by AJ Merlin
I’d have to wait until our visit to Johanna, and figure out what to do afterward. Hopefully, seeing her with Nathaniel would yield some answers.
Before that, I’d go see the Troublesome Trio. Both to fill them in, and because I missed them.
Chapter 6
I hesitated, worrying my lip between my teeth as I stared at the tarot cards in front of me that had been split into three smaller decks. It wasn’t usually this hard to focus on a reading.
My mind had been chaotic while I’d been shuffling and dividing, which wouldn’t help me in a true reading. It was focus time, I told myself as I shook out my shoulders to ease the tension.
What will help me? I turned over the top card of the first deck, resting the large, slick card face up on top of its fellows.
The Queen of Wands starred impassively up at me. She was cloaked in cloth-of-gold that shimmered, and her hand rested on the head of a large, black cat.
Courage. Determination. Independence. But wasn’t that the easy answer? Surely those helped everyone in most situations.
I wasn’t convinced I’d done such a good job focusing on the questions for the three-card spread. Summoner I might be, I couldn’t just throw my deck around with reckless abandon and expect it to create a breadcrumb trail to a prosperous future.
Which, admittedly, made a damned amusing image in my head.
What will hinder me? I flipped the second card quickly and set it back down on the mini deck.
It was the Moon.
I’d never felt so insulted by a card in my life, frankly. The jawbone seemed to tingle against my throat, and I couldn’t help but reach up to run my fingers along it.
When it wasn’t trying to say something about my current lack of control, the moon represented illusion, fear, and intuition. Currently, I couldn’t make up my mind on whether my magic was being cheeky, or this really was the reading.
What is my unrealized potential? Apart from insulting myself with my magic, of course. I flipped the last card over with a brush of magic instead of my hand.
The Three of Pentacles sat there, its two figures working in harmony under the stained glass window that held the pentacles themselves. Upright, the card signified teamwork, learning, and collaboration. A pretty obvious strength, in my opinion.
My Three of Pentacles was upside down.
In this orientation, the card stood for disharmony, misalignment, and working alone.
“I wonder if you’ve misunderstood, my friends,” I sighed, drawing the deck back into my hand and sliding it into its box. “Maybe I’m just too mixed up today to read for myself.”
I didn’t know what other possibility there was. I’d never gotten this combination of cards, for one, and everything seemed so erratic. Perhaps I had gone into the reading with some preconceived notions, a big no-no, but still. If I didn’t know better, I’d think my cards were trying to throw me for a loop.
It was not comforting. Neither was the small, very minute possibility that I wasn’t out of my mind, and my reading had been exactly what it was supposed to be.
I didn’t need any more puzzles in my life right now.
My phone vibrated from the table, but I ignored it in favor of staring out the window over the kitchen sink. From this angle, I could only see part of a neighbor’s roof, but it was enough to hold my attention.
Two white birds hopped along it, dipping and bowing to each other as they moved.
My phone vibrated again, and I snaked a hand out to grab it.
Dragging my absent gaze down to the screen, I couldn’t help the small, half-smile that curled over my lips when I saw Indra’s name on the text.
Are you coming over? Akiva won’t say it, but he’s been debating on calling you to see if you still wanted to.
Yeah, I’ll leave in a minute, I replied. You want tea?
I had every intention of stopping by the nearest coffee shop and getting myself very hot and very sweet tea.
Would love it. Just get me whatever you get.
My smile grew just a touch wider. Warn your dentist.
Parallel parking had never been my strong suit, but coming to the Troublesome Trio’s house had made getting better at it a necessity.
I eased my SUV along the curb behind some old silver car, squinting at what I hoped was still space between my vehicle and their bumper.
“Goddess, take the wheel,” I mumbled, easing up just a touch more and throwing the SUV into park. I hadn’t hit anything. Good for me.
When the street was empty, I jumped out of my SUV, both plastic cups in my hands as I jogged across the residential street and up the few stairs that lead me to the trio’s porch.
The house was nice, and I’d gotten a few more chances to appreciate the place they’d bought when Cian swept into town and became vampire king in the last few weeks.
With three floors, four bedrooms, and a shower that could fit a small militia, I was sometimes tempted to lie about our own water situation just so I could come over and lock myself in the bedroom with the ensuite Jacuzzi.
Not that I ever would, of course.
For the first time, the neighbors were outside at the same moment that I was walking up the stairs. Two elderly ladies sat on the porch to my left, both in rocking chairs.
I smiled. “Good morning.” It was barely still morning, at eleven thirty, but it still counted. Besides, I was all but nocturnal anyway. Anything before six pm was morning.
The younger woman beamed at me. “Good morning, dear,” she said. “I don’t believe I’ve seen you before.”
“Just another of that parade those boys have coming and going,” the older, thinner woman remarked snidely.
“Parade?” I couldn’t help but ask.
“Oh yes!” Now that I’d given her an opening, the woman leaned forward on her rocker with a bright gleam in her eye. She reminded me uncomfortably of Nathaniel’s mother. “At all hours! Day and night. You know what I’m talking about?”
“I do not,” I said, hearing movement from inside the house in front of me.
“She’s not part of that crowd, clearly,” the other woman agreed. “Look at her. Too clean cut. Even with that pink in her hair.”
The pink I still needed to touch up or cut out.
I kept the polite smile affixed to my face.
“Well. You do look much nicer than the rest of those people,” the lady sneered. “You know what I think?”
Akiva was on the other side of the door. I could smell him. Not to mention to my ears, his snickering was not quite as muffled as he might think.
“What’s that?” I asked politely.
“Whores,” the woman announced, just like that, to anyone that might hear.
I couldn’t help it. My mouth fell open slightly, and my mind blanked. “…What?” I was sure I’d heard her wrong.
“Those three in there? Whores. I’ve seen ‘em kissin’ on each other.” The woman nodded sagely. Even her companion nodded along like she was discussing the weather.
“I think they hold sex parties here,” she went on. “We hear all manner of howling during the night. You’d do well to stay away from them, dear. Wouldn’t want them corrupting you over to their bad way of thinking.”
Akiva laughed so loudly I was sure the old ladies had heard him.
“I’ll try really hard to remember that,” I said, unsure of what else to respond with. “I hope you both have a lovely morning.” I smacked the door so Akiva would let me in.
“You’re not going in, are you?” The older woman seemed horrified. “I thought you were just one of those delivery drivers.”
“No,” I sighed as the door finally creaked open and Akiva poked his head out to wave jovially at the two women. “Unfortunately, I come here a lot. And go inside. A lot.” I gave them my best forlorn expression and allowed Akiva to pull me inside.
“We’ll be lucky if they don’t call the cops, ya amar,” Akiva murmured in his rich accent, a wicked grin curving over his full lips.
“Akiva please, without Indra in the room, how will I know how you’re so sweetly insulting me this time?” I huffed, batting my eyelashes at him.
He scoffed. “You could ask me very nicely, and perhaps I might tell you.”
“He wasn’t insulting you today.” Indra breezed into the room, hand held out for his cup that I surrendered gladly. “He was calling you the moon.”
At my sudden look downward and tightened grip on my own cup, ever observant Indra paused. “Is that actually an insult, and I didn’t know?”
“No,” I sighed, pushing Akiva away when he tried to take my other cup. “On second thought, here you go, buddy.” I held it out to the lich, who paused.
“Why? Normally you’re very possessive over your drink,” he asked.
“Can’t I be nice? I’ll share, Akiva. Really.”
“Mhmm.” He plucked the cup from my fingers and took a drink.
Immediately his face morphed to a sneer of disgust. The lich thrust the cup back into my hand, still making a face as he swallowed the overly sweetened green tea. “That’s disgusting,” he announced. “How much sugar is in that?”
“I thought you liked sugary things. You have enough Lucky Charms in the cabinet to feed the city for a week.”
“Not like that,” he shuddered, his hazel-green eyes narrowing. “I didn’t mean to insult you.”
“It’s not an insult,” I repeated dismissively, taking the moment to really look at Akiva.
Honestly, appreciating all three of them was one of my favorite activities. Right now, both men were wearing clothes, which was not my preferred amount of dress for them, but I knew what they looked like without. I could suffer for now.
Both of them looked properly equipped to spend all day doing nothing. Indra wore black sweatpants that fit close to his legs and a dark grey t-shirt. Akiva was dressed similarly in dark, loose sweatpants of his own and a red long-sleeved shirt that he’d pushed back the sleeves of.
I was glad I’d resisted the urge to put on jeans and had arrived instead in an oversized t-shirt and running shorts.
“Where’s Cian?” I asked as Akiva made another face at my cup. I could have adjusted my wolf ears and listened for him, but that seemed rude to do in his own house.
“Sleeping,” Indra replied, gesturing for me to follow him off the threshold. “You can play watchdog today if you want, Akiva. The old lady’s got the phone out,” he informed the lich.
“She always has her stupid phone out so she can threaten to call the cops on us,” Akiva mumbled. “Perhaps we could give her something to call about?” He batted his eyes at us teasingly.
I rolled my eyes at him and settled onto the couch next to Indra with my knees curled up in front of me. “Do it with yourself,” I replied. “We’re drinking tea.”
Indra lifted his cup in a mock toast and nodded in agreement.
“You act like stuffy old zombies when you have tea,” Akiva said, putting both hands on his slim hips. I wasn’t quite sure what zombies acted like, apart from the shambling, but only raised a brow at the insult.
“Perish the thought,” Indra denied. “We would never encroach on your territory, my love.”
“You’re only talking to me like this because you outnumber me,” the lich accused. “If Cian were awake, you wouldn’t dare.”
“Oh, he looks serious, Indra,” I said, leaning over to murmur conspiratorially in the hellhound’s furry black ear.
“Clearly, we’ve gone too far,” he agreed solemnly. “We have only one option left.”
“Oh? What’s that?”
“We tie him up.”
Akiva’s face morphed to poorly disguised amusement. “A truly heinous punishment,” he said. “Perhaps you will gag me too, so I cannot call for our adoring vampire?”
“Surely.” Indra got to his feet. “You can stay here, George. I’m going to get the rope.” He meandered out of the room, still sipping his tea.
The rope? We were tying Akiva up? I couldn’t suppress the excited shiver that went down my spine.
“Why’s Cian sleeping?” I asked when I could barely see Indra. The hellhound had opened a hall closet and was rummaging around intently.
“Hmm?” Akiva sat down beside me on the sofa and shifted so he could sit cross-legged on the wide cushion. “He is tired,” the lich said after a moment. “There is a lot of energy involved in being a new vampire king. He’s had two attempts on his life this week.”
An unpleasant chill went down my spine. “What?” Akiva watched my face as I spoke, as if keenly interested in my response. “Why didn’t you tell me? I could help–“
“No,” he admonished. “Even we cannot help in some things vampire.”
“They tolerate us, to an extent.” Indra came back into the room with coils of red rope and a pair of scissors that he laid on the end table. “Me, because they think I’m his pet. Akiva, because he’s like a…distant cousin, you could say.”
I still wanted to help. Even if they didn’t need or want it, it was in my nature to worry.
“Do the vampires here not like him?” I took the rope he handed me, surprised at the soft, satin-like feel of it.
“Vampires tend to not tolerate change well, as a general rule,” Akiva shrugged. “It comes from being so long lived, I should think.”
“So we’re tying you up with this?” I asked, unsure what else to say on the topic of Cian. I wanted to help, but I also didn’t want to stick my nose in where it wasn’t at all wanted.
“Unless you have secret rigging lessons I am not aware of, Indra will be doing the tying,” Akiva informed me, plucking the rope from my hands. “I see you brought the fancy stuff.”
“We have company,” Indra shrugged, finishing off his tea with a wink at me. “I thought she’d appreciate the way it looks against your skin.” He walked to Akiva’s end of the sofa and leaned down, pressing his lips to the lich’s. “Love you.”
Akiva’s smile was warm and completely genuine. “I love you too.”
When they kissed, it was sweet. Not hot, like most of our kisses were, or lust-filled. Just…sweet.
A thought occurred to me that I stuffed very far down in my brain until it was buried.
I was jealous.
Not of them specifically. They’d been together for years and years, I knew. I did not begrudge them that, and I myself had no ambitions towards monogamy. But I’d never had someone to look at me like that and say they loved me the way that these two had.
The only people who had ever told me they’d loved me were my family members. Aveline liked to screech the words as she ran out of the house with wet hair and possibly having ‘borrowed’ something of mine to wear, but that was quite obviously not the same.
What was it like, to mean so much to another person and know without a doubt that your feelings were reciprocated with no reservations?
Blinking, I found that both men were staring at me, and I could feel the blush rising to my face.
“What?” asked Akiva, suspicion written in his expression.
“Nothing,” I denied. “I was just thinking.”
“About what?” he pressed.
I spoke without giving it much thought, intent on keeping my true feelings hidden. “About–well about all the things that can be done to you after you’re all tied up.”
“Honestly, George,” the lich sighed with a shake of his head. “You have such a dirty mind. Can’t I kiss my love without your thoughts going straight to the gutter?”
“No,” I said forlornly, widening my eyes so I could give him my best puppy-dog expression. “I suppose you can’t.”
Chapter 7
I didn’t have the heart to tell Indra I didn’t understand much of what he was explaining.
After covering the laugh at my words, he’d ordered Akiva to strip down to his boxers, which the lich did without complaint. I certainly wasn’t complaining either.
Immaturely, he threw his shirt at my face. I caught it unerring
ly and threw it to hang on the stair railing.
“Don’t be a child,” I admonished, trying to stifle my own amusement. “Aren’t you the oldest one here? Act like it.”
“Sit on the floor,” Indra told him, prodding him with two fingers to get his attention. “So I can show George what I’m doing.”
He’d done that willingly too, and I couldn’t help but consider what a nice bottom he’d make.
It was definitely on my bucket list to see him get dominated thoroughly by Cian, instead of just the bit of play they’d done at the club.
Once he was sitting and I’d joined them on the white carpet, Indra had proceeded to explain to me the steps he was taking as his hands moved quickly on the rope and Akiva’s arms. Before I knew it, the lich had both his arms bound behind him, with the ropes forming interconnected knots that ultimately looped around his throat and pulled his back straight.
He’d been right; the red rope was very pretty on Akiva’s dark olive skin.
“Do you want to try?” invited Indra. “I’ll untie him and walk you through it, if you’d like.”
I wasn’t sure how to say that to him, he’d just worked some inconceivable magic on Akiva that I had no chance of replicating.
Clearly, it was time to go home and thoroughly research rigging and different ties.
“I’ll watch you….do it again?” I offered from where I sat beside the hellhound. “I’m just not so sure where to start.”
Akiva craned backward on the white carpet as far as his arms would allow to stare up at me with his long-lashed eyes.
I flicked his forehead.
“Weren’t we going to gag him?” I added, before either of them could speak. “I could do that. It was going to be my favorite part.”
“If you’re worried about me yelling for Cian’s help in subduing the both of you and heroically rescuing me, you’re a bit late,” the lich informed me. “He’s already awake.”
