by D. D. Chance
“Fair enough, Nina Cross,” he said, pronouncing my name like a benediction. “But where will you be, today?” We moved out of the kitchen and into the main room, with its enormous multicolored chaise. “Somewhere safe?”
I shrugged. “What could be safer than Back Bay and Beacon Hill?”
He snorted. “A lot of places, considering your track record with monsters. You’re kind of breaking the mold, you know, getting attacked like you are. Normally, you have to piss off a monster before they’ll go after you.”
I lifted my brows, unbending despite myself. “Really? You’ve never been attacked by a monster unprovoked? Not once?”
“Not till last night, no. None of us have been, other than Zach—and then only demons. And though I haven’t asked him about it yet, you can bet it’s something Liam is researching right this moment. That’s not something that monsters do, or at least not any monsters that we’ve had record of any time in the last couple of hundred years. Monsters are monsters. I don’t mean they’re stupid, because they’re not, but they don’t have agendas like us. They don’t sit around and think about specific people to track down, and they don’t attack someone who hasn’t transgressed on their territory in some way. It’s not what they do.”
He leaned forward and kissed me on the forehead almost as if he couldn’t help himself, then angled back, holding my gaze. “Which is something you would know if you took a class or two. I’m just saying.”
“Ha.” Somehow, our arms had found their way around each other’s waists again, never mind the scrape of forks across the floor in the other room. It felt natural, oddly enough. So natural that my next words spilled out before I could stop them.
“What are you doing here, Tyler? I mean really. Why are you helping me?”
To my surprise, he tilted his head to study me more fully, while keeping his arms locked around my waist, his body pressed tight to mine. “Honestly? Because I can’t help myself,” he confessed. “You’re important—I know it in my bones.”
I snorted, making him blink. “So, you’re trying to recruit me to your cause?”
“It’s more than that,” he insisted, with an intensity that surprised me. “But I’d be lying if I didn’t say that was part of it. My whole life, I’ve only wanted to prove myself as a worthy Perkins. To become a leader of monster hunters and show everyone how it was done. There never had to be a reason why, it was just who I was. What I was. Setting aside the ghosts and all that, my home life was kind of shit. I don’t say that for pity, because my extended family’s richer than God and I am the luckiest asshole on the planet because of that, but I just wanted to get out and start hunting. Always. Liam too. We finally enrolled at Wellington and met Zach, who’d seen some things, and Grim, who’d definitely seen some things, and it all sort of made it real, you know? Even though we were fighting glow-in-the dark holograms or CGI boogeymen.”
I grimaced at my own words thrown back at me, but Tyler only squeezed me closer. His arms around me felt better than anything had in way too long.
“And then you came running into my world last night—first in my mind, did I tell you that? I had a vision of you before you ever showed up on campus.”
My eyes widened. “Yeah? Did I look like a badass?”
He laughed. “You did. You were running like hell and looked totally pissed, like the last thing you had time for was whatever was chasing you—and you were so freaking strong and beautiful and—”
He leaned back, his eyes shifting away as if to recapture the memory, which allowed me the chance to turn scarlet without him noticing, the blood rushing to my face. This gorgeous Ivy League hunter thought I was strong? Beautiful? Without warning, that admission made all his jabs about my lack of formal skills disappear in a poof of hormones. Which was ridiculous—and yet…
“And just like you were meant to find me, I guess. Like it had to happen.” Tyler dropped his gaze with those words, and I offered him a perfectly composed smile, as if super hunky college guys said these kinds of things to me all the time. “And then you did.”
“I definitely did,” I agreed. “Me and my land worm, just like you wanted.”
His laugh was genuine, and back to being a little smug. “I guess it was both our lucky days.”
“Uh-huh.” I tilted my head and looked up at him from under my lashes, which felt weirdly flirtatious and yet somehow totally natural. “And what if I did come to your school? How would that improve things?”
He lifted an eyebrow, cockiness firmly back in place now. “Well, for one, you’d be with me. That’s an improvement for anyone.”
“I’m serious,” I said, though I was grinning now. He could be excused for not believing me.
“So am I. And don’t get me wrong. I know I’m giving you a hard time because what you’re doing is not safe, but you fought like a baller, even if you’re untrained. That’s hotter than hell. The fact that you’ve survived multiple monster attacks for the past twenty-some years all by yourself without anybody to protect you but a vigilant mother who didn’t quite know what was going on and a bucketful of nails by your bed is pretty damned amazing. You’re doing fantastic on your own, and you heal like an absolute boss. I’d just like you to stay safe so that you have the opportunity to be more amazing.”
Stay safe… My heart gave a hard tug again. How many times had my mother asked me to do that very thing? How many times had I caught her watching me, her eyes filled with pride and hope and maybe a little fear, and talking to me—really talking to me—after she found the dull iron knife I’d bought at the renfest in my pile of dirty laundry? After that, she’d upgraded my unofficial Girl’s Guide to Monster Hunting to include offense as well as defense, and we’d role-played fighting over and over again, any time I’d asked.
She’d also protected me with her life the few times monsters had ever attacked when we were out together. She’d never once breathed a word about taking me to counseling, but…now that I thought about it, she also never tried to get me formal protection. Or her either, for that matter. The only time she’d ever expressed concern was when I’d once suggested I take a martial arts course. She’d flipped out. Funny, I hadn’t thought about that in a long time.
“What is it?” Tyler asked, gazing down at me. Once again, our instant connection felt way too right, too natural for someone I’d only met the night before. Granted, he’d arguably saved my life twice the night before, so I guess we could be excused.
He also was waiting for an answer, so I tried my best. “I was just thinking, Mom taught me everything she knew about fighting, and I learned other basic techniques from YouTube.”
“My point exactly,” he said drily, but I shook my head.
“What I mean is, she never encouraged me to learn how to protect myself, like officially. I asked her once if I could learn karate or whatever, and she got really upset at the idea. She insisted that I didn’t need any training—and that seeking it out was a really bad idea. I totally dropped it and never brought it up again. I don’t know if she never thought it was necessary, or if there was something else going on there.” She hadn’t mentioned me needing any training in her letter to her folks or whoever either, I didn’t think. The updates on my skills had always been relentlessly positive.
“That is kind of strange.” Tyler frowned, recalling my attention. “For most parents, their kid taking a self-defense course or something like that wouldn’t be a bad idea, especially if they were a single mom. But why wouldn’t she want you to get formal training? For that matter, why wouldn’t she have looked into specialized training?”
I rolled my eyes at him. “You mean like a monster hunter academy? Probably because she didn’t know it existed?”
“Maybe, maybe not,” he countered, leaning forward to kiss me on the forehead, then releasing me. He ran his hands through his hair as if he was trying to focus and having a difficult time. “If she was a teacher in Boston, especially this particular corner of Boston, I mean, depending on th
e crowd she ran in, somebody might have mentioned the stories about the magic academies tucked away around here. Not just Wellington. There’s also Twyst and a few others I’ve been told not to mention.”
I lifted my brows. “You can’t mention the others, but this Twyst place doesn’t mind the PR?”
“They’re a bunch of assholes.” He grimaced, leaning against the wall by the front door. “Wizards, warlocks, witches, and all that. They think they’ve cornered the market on all things magical in the world, but they’re wrong. Wellington gets some of their castoffs, and those students go on to be pretty impressive in their own right, even if Twyst has given up on them. But that’s a story for another time. We’re talking about you plus monsters equals a recurring and unfortunate problem. And there’s nowhere in the country that’s better at solving that particular equation than Wellington Academy. You really need to think about giving it a shot. Like starting today.”
This was the overbearing Tyler I knew and already liked way too much. I shook my head.
“I can’t today. I’ve got things to do. People to find.” Still, I smiled back at him, feeling a weird thrill of excitement curl through me. Tyler’s kind of attention went beyond the staunch, silent support my mother had always given me. This felt active. Energized. And useful too. Like maybe I could learn something to help protect myself against the monsters, maybe something that would get them to leave me alone.
“I mean it, Nina,” Tyler pressed. “You don’t have to do all this by yourself. You shouldn’t, actually. It’s not smart.”
“You’re…probably right,” I allowed. I blinked as his face was transformed by his wide, happy smile.
“Good,” he said—and then, once again, almost like he couldn’t help himself, he stepped toward me, pulled me into his arms, and kissed me…hard. The world seemed to pick up speed at that point—spinning around me at a dizzying pace. Something scraped, something else clattered, but for another thirty seconds, there was nothing but Tyler and me and our arms wrapped around each other, our mouths searing with heat and hope and—
“Whoa,” I yelped as the backs of my calves unexpectedly connected with something solid and my arms went wide, wind-milling as Tyler lunged for me.
“Gotcha—I got you,” he said, his laugh loud and carefree as he managed to pull me away from my multicolored chaise and into his arms like I weighed nothing. Then his mouth was on mine again as he swung me around, and I had a vague sense of him moving toward the front door of my apartment again, without me having to think about anything but the touch of his lips on mine, the delicious intensity of his muscles tightening as he gripped me close, the warmth of his body surrounding me. I felt unreasonably safe and protected and cared for in this virtual stranger’s arms—and something else too.
I felt like I belonged.
“Run” my mind whispered, ever more faintly.
“Promise me you’ll come to the academy tomorrow,” Tyler murmured, his lips shifting off mine to trail a line of kisses up to my ear. He breathed out, and the combined sensation of his warm breath on the sensitive skin and his intense focus made my heart shiver with excitement. “I won’t stalk you, and I won’t bug you. But promise me.”
“Okay,” I heard myself agreeing as he opened the door. The polished stairway gleamed in the sunshine pouring through the windows, and he settled me down to the floor, making sure I was steady before we trotted down the stairs hand in hand. Once again, the move was more natural than it should’ve been, but we truly seemed to fit together, weirdly enough. And I found I didn’t want to let Tyler go. Which was why it took another ten minutes and one overturned planter before he stepped back from me. The taste of coffee and possibility still lingering on my lips, I watched him stride easily down my front stairs to head back toward Wellington Academy. An academy I hadn’t even known existed before last night.
I watched his long, rangy form move easily down the tree-lined street. He didn’t look back, maybe because if he did, he knew we would end up tangled together again, the heat of our attraction taking us both by surprise and probably flattening the tires of the cars edging the street.
I wrapped my arms around myself, grinning like an idiot. “You better not be a seduction monster,” I warned under my breath, not bothering to stop the giggle. Could those exist? I’d done enough research to decide that there were no such things as actual succubi, but maybe there was a dude version anyway? Maybe originating from the Jersey Shore?
Still chuckling, I turned back around, scanning the street, until my gaze finally came to rest on the tiny wooded grove a few houses up from my brownstone. It was a sweet little pocket park, with just enough of a fringe of trees to make you feel like you were moving into a wooded idyll before opening to a wide grassy corner, with a manicured little path winding through it. Students and young families alike gathered there to sunbathe, play, or simply sit on one of the several benches, enjoying a momentary respite from the day. It wasn’t a scary place at all, yet I felt a chill as I studied the cheerful tree line. It practically burst with new spring flowers and tiny shoots of green, a promise of the summer to come. So why did it suddenly feel wrong?
Then something shifted in the empty spaces between the trees, something that gained solidity as I watched. I swallowed, going perfectly still. What in the…
I wasn’t imagining it. There were figures standing there, tall and lean and intensely beautiful, dark against the green leaves and newly sprouted boughs. They watched me, not coming closer, but not slinking away either. They weren’t people, I somehow knew. They didn’t belong here.
Monster bait. The phrase leapt into my mind, spoken in Grim’s harsh sneer. I wanted to forget it, but I couldn’t, the idea now planted and taking root like the slender trees in the park across the street, with their twisted, flowing branches serving to hide something dark and deadly that waited for me to make my next mistake.
Monster bait.
I stepped back inside my brownstone and shut the door tight.
10
Eight hours later, I sat huddled over my coffee at the Crazy Cup coffee shop up on Newbury, staring at the shifting images on the TV screen on silent in the corner, while my mind bounced from the day’s lack of progress to the secret magic academy of richy-rich monster hunters and back again. It’d been another long day of unfocused anxiety and dead ends.
Maybe I should go home to Asheville. Even if its monsters didn’t yodel.
“Mind if I turn this up?” One of the baristas spoke up from behind the counter, her eyes wide beneath her heavily-mascaraed lashes and her shining beehive of Amy Winehouse-worthy black hair. “They’re saying something about the mugger.”
I lifted my brows as the other patrons murmured general approval. From everything I’d read since coming to Boston, crime in the city was a problem, sure, but not in this rarified neck of the woods. Privilege and preppiness had its benefits, or so it had seemed. But the scene on the TV, apparently shot earlier today before sundown, looked an awful lot like the pristine, tree-lined streets that had already grown familiar to me. I’d heard about some mugger over at Boston College earlier in the day, but that still seemed kind of far away from here. Judging from the rapt attention of the coffee shop patrons around me, however, it wasn’t far enough.
“That’s over by Boston College,” the barista said. “I’d swear that’s College Road.”
“Another mugging?” a guy standing in line asked unnecessarily as the scroll beneath the TV image told the basic story. The barista punched up the sound, and an earnest-looking woman in a bright red blazer spilled the news to the listening audience.
“While police don’t have any suspects yet, we’ve received new information from today’s assault at one of Boston’s most prominent colleges. A male student, whose identity is being withheld by the police, had been walking southeast down College Road near the university when he was assaulted by a man purportedly dressed as a Victorian reenactor. Other students were drawn to the scene by his shouts, but
not before the young man was seriously injured and the assailant had fled. There do not appear to be any witnesses to the actual assault. Police have not released any additional details at this time, but this is a developing story.”
There was more, but everyone’s attention was already shearing away, their interest blunted by the lack of specifics despite the apparent violence. Or maybe it was the idea of a guy dressed up like some out-of-work stage actor. Only in Boston, I thought. The image shifted, and the barista dialed the TV volume down again.
I turned my attention back to my coffee cup, mapping out my plan. I’d give the Great Janet Cross search one more week…maybe go see Tyler again…but that was it. I needed to let go of this wild goose chase, get on with my—
Something shifted in the corner of my eye, and I turned, frowning as I recognized the enormous guy sitting in the corner.
Monster Hunter Grim, sitting in the corner of the Crazy Cup behind a mug that looked like a child’s toy in his hands. I hadn’t seen him come in, which surprised me. He was kind of a tough guy to miss. Huge, even half hidden in the shadows, bulging muscles barely contained beneath a faded blue T-shirt and scuffed jeans, his long blond hair pulled back tight from his chiseled face.
He met my gaze steadily, not even doing me the favor of nodding in recognition, but before I could think of something to say to him, the front door opened and a dozen or so newcomers came crashing in. Their chatter filled the small coffee shop, a rush of complaints about finals, plans for the summer, laughter and gossip. Like college kids were supposed to be.
Like I’d never been. I watched them a little wistfully for another long second, then glanced back toward Grim—
And stiffened. He was gone.
Leaving my mug on the table, I was out the door a second later and turned to the right, where a frigid breeze seemed to strike up out of nowhere. I’d felt that same blast of cold air right before I’d smacked into the guy’s chest last night, and then again in the coffee house…there had to be a connection. Grim might have a handle on tracking me, but he wasn’t the only hunter out walking the streets. I took off into the shadows, cutting down one street, then another, but the cold air eventually petered out, and no Grim. Dammit.
