Queen of the Night Time World

by Kristen Strassel

  “We have to hurt Rachel.”

  She nodded, chewing on her lip. “I hope the spell will be enough to do the trick. But I’ll do what it takes to keep both Realms safe.”

  While she made a perfect leader, she was a lousy Dominia. Rainey thought everyone deserved a second chance. I prayed it wouldn’t be her downfall.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  On the ride back to the apartment, I pretended nothing had changed. Rainey was driving, so I was free to close my eyes, shove my hands in the pockets of my hoodie, and drift back to the days of Cirque Macabre. I startled myself awake, afraid to travel when Rainey needed me by her side more than ever. And even more afraid that I wouldn’t be able to.

  “When you neutralize Rachel or whatever the spell does, does it erase everything she’s done?” I asked. “Will it change vampire history?’

  Rainey could only side-eye me. “I’ve never cast the spell before, I wrote it as a last resort. Gabriel always warned of greed which, no offense, I thought was directed at you. He worried about one creature getting too much power. I don’t think Rachel naturally has a lot of power. It’s her ability to take it away from others that’s alarming.”

  “She claims she took my travel power, and that’s how she got to Gabriel.”

  “But you came to the Realm. Didn’t you have to travel to get there?” Rainey asked.

  “Lennon used some of your crystals and spells to help me out,” I said. Rainey cringed. “Sorry if she wasn’t supposed to touch them. I know you hate that. Like you said, last resort. And Tristan seemed to think transport between the Realms was much easier than I experienced.”

  “Yeah, well, you don’t drink as much as he does. He probably has some Venom-induced travels.” She chuckled. “If she stole it from you, I can’t guarantee you’ll get it back. It’s a scorched-earth kind of spell. We can’t afford to go in a la carte and miss something.”

  “I understand.” It was a night for mourning all that we couldn’t get back. Callie, and now my travels. We couldn’t have it all, no matter how badly we wanted it. “Lennon said energy couldn’t be destroyed, though. The second law of...crap, I don’t remember. Because science, basically.”

  Rainey interrupted me with a laugh. “Science is just magic with a pattern.”

  “Science is magic people will admit to believing in.” We were getting off track. “But that means if you take those powers away from her, they have to go somewhere.”

  “I know,” Rainey said softly as she turned into our apartment complex. “I planned on giving them back to Gabriel. The bulk of them belong to him.”

  “But what if she took from more than one person? Everything goes to Gabriel.”

  Rainey turned to me before getting out of the car. The keys dinged in the ignition. “I can’t make any guarantees, Holly. I want you to be powerful, because I love you and I want you to be happy. And I’m not going to lie, we need all the power we can get, as adoptive non-vampire clan mamas. Other vampires will assume we’re weak until proven otherwise. We can’t repeat Callie’s mistakes.”

  “You’re super sexy when you’re powerful.” I leaned over the console to kiss her cheek. “But I want my power back.”

  “You keep saying that, and you can’t sway me anymore, Holly. There’s too much at stake.” Yeah, right. She shook her head. “I’ll do my best.”

  “I don’t want to fight with you. I’m exhausted. Leave the bags in the car and we can deal with it when we wake up.” I just wanted to get into bed with Rainey and make up for lost time. Feel that newfound power as it flowed from her body to mine.

  The door was open a crack when we got to it. Fuck. In the chaos of the last couple days, no one had called to get the slider fixed. A broken window in an apartment complex was an engraved invitation for trouble.

  Rainey wrinkled her nose when I stopped in front of the open door. “What are you waiting for?”

  “Did you leave the door open?”

  “No.” She kicked it so hard the wall would have a knob-sized hole in the drywall. We were never getting our security deposit back.

  The living room was trashed. Books ruined, pillows slashed. Candles glowed on every surface—one wrong move would burn the building down. Our intruder didn’t know our apartment had been fire-proofed. But she did have a plan, and not very much respect for us, which was clear from the way Rachel lounged on our couch. Legs crossed, arms spread wide.

  Rainey’s mouth gaped as she surveyed the pages of spells strewn over the carpet. It was much more personal than ripping apart a book—it was spitting in her face. Rainey was new-power drunk and hadn’t learned how to hold her liquor yet.

  “I hear you ladies are taking over the clan.” Rachel crossed her leather-clad legs. The outfit was a little much. “That’s so cute.”

  “Did you think it belonged to you, like you apparently think our apartment does?”

  “Holly.” Rainey should’ve been taking my side. But Rachel had something else that we didn’t—a plan.

  And she knew it. She grinned, looking between the two of us. “How long do you think the vampires will follow you once they find out the whole reason you came to Las Vegas was to destroy them?”

  Rachel may have destroyed Rainey’s spell books, but it didn’t mean she hadn’t studied up on our history.

  “Who told you that?” Rainey asked, her voice calm.

  “Nobody.” Rachel shrugged. If it was an attempted to look cute, she failed. “Can’t trust anyone around here, anyway. You know that. I decided to take your travelling talent for a spin. You’re going to miss that one, aren’t you? It’s a lot of fun. I’d only meant to go back in time and learn some of these spells, but you ladies gave me quite the education.”

  Rainey and I shared a glance. Keep her talking. I narrowed my eyes at Rainey, and looked back at Rachel, who shook her head like I was crazy. She could’ve been right, but I was pretty sure she didn’t hear The Dominia’s demand. Rainey never had that power before.

  I sat on the edge of the couch, close to one of candles. I let my finger hover over the flame until the fire tickled my skin and turned to Rachel, licking the heat from my finger and then blowing smoke at her. Out of the corner of my eye, Rainey shook her head. “Where did you go? To Circus Circus?” I asked.

  There weren’t many options. Rainey and I split our time between the awful apartment Lucille rented for us and Cirque Macabre.

  “Actually, I went all the way back to the beginning. To The Riviera. The original show that revolved around you, The Fire Dancer.” She gave me the most sickening smile. “I got to know Noah when he sang for Soul Divider. Real sweet guy, you should’ve given him a chance. He was so into you, too. But he was worried about the lesbian thing. I encouraged him to pursue you, no matter what it took. It took you a little while to come around, but I told him some dick would do you—”

  I picked up the stone candle holder and smashed it against her head. The impact was little more than an annoyance to a vampire, but it was enough to catch her off-guard and let the fire do the real work.

  Rachel ignited immediately. All that bad energy mixed with heat caused an explosion that rocked me off the couch. Rainey’s fire-proofing was no match for this. The apartment was full of smoke, and I crawled low, ignoring the flames that crawled up my arms. I would make sure that bitch was dead before I took care of myself. The couch was completely engulfed, and I screamed when someone grabbed me. I couldn’t see who it was through the smoke, but they hosed me down with the extinguisher. Rainey pulled me off the floor and ran for the door.

  She collapsed on top of me on the walkway outside the building. Our neighbors were already outside, some of them with dogs and cats in their arms, and I did a silent headcount, making sure everyone was there. Red lights flashed against the flames, and I prayed the fire department stopped the fire before everyone’s lives were ruined.

  “Did she escape?” My voice was ragged from smoke and emotion.

  Rainey shook her head. “S
he exploded. If she escaped that, she’s stronger than all of us.”

  “But you didn’t get the power back.”

  “I didn’t.” Rainey’s lips quivered, and she managed a smile.

  “What does that mean?”

  She helped me get up from the sidewalk, and led me away from the chaos. We walked through the complex, hand in hand, and settled at the pool. The night was warm enough we could kick off our shoes and put our feet in the water. Indulgent, considering what destruction we’d caused. But we needed that peace. A spark from my skin landed in the water and shattered our reflections.

  “Did you see that?” she asked. “That’s energy. It’s everywhere. It didn’t belong to Rachel. It belonged to Gabriel, and the Realm. All the soot that covers the people in the building, the sparks, they’ll absorb that energy. I might not be able to save Gabriel. I’m sure as hell going to try, but at least I know his spirit will live on in everyone touched by the explosion. Good overcame evil, Holly.”

  “I killed someone.” By fire. Just like Rainey had been sent to guide me to do. “My half-sister.”

  “You kicked evil’s ass.” She smiled against my lips, and I let her inside. This kiss was different, because this time I was certain it meant I got to keep Rainey forever. “I can See your future, and for the first time, I See the vampires, too. Maybe because Rachel’s gone. What else would cause the change? You’re all going to be back on stage, better and sexier than ever. Everyone’s going to be screaming your name, Holly. They love you. But they can’t have you, because you belong to me.”

  The Afterlife (A few weeks later)

  All it took was a look from Rainey to make the producers scatter from the doorway of my dressing room. They knew better than to push their luck. There was no going over her head, unless they wanted to deal with me.

  They didn’t.

  I’d been pushed down for so long—by Lucille, then my coworkers at Cirque Macabre, and finally Rachel and Callie—it had become ingrained in me to expect it. But it never stopped making me angry. Heat rose inside me when she turned around with a smug smirk on her face. All those people, those creatures, tried to extinguish my fire and they failed. It roared inside me, stronger than ever. Tonight was the first night I’d be able to set it free, on stage, where it belonged.

  “The show starts soon, Holly,” Rainey said once she closed the door. “Shouldn’t you start getting ready?”

  “There’s something I have to do, first.” I kissed Rainey’s head and she giggled. I learned my lesson and I planned to soak in as much of her light as I could. Especially before I took care of this.

  I’d never been in Tristan’s dressing room before. I stopped waiting for an invite long ago, and opened the door after no one answered my knock. The mirrors amplified the candlelight, but otherwise the room was dark. Dark furniture, plush throws. Tristan’s red gaze met mine in the reflection, but he didn’t move.

  I took a deep breath before sitting next to him on the leather couch. The room smelled like Callie’s perfume. She was here, haunting Tristan, whether she meant to or not. His hand rested on his thigh, and I slipped my fingers between his. It had only been weeks since we lost The Mistress, and we’d been so busy rebuilding the clan and the show I hadn’t had a chance to slow down and talk to him.

  With an anxious, excited throng of fans waiting for us in the theater, now was the time. Even if we had to stop to do it. I’d never had much control over time before, and that had to change.

  “Things will feel more normal after we play,” I finally said. My gaze was fixed on the candle on the table in front of us. Rainey had to have given it to him. It emitted much more than light. It emitted strength. We couldn’t rely on the energy from outsiders to fix our problems anymore. It was finite, and we had to become self-sufficient as a clan.

  I still didn’t think of myself as a part of any group, much less its leader.

  “I don’t want to feel normal.” Tristan flinched but he didn’t let go. “I don’t deserve normal. I killed the person who loved me more than myself. All those people out there, they’ll know.”

  “There’s no way they’ll know.” As vampires, we were above the law. “All they’ll know is you’re hungry and they’ll be more than happy to help you with that.”

  “She made me better.”

  I shook my head. “She didn’t. She made you think you needed her to survive. That you could survive without being true to yourself because doing some undefined right thing was better.” I pulled my hand away from his and jumped off the couch. My leg knocked against the table, and the flame on the candle wobbled. “And for you, for us, it’s not. You need to be you. Don’t fucking apologize to anyone, Tristan. You are a creature who thrives off sex and all those people out there”—I mimicked the sweeping motion he made minutes before when referring to the crowd —“lust after you because you are the flesh and blood version of their wildest dreams. You make sin look good.”

  Tristan scoffed. “You can say that because you have Rainey and Blade in your bed.”

  I crossed my arms and rolled my eyes. It was for my own satisfaction, since he probably couldn’t see it in the dim light. “You can borrow Blade if you want.”

  Now there was some hate sex I would pay top dollar to watch front row, center. Too bad it would never happen.

  “No, thanks.” A glint of white fang shone in the darkness. I was pretty sure he grinned, but it didn’t last long enough for confirmation. He leaned back against the cushion, his mouth a hard line. Tristan would rather punish himself than feel good. “I can’t go on without her.”

  “You can.” I sat again. I wanted to hug him, but it was impossibly awkward at this angle. He thought he had no one without Callie because he was right—no one had taken the time to talk him through this since she was gone. I made a vow to do better. Callie learned on the job, too. “Her spirit seeps out of your every pore. She’s here with you, haunting your ass. And you know what? She’s really pissed off right now because she sees you sitting in the dark, moping, instead of doing what she wants.”

  That got his attention. He turned to me, energy flashing in his eyes like a lightning storm. “What do you know about what Callie wanted?”

  “Because it was obvious.” I pushed him. “She wanted you to be happy. And she wanted you to be you. The guitar playing, drinking, fucking demon that tears it up in every facet of his life. She doesn’t want you to die a slow death because—”

  “I killed her,” he said, finishing my thought.

  “No. Callie trusted the wrong people. Rachel chewed her up and spit her out when she got what she wanted from her. It made her weak. It made us all weak. We’ve shown enough weakness for a lifetime. She and Gabriel put us at risk, and now there’s a bunch of vampires who will be lining up to take your place. But I’m not worried, because no one can ever take your place.”

  He smirked. “You have all the answers, don’t you?”

  “I don’t.” My plan was dangerously close to backfiring. Five thousand people depended on me to get his ass on that stage in T-minus thirty minutes. I had to make this quick, because I hadn’t even put my makeup on yet. “Did I ever tell you why I wanted to work with you? Because you’re my favorite. You’re the vampire who’s most true to himself. You don’t give a fuck about what anyone else thinks. You do you. Not doing that will kill you. I watched you almost commit suicide once. I won’t do it again, Tristan. I will be your biggest fucking cheerleader until you believe every word that comes out of my mouth. And then I’ll just say it louder, so the people in the cheap seats hear it, too.”

  He pulled me into his body and held me there. Hugs were awkward for him, too. It had nothing to do with the angle. The clan had been built on distrust, secrets, and lies, and Callie had taken over a shaky foundation. She never had a chance to right the ship, if that was her intention. But she didn’t have what I had: an angel keeping my ass in line.

  “You’re my favorite, too.” His grip tightened and he kissed my che
ek. His lips lingered on my skin, and he needed so much more than I could give him. “You might not have big shoes to fill, but we need a leader more than we ever did.”

  “I won’t let you down.” I gave him a quick peck on the cheek before I broke away from him. “But if I’m going to lead you on that stage, I have to get ready. You have no idea how long it takes to put on fake eyelashes.”

  “You don’t need that shit.”

  Tristan was still in there. “Right, because all anyone’s looking at is my tits,” I said.

  “It doesn’t suck.” He didn’t try to hide this smile. “But it’s your energy that draws everyone in.”

  It was contagious, and it warmed me. For the first time in a long time, I didn’t have to worry about my fire. But I understood how Tristan felt—like he wasn’t enough. “But you’re the one in their fantasies.”

  He grabbed my arm when I rose from the couch, not letting me go. “Thanks.”

  “I believe in you, Tristan.” Because when I looked at him, I saw me. “Now get ready to kick some ass.”

  Tonight’s show was different than the shows we put on before my accident. Before all hell broke loose with the band and the Realms.

  I had butterflies. The energy outside of Tristan’s dressing room was electric and he’d get swept up in it the minute he opened the door. This was what we fought so hard for. It made the struggle worth it because now we could appreciate what we created.

  I didn’t have to look at the face chart anymore to do my makeup, which gave me more time to admire Rainey in the reflection. She took no chances tonight—crystals surrounded the grimoire on the table. I’d forever be thankful we left the book in the car the night we found Rachel in our apartment. So much had been lost, but the history of the world according to Rainey—as I started to call it—had been spared.

  “Don’t overdo it with that stuff.” My mascara wand hovered in the mirror between us. I almost dropped it when I realized she was wearing sparkly fishnets. Just like the first opening of The Afterlife. We were getting a second chance to make things right.