by Chloe Neill
We’d long since passed ten.
I took off my boots and hung up my coat, then headed upstairs to my second-floor bedroom. The world may have been chaotic, but my bedroom was not. It was simple, clean, and organized—my respite from Pack life. Like my clothes, the room was decorated in shades of black, white, and gray. A white four-poster bed was the focal point, near a bureau I’d painted a black and white chevron pattern.
I pulled open the top drawer of the bureau and perused the contents. T-shirts and pajama bottoms for winter, skimpier nighties for hot nights or special occasions. Unfortunately, they still bore the tags.
“Someday,” I grumbled, pushing them aside and pulling out a heather-gray T-shirt, the lingering scent of Jeff’s cologne filling the room. The shirt was one of his, with a chartreuse “Jakob’s Quest” logo across the front. He’d let me borrow it after I’d been soaked in a downpour, and I’d forgotten to give it back.
Or I’d decided not to.
I tugged it over my head, pausing while I was cocooned in cotton and Jeff, savoring the scent of him, wondering what it would be like if he’d been there with me.
I’d imagined the scene a thousand times before: turning off the light, lying down on cool sheets, his body beside mine, arms ready to wrap around me.
But that was just a fantasy. Tonight, again, the bed was empty—Jeff replaced, as always, by the cold weight of tradition.
I dreamed I straddled the crux of the farmhouse roof, one leg on each side, a hammer in hand. The shingles, gray with age, were falling away from the roof like scales, floating to the ground like feathers. I used the hammer to beat them back down, but the work was useless. They lifted and rose away, leaving the bones of the house bare beneath them.
“Fallon!”
My eyes opened. I wasn’t on the roof. I was in my own room, sprawled on my stomach, an arm and leg hanging over the side of the bed. There was no hammer, but someone was pounding fiercely on the bedroom door.
“Hold on,” I said, flipping off the sheet and sitting up, squeezing my eyes shut until my head stopped spinning. I’d slept like the dead, and my head throbbed like I was hung over.
“I’m coming,” I said when the beatings continued, and stumbled to the door.
I yanked it open and found Gabriel in the doorway, a haggard expression on his face. There were shadows beneath his eyes.
“It’s, like, six in the morning,” I said, squinting in the sunlight. We didn’t sleep much, although we tended to sleep those hours in the early light of day. “What do you want?”
“Your ass downstairs. The coronet is gone.”
I pulled on enough clothing to turn the T-shirt into loungewear and headed downstairs in sweatpants and bare feet.
Adrenaline pumped, making my blood run and brain race. But I was still groggy, and the sensations mixing together made me feel like a college freshman after an all-nighter.
Christopher, Derek, and Ben were already in the living room, once again around the open box.
“Where’s Eli?” I asked, as I joined the circle.
“Kitchen,” Ben said.
I peered inside in the box. It was empty. Even the purple cushion was gone.
Fear warred with exhaustion and irritation. “I thought we were putting the crown in the safe,” I said.
“We did. The box was down there,” Gabriel said. “Empty.”
“At least there weren’t spiders in their place,” Ben lightly said.
Gabriel’s slanted look actually seemed to chill the air in the room. “The safe was open. Someone managed to pick the lock.”
“Who figured out it was gone? And why the hell were they in the basement at six o’clock in the damn morning?” I was not a morning person. And I was real damn grouchy before coffee.
“Nobody figured it out.”
I glanced at the doorway. Jeff stood there, hair tousled, a leather jacket over a T-shirt and jeans. He looked pissed, and magic spilled across the room like a horde of angry insects. He walked toward us, but didn’t even spare me a glance.
I assumed he was mad because I’d ditched him the night before. But I’d done what I had to do, and I’d explained that to him. He knew the deal. I didn’t have time for a tantrum, especially not right now. We were in crisis mode.
Ben glanced between us, settled his gaze on me, the question in his eyes obvious. But I shook my head. The coronet was missing. Our focus was on the Pack.
Always on the Pack.
“The alarm on the safe went off. It’s set to send me a message,” Jeff said.
Ben frowned. “Why did it alert you?”
“Because I had him install the security system,” Gabriel said.
“I didn’t get a message the doors or windows were breached,” Jeff said, glancing at him. “I take it the alarms weren’t turned on?”
“We’re way the hell out here,” Gabriel muttered. “Since when do we need to live in a security state?”
“Since you’re the Apex of the Pack and you moved the crown up here,” Jeff countered. “It’s important.”
Gabe’s magic spiked. “I’m well aware of the importance of the goddamned crown. I don’t need the reminder.”
Wisely, Jeff bit back a response.
Eli walked into the room, two steaming cups of coffee in hand. I held out hope one of them was for me, and thanked my lucky stars when he handed it over.
The first sip was hot, full-bodied, intoxicating. I gave him an appreciative nod. Eli and I were closest in age, and we’d spent more time together than probably anyone else in the family. He knew about my coffee obsession, and enabled it. Which made me love him more.
“When was it taken?” Ben asked.
Jeff checked his phone. “Forty-two minutes ago.”
Christopher rubbed his face. “Five-thirty in the damn morning? Who wakes up to steal a crown at five-thirty in the damn morning?”
Ben made a sarcastic sound. “Someone who wants a crown and doesn’t want to get caught.”
“Suspect list?” Eli asked.
“Everyone from Louisiana to Minnesota who wants the damn thing?” Christopher suggested.
“Only one of those people was here yesterday.”
We all looked back at Jeff, who stared back at me. Angry. Betrayed. I guess he’d taken it personally after all.
My stomach curled from the hurt in his eyes.
I tore my gaze away and looked at Gabriel. “He means Patrick.”
Is that why Patrick had come here? Not to meet me, but to get closer to the crown? He wouldn’t have been the first potential mate with an agenda.
“He was here to meet Fallon,” Ben offered, stepping closer to me as if that could protect me from the pain.
Jeff looked at Gabriel. “He was here because he wants to get closer to the crown. And there are two ways to do that.”
Get the crown—or get the girl?
Gabriel turned back to him, arms crossed and angry magic radiating from his body. “Is there something you’d like to get off your mind, whelp?”
Magic rose between them, furious and hot, spinning around the room like a dervish. Both of them angry, both of them worried. Neither of them about to admit it aloud.
The last thing we needed was an intra-Pack dispute. We had bigger things to worry about.
Eli stepped between them, beating me to it. “Let’s all take a breath. The Yorks are good people, quality people. Patrick didn’t even want to look at the crown yesterday. He seemed plenty sincere about that.”
“So he knows how to act,” Christopher said. He looked at me. “You were with him. What do you think?”
All eyes turned to me, including two blue ones that didn’t look especially pleased about it.
“I don’t know.” I pushed my hair behind my ears and caught Jeff’s glance at the T-shirt I’d forgotten I’d been wearing.
I felt his rush of magic—possessive and pleased. He didn’t comment; but he didn’t need to. I’d slept in his shirt. Didn’t that say enoug
h?
But this was not the time, so I pushed it back. “He seemed less interested in the crown than my feelings about it,” I said. “But who knows?”
Jeff pulled a tablet from his pocket, began typing on the screen. He always had a gadget in hand, and this small and sleek rectangle was his new baby. “I’m going to check the camera.”
“There’s a camera?” Eli asked.
“It’s part of my standard security package,” Jeff said, eyes on the tablet.
We stood silently while he played with the camera interface. “Here we go,” Jeff said after a moment, and we circled around him.
The image on the tablet was distorted by the fish-eye lens, which had been mounted above the door, but there was no mistaking the man on the screen: Patrick York walked to the front door and slipped inside. Twelve minutes later, he walked out again.
I felt sick. Nauseated at the betrayal, humiliated at the ruse. I wiped a hand across my lips, as if I could wipe away the kiss he’d offered. He’d kissed me, and then snuck back into our house and stolen the Pack’s most precious item.
But it had all happened so quickly. I grabbed what remained of my pride, held tight. “Surely he couldn’t have gotten to the safe, unlocked it, and gotten out in twelve minutes?”
“He could have if he’s trained,” Christopher said, shrugging when we looked at him. “What? So I know how to work a lock.”
Ben slanted his head. “We can’t actually tell if he’s taking anything with him.”
“What else would he be taking?” I asked. “He had no reason to be back in the house. No reason other than the crown.”
Without waiting for an answer, I walked to the window and lifted the sash. The breeze was frigid, but a relief as hot tears of embarrassment slipped down my cheeks.
I wiped them away as sneakily as I could. God forbid any of them should see me cry.
“I can call Catcher,” Jeff said. “Or Merit. Or the Chicago Police Department. But I’m guessing you want to keep this in-house.” Merit was Chuck Merit’s granddaughter, a vampire of Chicago’s Cadogan House. Much like her grandfather, she spent a lot of time solving supernatural problems.
“In-house,” Gabe said. “We don’t need the attention.” His tone dropped, deepened, and was rough by worry. “Is there a chance he knows how to use the crown?”
Silently, Eli glanced at Jeff.
“Jeff knows,” Gabriel said. “I told him.”
“Security,” Jeff said.
“In that case,” Eli said, “I don’t know how he would. The information would be hard to come by, and Yorks have been out of the loop for a very long time. I doubt they’re even friendly with anybody who knows. Did he mention anything to you, Fallon?”
When I was sure my face was dry, I turned back, looked at my brothers. “No. Not a word.”
“This is a disaster,” Ben said.
I knew he meant the theft, but I still felt responsible. All of this trouble, the drama, because of tradition. Danger to the Pack, Jeff pissed, my brothers worried. Our role in the Pack at risk. All of that because tradition had put a thief right under our nose. And because a man we’d trusted with that tradition had betrayed us all.
Humiliation began to give way to anger. And there was only one healthy way to deal with anger.
“I’ll go,” I said, moving back to the group. “I’ll find him, I’ll kick his ass, and I’ll bring back the coronet.”
“I’ll go with you,” Ben said, but Gabe shook his head.
“People will wonder why we’re sending half the family on a crusade hours before the initiation.”
“I’ll go with her.” We all looked at Jeff. “They won’t suspect us going together.”
Because we were always together. And that said volumes.
Gabriel looked between us, considered. “Do it. I’ll call Richard in the meantime.”
“Is that wise?” Eli asked. “If he’s in on it . . .”
“Patrick said his father was sick. I don’t know if he’s up for plotting to take over the Pack.”
“Or maybe this is his last effort to become Apex,” Ben said.
“I’m calling him,” Gabe said. “If he’s involved, there’s no point in denying it now. If he has the crown because he wants the Pack, I doubt he’ll hold that in.”
“Patrick’s staying at the Hotel Meridian,” I said. “That’s the first place to go.”
Gabe checked the grandfather clocked that ticked in one corner of the room. “The initiation’s at six o’clock. Find the coronet, bring it home. Or we hand the Pack over to someone else.”
4
I dressed and met Jeff downstairs, where he waited by the front door.
“I’ll drive,” I said, and he didn’t argue. My car was small—a coupe that could be easily parked in Chicago, but had enough horsepower to zip around traffic. Or mow down a potential with a traitorous agenda. Not that I had violence on my mind.
Jeff didn’t respond or say anything else until we were in the car and ten minutes into the drive. And then he surprised me.
“I’m sorry,” he said. “I was an ass. You don’t deserve that. Not when you’re trying to do the right thing by your family. It’s just . . . you don’t know what it’s like for me.”
I goggled. I knew exactly what it was like—because I was the one living under the weight of it. “I know exactly what it’s like for you. You don’t know what it’s like for me.”
“Then tell me. Don’t pull away.”
“I don’t pull away.”
“You do pull away. You hide behind your family.”
“I do not.”
“You do.” His voice softened. “You do, Fal.”
I sighed, feeling suddenly tired. “We’re adults, not children. Sometimes adults don’t get what they want. Even if it hurts,” I added after a moment.
His voice was quiet. Hopeful. “And what is it that you want?”
I knew what he wanted me to say. What he needed me to say. But I couldn’t. Because if I admitted it to him, to myself, that I wanted him, that I cared for him and needed him, then I’d be admitting that everything else had been a lie. That every date with every potential had been a farce, that I wasn’t really trying to find a match for the good of the Pack.
So I didn’t say anything.
Jeff made a low growl and ran his hands through his hair. “I swear to god, Fallon. Sometimes . . .”
“Sometimes what?”
He sighed hugely. “Sometimes life is not fair.” He was quiet for a moment, then looked over and smiled at me. “Will I get in trouble if I ask how the date went?”
“So much trouble,” I said, but couldn’t help smiling back. And when I did, the world seemed to right itself again. “It was dull until, you know, he broke into my house and stole my family’s birthright.”
“So you probably won’t be going out with him again. Which means I have a chance.”
The hotel was located in Gold Coast, a swanky neighborhood just north of the bustling Loop. The building that housed it matched the area’s ivy-covered townhouses, but the lobby was modern and sleek, decorated in shades of white and cream. The attendants at the front desk, both men with slicked back hair, wore buttoned shirts with rolled sleeves, suspenders, and bow ties. It was either very hip or very pretentious; I wasn’t entirely sure which.
We walked to the counter. The attendant—Cash, according to his name tag—smiled at us.
“Welcome to the Hotel Meridian. Are you checking in?”
“We’re looking for a guest, actually. Patrick York?”
“Ah, yes.” He glanced down at his screen, typed a few characters on a slide-out keyboard. “I’m afraid Mr. York has already checked out. Just a few minutes ago.”
I stifled a curse.
Cash looked up, apologetic. “Is there anything else I can help you with?”
Jeff and I looked at each other, and I opted for frankness. “We believe Mr. York may have inadvertently taken something that belonged to my
family.”
Cash’s eyes went wide. “Really.”
I nodded. “Since he’s gone, would it be possible for us to take a look at his room? I know it’s an inconvenience, but it would make my family feel a lot better.”
He grimaced. “That’s not exactly policy.”
“The guest has checked out,” I reminded him. “So there’s no breach of the policy. We just want to see if perhaps there’s anything he might have left behind.”
Jeff put his hand on the counter, a folded hundred-dollar bill tucked subtly between his fingers. “We’d appreciate it very much.”
Cash’s eyes stayed flat, but he took the money and handed us a keycard. “Sixteen twenty-eight,” he said, gesturing with a bladed hand toward the elevators. “Help yourselves.”
The elevator was empty, and it moved slowly and steadily up the side of the building, adding or subtracting a guest here or there. When we reached the sixteenth floor, we followed the arrows to the right, checking the room numbers until we reached 1628.
“Got it,” I said, holding out my hand for the key card. Jeff handed it over, and I unlocked the door and pushed it open.
“Damn,” Jeff said, stepping inside behind me. “I think the Yorks have money.”
If the suite was any indication, he was right. A central hallway led to a bathroom, a bedroom, and a sitting area with a view of the lake. The furniture was high-end, the linens fancy. Silk curtains in wide vertical stripes were tied back at the windows. The room hadn’t yet been cleaned, which gave us better odds of finding some hint of what he’d been up to.
“Probably so. He had a driver yesterday.”
“Fancy,” Jeff said. “I’ll take the bedroom. You look in here.”
I walked to the small desk, opened the drawer, and rifled through complimentary stationary and Chicago-centric magazines. I found another guest’s discarded receipt for the observation deck at the Hancock Tower, dated more than a month ago, and a cellophane-wrapped peppermint.
Nothing had been lost between the couch cushions, nothing stuffed into the pillows. I found only dust bunnies under the couch, and the wastebasket was empty.
