like uncapped markers. I also didn’t recognize him. If he was Housed, he hadn’t been in a House recently. Not given the look of him.
“Hi,” I said. “Can I help you?”
He looked up at me, dark circles beneath eyes nearly slitted with exhaustion. “You’re here to help?”
“Sure. Are you here to see Ethan?” Supplicant seemed the best guess. How else would he have gotten past already bulked-up security? Maybe he’d been in the House to talk to someone, had slipped away undetected.
His shoulder twitched, nearly lifting enough to meet his chin. “Help. There’s so much talking.” He tapped his palm against his forehead. “Talking. I can’t stop it.”
“I’m sorry?”
I wished Ethan or Malik were here. They’d know better than I how to handle a supplicant who seemed imbalanced, or at least confused.
“It’s talking. The voice. It’s screaming—the same things over and over and over again. Hello. Hello. Hello. I am here. I am here. I am here.”
I was leaning toward imbalanced. And we didn’t need imbalanced running around the House.
Ethan, I silently said. If you’re in the building, get Luc and some guards and come to your office. I didn’t know if he was close enough to hear me, doubted that he was.
“Let me just call someone to help you,” I said, and reached for my phone, belatedly realizing I’d left my small clutch—and my phone—in the limo. I’d have to use the one on Ethan’s desk.
His gaze narrowed on me, his eyes silvering—the mark of heightened vampire emotion. “Why is it screaming? Do you hear it? Why don’t you hear it?”
I didn’t especially want to turn my back on this clearly troubled man, but I didn’t really have a better option. The first floor of the House had been mostly dark, and until I could get to a phone, or otherwise signal someone, I had to handle this on my own.
“Don’t have my phone,” I said easily, trying to keep the mood light. “Let me get the one on the desk.”
“No!” His voice was loud, the word a bark of sound—and alarm. “No more screaming!”
His fangs were long, white, needle sharp. He launched toward me so quickly I had only a moment to turn, to brace myself against his impact. I managed to dodge most of the force, but he tripped me up, sent us both slamming to the ground. My head bounced against the floor, making my vision waver and putting stars at the edges of the room.
“It’s your fault!” he said, and reared back to punch me. I raised an arm, blocked the punch, grabbed his forearm, and twisted, trying to unbalance him. But he was enormous, and he seemed to believe I was one of the mental demons he was fighting. He raised both arms, slapped at his forehead, and then tried to slap at me. I blocked his shots, but a couple put bone against bone, which sent pain singing through my arm.
“If anyone’s in the hallway,” I yelled out, “I could use your help right now!”
“Stop it!” he cried, missing the irony. “Stop doing this to me! I just want it to stop!” His eyes were red and brimming with tears, and he lifted his arms, beat the sides of his fists against his head. “Stopstopstopstop!”
The dress hiking up around my thighs, I managed to get a leg between his and scissored to twist him off. The vampire grabbed my sash, ripped it away as I reversed our positions, and he hit the ground with a thud.
I scrambled to my feet, shoving the dress back down and kicking away the stiletto heels. They’d make a decent weapon if I needed it, especially since my dagger was with the phone in my bag. And since no one had responded to my yelling, I’d have to hold my own until someone, in these predawn hours, happened to walk through the first floor.
The man climbed to his feet again, those fists beating against his ears. “Stop screaming! Stop talking! I don’t want to hear it anymore! I don’t want to hear it!” He looked up at me, fury and fear matching beat for beat in his expression. “Make it stop!”
I took my chance, dodged back to the desk and the phone. I managed to grab the receiver before he followed me, snatched up the letter opener from Ethan’s desk—a long, silver, double-sided blade. I raised an arm, expecting him to stab forward. Instead, he stumbled back, put the dagger’s gleaming point at his temple. There weren’t many ways to kill a vampire, but I had to guess stabbing himself in the head would do the job.
“I’ll silence it,” he said, silvered eyes frantic. “I will end it.”
I was no longer the victim—he played that role now, too. I put the phone down, held out my hand.
“Let me have the dagger. There’s no need for it. I can help you with the screaming.”
I jumped forward, wrapped my hands around his wrist, worked to force it down and away.
“No more screaming!” He kicked out, trying to push me loose, but I dodged the sloppy shot. He screamed, began pushing me backward until we hit the shelves on the opposite wall. Something crashed to the floor beside me. But my focus was on the blade in the vampire’s hand, and my own fingers, which were white-knuckled around his.
“Just put down the blade,” I said, ducking as he swung out with his free hand. He made contact with something on the shelves, which hit the floor with another crash. If they hadn’t heard me yelling, maybe someone would hear the trashing of Ethan’s office.
He pushed me hard against the shelves again, then pushed me back toward the windows, trying to scrape me off like a barnacle. My hands were getting sweaty, and his eyes looked more desperate.
He pulled away, freeing his arm and sending me backward. I stayed on my feet but hit the shelves again. Eyes on him, I scrambled fingers against rows of books, searching for something I could use as a weapon. Delicate things hit the floor, upended by my questing fingers,
until I touched something cold and hard. I grabbed it. He lurched forward. Weapon in hand, I swung and nailed him in the temple.
He staggered forward, hit the back of the couch, bounced backward again, and nailed me. We hit the ground together, his weight across my middle.
“Merit!”
I heard my name, and then the man was lifted off my chest. Brody had grabbed the man under his shoulders, laid him on the office floor.
Brody hadn’t been a guard very long, and his eyes widened as he looked at me, dress ripped, hair around my face, and a bloody marble obelisk in my hand.
“I saw the light on,” he said, offering a hand to help me climb to my feet. “I didn’t think Ethan was back yet, so I was going to check it out. What happened in here?”
I edged around the man on the floor, his chest rising and falling, which was good enough for me. He was still breathing, but he’d have one hell of a headache when he woke up. And he hadn’t killed himself, which was something. Beneath him was the crumpled ribbon of satin and glitter that had been my bachelorette sash.
I put the paperweight on the bookshelf, pushed my hair from my face. “I’m not entirely sure. I walked in, and he was here, and he went ballistic.”
“He attacked you?”
“Yeah.” I looked down at the man, at his unfamiliar face and grubby clothes, the chewed fingernails and cuticles. Even on a longer look, no one I recognized. “He look familiar to you?”
“No. Should he?”
“No,” I said, but that was really a guess. I didn’t know if he should be familiar, if he was someone we should have been aware of, or if this was as strange and random as it seemed.
I gestured to the phone on Ethan’s desk.
“Call the Ops Room and lock down the House. Then call my grandfather,” I said, chest still heaving. “Tell him we’ve got a vampire, maybe sick, maybe mentally ill. Definitely unconscious. Tell him to contact the CPD or an ambulance or both, and get over here. And find Ethan.”
