The Worth Series: Complete Collection

by Lyra Evans

  Oliver swallowed hard, pulling a face he hoped indicated his dismissal of the idea, but his mind kept conjuring up images of Connor in various states of undress.

  “I just want to survive to actually close this case,” he said. “Besides, if I die, who will clear you of involvement?”

  “So you believe I’m innocent, then?”

  Oliver coughed a laugh. “Innocent? No. You’re clearly guilty of reckless driving. But I’m still on the fence about murder,” he said.

  Connor said nothing but slowed the car slightly. “I thought police were made of stronger stuff,” he said.

  “Not stronger than asphalt at 100 miles per hour,” Oliver muttered.

  They finally pulled into the driveway of a large manor house. Similar in design to the Carmichael estate, it was actually about half the size. Still, it could have eaten the whole of Oliver’s walk-up and had room left over for a duplex, he suspected. Grey stone walls made up the outside, with arched windows and a dark roof to detail. The entrance was flanked by two stone pillars, and the front door was carved of mahogany in the style of a cathedral. It was beautiful and stately and very much not a nightclub.

  Connor brought the car to a stop that only gave Oli the mildest whiplash and got out. Oliver peeled himself off the leather seat and climbed out, a pointed look on his face.

  “This is the Hunt club?” he asked, eyeing the building sideways. “A bit—different—in aesthetic, isn’t it?”

  Connor considered the house. “What kind of nightclubs are there in Nimueh’s Court? This, Detective, is what, in Logan’s Court, is considered a manor house. Mine, actually.”

  Oliver made a face. “I see that, Mr. Pierce, what I’d like to know is why we’re here. I thought we were going to see your man.”

  Connor began climbing the steps to the front door, leaving his obviously expensive car out in the snow. Oli glanced back at it, then quickly followed Connor up the steps.

  “Someone will take it inside,” he said by way of explanation. We’re here because it’s ridiculously early to go to a club. No one would be there. Or have you never frequented a nightclub in the past?” He shot Oli a look and smirked. “Doubtful.” He reached for the heavy knob and pushed open the massive entry door. Inside was a polished marble floor and a spacious entry hall. “Also I believe I asked you to call me Connor.”

  Oliver didn’t answer, his attention instead on his surroundings. Taking in everything he could about Connor’s home, he kicked snow off his boots and stepped inside. The walls were painted in a warm, subtle yellow, complementing the warm wood staircase to the left. There were paintings and photographs hung on the walls, but an absence of portraits as there had been at the Carmichael Estate.

  Slipping off his boots, coat, and scarf, Oliver looked up at the glittering chandelier. Hundreds of twinkling lights were suspended mid-air by finely wrought silver stems, giving the fixture the look of frost on a branch. Further down the hall was a large open doorway to what could only be a sitting room. The hearth on the far wall was just visible from where Oliver stood, but he’d already seen it. It was the same one that featured in the half-clothed photo on Connor’s company site.

  “I’ll take that,” Connor offered, holding out a hand for Oli’s coat and scarf. Oliver stared at him a moment, quickly taking stock of what might be in the coat that he could need in a pinch. “I’ll give it back,” Connor said after a moment, one eyebrow arched. “I just mean to hang it up.”

  Realizing there was nothing in his coat, Oliver sheepishly handed it over to Connor, who promptly hung it in the closet.

  “I’ll keep my bag with me,” he said.

  “I expect so,” Connor answered. “You never know when you might need those silver bullets or those quartz-lined gloves.” Oliver tensed, but when Connor turned back there was no accusation in his face. He was still playing. “I would hardly expect a police officer on duty to come into Logan’s Court completely unarmed.”

  Oliver’s hand tightened on the strap of his bag, but a pang of guilt made him pull it off his shoulder and set it on the ground. “Can’t be too careful,” he said. “But I also have no intention of starting an inter-kingdom incident without need.”

  Connor’s eyes went to the bag and back to Oliver. “Anticipating a need for an inter-kingdom incident?” Oliver said nothing, and Connor made his way down the hall. Oliver expected to go to the sitting room, but Connor began to climb the stairs instead. Oliver followed until the base of the stairs, then hovered there as Connor climbed.

  Halfway up, Connor stopped and looked down. “Do you plan to stay in the entrance until we leave?”

  “I’d like to know what we’re doing here,” he said, cheeks hot. “Why take me to your home? How does this help your case or mine?”

  One hand on the railing, Connor shook his head. He seemed larger than life, hovering on the stairs, beckoning Oliver up, lit by the frosted branch chandelier. He was breathtaking. In any other situation, Oliver would have been on him by now. He would have flirted, pressed in close, asked to be brought to Connor’s home. He would have pulled Connor up against him the moment they were inside the door, pressing his own back into the wall as he explored all of Connor’s body.

  But this wasn’t any other time. This was a murder investigation, and Connor was a suspect, however little Oliver wanted him to be one. A Wolf tore Eloise Carmichael apart, and someone would have to pay for that crime. So until he caught the guilty party, Oliver would have to push his feelings, his yearning aside and focus on the case.

  “You agreed to do what I say,” Connor reminded him, his voice silky, full of a tinkling kind of pleasure. “Are you backing out?”

  Oliver frowned. “No. But you haven’t actually told me anything yet.”

  Connor stepped back down the stairs, stopping on the last. He looked down at Oliver, but without condescension. At over a foot above Oliver’s head, Connor seemed insurmountable while inviting Oliver to do just that. The smell of him, so close, his chest directly at Oliver’s eye-level, was like inhaling desire. Hot and musky and cut with a lightness like starlight.

  “Fair enough,” Connor said. “You have to change. Your clothes aren’t anywhere near appropriate for Hunt. And they reek of Nimueh’s Court, of the police department.”

  Oliver pulled a face, offended. “They do not. These are newly washed. I didn’t even stop by the precinct on the way here. No way you can smell that.”

  Connor’s blue eyes sparkled with the challenge. “I can smell everything on you,” he breathed, leaning down so he was less than an inch from Oliver’s face. He took a long, slow breath, and Oliver felt himself lifting up in the motion of the air, trying to follow it, to be closer still to Connor.

  To mask the involuntary movement, Oliver stood on tiptop and brought his mouth close to Connor’s ear. He whispered, “prove it.”

  A smile curled Connor’s lips. “The precinct smells of burnt coffee, reused coffee grounds, and the spark of wasted magic. Not the kind used for no reason, but the residual smell of magic improperly funneled through government-issue gemstones. Quartz has a tang, a sharpness to the smell. It’s effective for weaponized spells, but it loses energy, making it unreliable for endurance, which is why everything that comes into a police precinct in Nimueh’s Court smells of lost magic.” He took a breath in, and Oliver’s mind darted back to the quartz-lined gloves in his bag. He’d never thought of the endurance of quartz before, but Connor was right. Long-term spells were almost impossible with quartz.

  “You wore these clothes about a week ago to work, which is why the smell is faint, covered mostly by the standard brand detergent you use. Twilight Forest is what they call that ‘flavour,’ but it doesn’t smell at all like a forest at twilight. This is sweet, more spiced with cinnamon and undercut with starch.”

  His clothing suddenly itchy, Oliver fought not to wriggle beneath Connor’s gaze. “Sure,” he said. “But most of that could be guesswork. Hardly everything, is it?”

  Con
nor licked his lips, his pupils dilating as he studied Oliver. “I meant what I said. I smell everything. I can smell the soap you used in the shower this morning, the shampoo at the bottom of the bottle—you ran out today. I can smell the spearmint toothpaste and the cologne you use when you don’t have time to shower. It smells like your soap, so no Wizard would be able to tell the difference, but I can. It masks the smell of you, rather than enhance it. You missed a spot on your neck when you showered—the cologne is still there.”

  Oliver shivered. Connor took a step forward, off the stairs, and forced Oliver to step back or let Connor press against him.

  “I can smell the muffin you ate for breakfast and the coffee you drank late last night. I can smell the Carmichael Manor clinging to the pores of you. Eloise smelled the same way when she came. Pot pourri and crisp linens and just the slightest hint of dust. It smells of old money and no accountability. Worse than all that, you smell of death. The cloying, persistent stench of decay, the iron oxide of blood, the bile and fluids, and the way every smell is crisper against snow. I know you were at the crime scene, and it clings to you still.” Connor advanced still, and Oliver moved backward until he couldn’t move back anymore. His back to the wall, he was pinned in exactly the way he might have wanted to be—another time. But now, with Connor stripping him bare with only scent, he felt much less in control. “And I know you’re gay because I can smell him on you. I can smell the man you left the club with, the man you let inside you, the man you wanted to fuck you hard who couldn’t quite manage as well as you’d hoped. I can smell his desperation on you, even a day and a half later.” Here Connor leaned in, one hand pressed to the wall on either side of Oliver’s head. Into Oliver’s ear he breathed, “I can smell it, and so will they.”

  His body wrought like a tension wire, Oliver reacted before he could stop himself. He slammed his palm into Connor’s chest, pushing him back to give himself space. He was heaving, anger ravaging his judgment. When he looked Connor in the face, he saw anger there too, but it was almost immediately clouded. Disappearing behind a smug look, the anger was confusing for Oliver. He breathed deliberately, trying to slow his racing heart, and found his calm.

  “You made your point,” he said to Connor. “The Wolves at the club will smell right through me. So tell me what to do.”

  Chapter 8

  Connor led Oli up the stairs. The wooden staircase barely exhaled beneath his footsteps, as though it was used to more weight than Oli put on it. Ahead of him, Connor’s tall frame pushed onward and upward. There was a sway in his shoulders, a curve to his spine, and every motion spoke of power and comfort in that. The details of the manor, the paintings and artwork, the lush carpet and marble tiles, the solid wood finishes and antique furniture—all of these things spoke to Connor’s status. He was an Alpha in Logan’s Court, head of one of the core packs that made up Logan’s people, but Oli hadn’t been aware of just what that meant.

  Connor was old money, clearly born into a family with power and influence. The manor, the car, the way Connor claimed the air around him when he spoke—all indicators of his upbringing. With every step upward, Oli felt the stark difference between them ever more. Oli was barely middle class; his family had been comfortable but not wealthy. And now they were gone, and Oli was alone. He had inherited little, just enough to get by. No properties or titles. All he got from his parents was their magic, really. Powerful enough, certainly, but he was hardly the only powerful wizard in Nimueh’s Court.

  At the landing of the third floor, Connor turned down a hallway, and Oli paused at the top step. The ceilings were vaulted, arched and decorated with finely carved wood. Roses and vines, thorns and knotwork. Oli swallowed hard. He didn’t belong here, with this veritable prince of Logan’s Court. Oliver never let himself get intimidated by anyone, and it wasn’t Connor himself that intimidated him now. It was the house, the centuries of history he could feel in every splinter of wood. It was the knowing that everything around him was out of his grasp.

  He felt small, for a moment, standing in the hallway of the third floor, and Oliver hated himself for feeling that way.

  Connor reappeared, having noticed Oli was no longer behind him. He stood a few feet away, one eyebrow arched, his blue eyes searching Oliver’s face.

  “Taking in the view?” he asked, and Oliver thought he meant to sound playful. He didn’t quite manage.

  “Let’s say I do what you say,” Oliver said, slowly forcing out the words. “How do I know this isn’t an elaborate scheme to trap me? To put me in a situation where I look like I’ve compromised myself. If I’m caught playing your consort, who’s to say I’m playing? And if you are the killer, then I can’t arrest you. No one would believe me. How do I know this will even work?”

  Connor, arms crossed over his chest, rubbed at the side of his face with his thumb, eyes closed. “I’m some criminal mastermind,” he said. “You give me too much credit.”

  “This isn’t a joke,” Oliver said. Connor sighed and looked evenly at him. His lips parted, moving as though to speak, but he didn’t right away.

  He finally said, “I’m an Alpha of Logan’s Court. It is my responsibility to protect the reputation of my people, as well as defend the Treaty my ancestors fought for centuries to win. I will do everything in my power to make clear our innocence in this matter.”

  Eyes narrowed, Oliver shook his head, taking a step toward Connor. He wanted to crowd him in, the way Connor had done at the base of the stairs. Oliver pressed him into the wall, refusing to give an inch, and Connor let himself be pinned. Oliver had the distinct impression he enjoyed it, but Oli ignored that.

  “That’s the party line, I’m sure,” he said, his lips only inches from Connor’s. “But what’s really in it for you? Why are you helping me?” Again, Connor didn’t answer right away. He hovered in the tight space between Oliver and the wall, breathing in slowly. His gaze never left Oliver’s, never wavered once.

  When he did answer, he spoke with a quiet kind of fire that Oliver hadn’t seen in many years. No one burned with that kind of heat—not for Oliver. “I am not a murderer.” His words were barely a whisper but raw with meaning. “And I will do everything in my power to prove that to you.”

  A spark and a flash inside Oliver’s chest, and he found he couldn’t breathe. His expression unchanging, Oliver waited a beat, then took a step back and let Connor free. “We’ll see,” he said and nodded back down the hall.

  Connor lifted himself off the wall and led Oliver around a corner and down another hall. At the end was a large wooden door. Connor led Oliver inside, but it wasn’t at all what Oliver expected. It was a bedroom.

  The four-poster bed on the far wall was flanked by two floor-to-ceiling windows. The heavy curtains partially drawn, light filtered selectively into the room, illuminating the deep green duvet and pillows. To the right was another set of doors. One was open and led to an en-suite bathroom, by the look of the pale tiles of the flooring. The second was closed, but Oliver assumed it must be a closet of some kind.

  Stepping further into the room, Oliver noticed several full-length mirrors, a changing screen, and antique wooden dressers. The small chandelier in the room was an echo of the larger one in the entrance—so delicately wrought in silver and glass, it looked more as though frost had formed on thin air and hung frozen in time.

  Connor began unbuttoning his shirt, and Oliver felt his neck get hot.

  “What exactly are you doing?” he asked, his voice hoarse. To Oliver’s frustration, Connor was smirking.

  “I’m removing my shirt,” he said, as though it was plainly obvious. Which it was. Oliver rolled his eyes.

  “How does this help me prepare for tonight?” he asked, watching Connor despite himself. Connor pulled off his shirt and tossed it aside, revealing the smooth expanse of his back. Oliver let his eyes rove over the corded muscle of Connor’s back, down the slope of his spine to the small of his back, just above the waist of his pants. His throat was dry.<
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  “You smell,” Connor said, and Oliver coughed, glaring. Connor’s smirk grew, and he sat back on the bed. It gave under his weight, just slightly, as though welcoming him home. Oliver stood motionless in the doorway. “You smell of Nimueh’s Court. We need to fix that.”

  Oliver’s eyes travelled to the bathroom for a moment, desperate to look anywhere but Connor’s naked chest. “So I’ll just shower again or—”

  “In time,” Connor said. “But it won’t be enough to do that. You can’t just purge the smell of your Court from your body. You need something to replace it with.” Oliver looked back at Connor only to regret it. He was sprawled in the middle of the bed, his flat, perfect chest heaving as he breathed. His blond hair was slightly ruffled by the pillows behind him, making him look slightly mussed. The smirk on his lips was begging for something. “You need to smell like me. And I need to smell like you”

  Straightening abruptly, pushing all the inappropriate images out of his head, Oliver shook his head. “This is ridiculous,” he said. “I don’t have time for games—”

  “You’ve got hours, actually,” Connor said. “The absolute soonest we can go to continue your investigation. And like I said, if you want answers, you’ll need to do what I say. So take off your shirt and join me.”

  Oliver stared, his mind going momentarily blank. A rush of blood, and he absolutely wanted to do what Connor said. Only a small part of his brain fought to remain rational in the face of Connor’s beautiful body. It was absurd, really, but he was at Connor’s mercy. Out of his element, surrounded by potential enemies, Connor was the only one offering to help. And Oliver needed help, despite himself. He needed to solve this case, and fighting Logan’s Court would be far more difficult and damaging than cooperating with Connor.