Chapter 14
Leo was grumbling as
he came through the door. “Damned snow. I wish it would give it a
rest.” He looked up and saw Rhiannon entering the kitchen, with
Kaylin and Chatter right behind her, and the frown turned into a
smile as his face lit up. “Hey, honey, I’m home!”
As he enfolded her in
his arms for a long kiss, I hoped to hell that I wasn’t going to be
a wedge between them. I also hoped that Peyton was wrong about
Leo—and that my own secret suspicions were off.
I sliced the pizza
and slid the pie on the table while Peyton poured drinks all the
way around and set out the pudding and cookies. Kaylin and Chatter
slid into their places and I stared at Kaylin, wondering what he’d
say. He’d been against my dreamwalking with him the first time, but
a lot had happened since then. He glanced up to meet my gaze,
unblinking. A dark smile fell across his lips as he lifted his beer
and slowly saluted me with it.
As we all fell to
eating, I glanced over at Rhiannon. She nodded. No time like the
present. I leaned back and licked the melted cheese off my
fingers.
“Guys, I need to talk
to you about something. I need your help.”
“Peyton and I have
already agreed to help her in this, and we’re not changing our
minds, so I suggest you think twice about turning her down.”
Rhiannon swallowed her pizza and blinked. “Kaylin, we especially
need your help.”
“Why do I think I’m
not going to like this?” Leo frowned, pushing his food around on
his plate.
“Because you feel
it’s your duty to protect us even when it’s not. But we’re here to
help each other, and no single one of us is strong enough to
protect the others.” Rhia gave him a playful kiss, but he scowled
at her.
“What’s up? I can
feel something coming.” He reached for another slice of
pizza.
I took a deep breath.
“I’m planning something. I need your help, Kaylin, but if you
aren’t comfortable then I’ll find another way. No matter what, I’m
going through with this.” In a rush, I spilled out, “I’m going to
steal some of the antidote and give it to Grieve.”
Leo choked on his
pizza, coughing so loud I thought we were going to have to thump
him on the back. I glanced over at Kaylin, who raised his eyebrows
but didn’t say a word. Chatter looked at me like I was
crazy.
After a moment, Leo
pushed his plate back and stood up. “This is insane. You’re going
to get all of us killed.”
“I’m not asking
you to help. I’m not asking Rhia and
Peyton to go in with me. I’m just asking you to keep your mouth
shut about it. As far as you’re concerned, you don’t know
anything.”
“If Geoffrey finds
out that I’m keeping this quiet, he’ll rip my throat out—and yours,
too!” Leo slammed his hand on the table. “You can’t do this! I know
you’re hot for Grieve, but face the fucking facts: He belongs to
Myst now. You lost him, he’s gone. Buh-bye!”
I slid out of my
chair, staring at him, unable to believe the extent of his anger.
Leo seemed mild-mannered on the surface, but he’d shown a nasty
temper more than once now.
“Excuse me, but you
don’t own this house and you don’t own me. You’re not my brother or
my keeper. Grieve means more to me than you can ever comprehend. If
you can’t accept the fact that he and I have been bound for
lifetimes, then you never will.”
“We don’t always get
what we want.” He turned a cold eye at Chatter, then back at me.
“We don’t always get who we
want.”
He was jealous.
Chatter had a crush on my cousin, and Leo knew it, so he was taking
it out on all of the Cambyra Fae.
“You’re
threatened—Grieve and Chatter threaten you!” I shoved my finger
against Leo’s chest. “Grieve scares the hell out of you and you’d
do anything to keep him out of my life. And Chatter—you don’t want
him near Rhiannon.”
“Fuck that! I’m not
scared of some freakshow Fae. What I am scared of is having a
member of the Indigo Court under the same roof as me. A member of
the race that killed my sister. That killed my fiancée’s mother.
Your aunt, might I remind you! And I
take my job for Geoffrey seriously. I owe him—”
“You owe him what?”
Rhiannon turned on him. “A paycheck? He’s one of the vampires, Leo. I don’t mind you working for them,
but I’ll never trust them.”
“At least the
vampires keep their word—”
“Yeah, right. And
they use every trick in the book on us. Look at the contract I
signed with them.” I waved my hand, accidentally knocking over my
juice. I ignored it as it trickled across the table. “Lannan’s not
going to keep his word—he’d love a chance to humiliate me,
especially now. You think they have respect for you just because
you play toady for them?”
“Don’t you ever call
me that again!” Leo knocked his chair over as he backhanded me
across the face.
I reacted instantly,
kicking him in the stomach and knocking the wind out of him. “You
ever touch me again like that and I’ll
make you wish you hadn’t.”
His eyes wide, Leo
slid to the floor. “I’m sorry . . . I didn’t mean to hit you . .
.”
“Bullshit. You knew
what you were doing.” I rubbed my cheek. “And for your fucking
information, dude, I’ve been thinking about alternative places
where I can keep Grieve. I value my cousin and Kaylin too much to
chance having him in the house with them. You—I’m not so sure about right now.”
Rhiannon stared at
him, horrified. “I can’t believe you just did that. I thought I
knew you.”
“Please, don’t look
at me like that. Honey—sweetie . . . I didn’t mean to hurt her.”
Tears in his eyes, he turned a dark gaze on me. “Geoffrey
does respect me. And since that seems
to be all the respect I get around here, then maybe I should move
back to my apartment. Rhiannon, come with me. Get the fuck out of
this place and cut your losses.”
She shook her head,
slowly backing up from his outstretched hand. “Leo, what the hell
are you doing? I know you’re upset, but nobody touches a woman like
that in this house. Cicely, are you okay?”
I nodded. My jaw was
sore, but he’d grazed me rather than hit spot on. “Yeah, I’m all
right.”
Leo stared at the
table. After a moment, he said, “I can’t excuse myself. I can’t
take it back, but Cicely, please. I didn’t intend to hit you. I
don’t know what I thought . . .”
“You’d better leave—”
Rhiannon started to say, but I stopped her.
“No,” I said, moving
between her and him. I faced him down. “There’s nothing more I’d
like to do than throttle you, Leo, but we can’t afford to divide
up. Myst would come after you in a heartbeat. Not only are you a
day-runner for the vamps, but she assumes you’re a friend of mine.
I’m no longer sure she’s right, but you’re a sitting duck. However,
understand this: I will rescue Grieve if there’s any chance of
doing so. You’re going to have to get over your fear and learn to
accept it.”
He smoldered but then
ducked his head and nodded. “I don’t like it. And I won’t pretend
to.”
“You don’t have to.
You just have to stay alive, and your best chances of doing that
are while you’re here. Got it?”
Rhiannon was staring
at him, arms crossed. After a moment, she turned away. “So, Kaylin,
after all this, are you going to help us?”
Kaylin let out a
quiet snort. “Whatever you like.”
I turned back to him,
searching his face. The old Kaylin would have objected, but he
seemed blasé about the whole matter. Everything felt like we’d been
shifted onto quicksand; the landscape was changing even as we
walked through it. “Thanks.”
“No problem.” He
reached out and slid another piece of pizza onto his plate. “You
might want to wash the blood off your face.”
I reached up. Where
Leo had hit me, a trickle of blood trailed down my cheek. Without a
word, I headed to the bathroom. He’d been wearing a ring that had
grazed my cheek, slicing a thin weal down the side. As I washed it
off and slathered it with antibiotic ointment, I wondered if Myst
was going to sit back and watch us tear ourselves apart before she
even had a chance.
As I returned to the
kitchen, Leo was talking in quiet whispers with Rhiannon, who was
shaking her head. After a few minutes, he grabbed his coat and slid
into it.
“I’ve got work to
do.”
“Are you going to
tell Geoffrey?” I turned to him. “Tell me the truth.”
After a long pause,
Leo shrugged. “Not right now. No, I won’t. But you’re being a fool.
And I don’t want any part of it.” And with that, he headed toward
the door, but before he could get there, his phone rang. He
answered, listened for a moment, then flipped it shut.
“Shit, we have
problems.” He glanced out the window. “It’s almost dusk but not
quite enough for Geoffrey’s people to come out.”
“What’s going
on?”
“Vampiric Fae,
spotted heading into the parking lot at Anadey’s Diner. Probably
light-crazed.”
“Mother!” Peyton
grabbed her coat and I was right behind her.
Without another word,
we headed out into the growing dusk.
I floored it and we
swerved into the parking lot of the diner. The door was ajar and
there was a ruckus coming from inside. I pulled out my fan as
Peyton raced to the side, transforming into her cougar self even as
she ran.
Leo reached into the
pocket of his trench and I let out a sharp breath as he pulled out
a Beretta . . . by the look of it, an M92. Dane—my mother’s
boyfriend—had showed me his collection when we lived with him, and
I’d soaked up all the knowledge I could about guns from
him.
Slapping in a
high-capacity magazine, he cocked the gun in wait. Whether bullets
would work against the Indigo Court, I didn’t know, but the fact
that he owned one and hadn’t told us caught me by
surprise.
As we neared the
entrance, screams echoed into the evening air. Kaylin rushed
through and I followed.
The diner was a
bloody mess. Four of the Shadow Hunters were enough to take on a
diner full of people. One of the Lupa Clan was in a fight for his
life with one of the Vampiric Fae, rolling on the floor trying to
push the Shadow Hunter off as the creature began to transform atop
him.
A second Shadow
Hunter was feasting on the remains of a woman, and her blood ran
thickly across the floor. The doglike monster looked up, a long
scrap of muscle hanging from his mouth, but his eyes were
intelligent—crazed, but far too smart for our safety. The woman was
still screaming—he was devouring her alive. My stomach
lurched.
Still another pounded
against the ladies’ room door, trying to break through, and we
could hear screaming from inside. The fourth was headed toward the
kitchen, where Anadey was wielding a huge cleaver.
“Stop him!” I
shouted, but Peyton was two steps ahead, leaping on the Vampiric
Fae and knocking him to the floor. I motioned for the others to
stand back and swept my fan three times.
Winds don’t fail me now. Gale force.
A gust howled through
the diner, raging more than one hundred miles per hour, catching
everyone off guard, toppling everything not nailed down. Plates
went whipping like Frisbees, glasses smashed against the walls, the
hurricaneforce winds caught up the chairs from the front tables and
sent them sailing through the windows. The lights flickered as
screams erupted—the Shadow Hunters were not happy with
me.
As soon as the winds
died, Kaylin rushed in, aiming his shurikens with deadly accuracy
toward the head of the creature who was feasting on the woman. She
had passed out—or died—and was a bloody mess of torn flesh. The
Shadow Hunter screamed again and rushed toward the
dreamwalker.
As Leo aimed and
fired off a half dozen rounds, Rhiannon held her hands out and sent
a blast of flame through the air. Both the bullet and the flame
caught hold of the Indigo Fae and he fell to the floor,
transforming as he did so. As he shifted back into his normal form,
he jumped up, blackened from the fire and bleeding slightly from
the bullet, which had gone directly through his shoulder. But the
bullet hadn’t seemed to slow him down any, and he aimed himself
directly for Rhiannon.
Her eyes went wide as
he launched himself and jumped. Leo dove between them, but not
before the Shadow Hunter caught Rhiannon and took her down. At that
point, the Shadow Hunter pounding on the bathroom door broke
through the wood, and the one heading toward the kitchen ducked as
the cleaver came flying out from behind the stove.
“What kind of game
are we playing now?” A familiar voice rang over the chaos from the
door of the diner and I whirled around to see Lannan enter the
room, leading a group of eight vampires. They were dressed to kill,
in black leather, and their fangs were gleaming in the dim light.
For once, I was relieved to see the bloodsucker.
Without another word,
the air blurred as the vamps sprang into action. They were all over
the Shadow Hunters and the blood began to flow.
A hiss here. A shout
there. The lights flickered again. Outside the snow was falling at
a steady clip and people passed by, their car doors locked to keep
the monsters at bay. The woman on the floor was dead—one of the
vamps had gotten distracted and was licking up her blood. Lannan
had the Shadow Hunter by the throat—the one who’d grabbed
Rhiannon—and was holding him off the floor, squeezing as hard as he
could. Rhiannon scrambled out of the way.
Two of the other
vamps had routed the Indigo Court Fae from the bathroom and as I
watched, one of them plunged a cast-iron spike through the Shadow
Hunter’s heart. He shrieked and dropped, dead.
So iron stakes can kill them.
Ulean swept around
me. Yes, they can, it appears. Be cautious of
using your fan, Cicely. It has powers that you do not yet realize
and they can captivate—
But I shook off her
warning. At that moment, Anadey stumbled out, helped by none other
than one of the Lupa Clan. She looked dazed. At that moment, the
other two Shadow Hunters raced out of the diner, followed by five
of the vampires. There were screams from the parking lot, and then
all was silent. One of the vamps returned a few minutes
later.
“All taken care
of.”
I stood very still,
keenly aware of how much blood was staining the diner, and how
easily it could set off the vampires. I stared at Lannan, who
swaggered over to me. He said nothing, but reached down to cup my
chin. I waited. He planted a long, slow kiss on my lips and, still
in shock, I found myself responding. As I pulled away, he
whispered, “You can thank me for saving your cousin
later.”
And then, as quickly
as they’d come, the vampires disappeared into the darkness and we
were alone, knee-deep in carnage. The night closed in and Winter
howled her wrath.
Anadey slowly came
around the counter to the front. “All right, who’s hurt?” She
stared down at the woman’s torn body and shook her head, her
expression fractured between shock and pain. “That was Eva. She
comes in here every night for coffee and pie . . .” She turned
away, looking over the remains of her restaurant.
A handful of people
filed out of the restroom. They looked bruised but no worse for the
wear. A couple of people were hurt; one man looked seriously
injured, but it wasn’t apparent whether it had been the Shadow
Hunters who’d hurt him or the broken glass from the windows. As
Anadey picked up the phone to call for an ambulance, Leo sidled up
to me.
“And you still want
to bring one of them into the house. You like fucking danger, don’t
you? I bet you even want Lannan—you protest, but you weren’t
putting him off last night. He was all up inside you—I saw it. I’ll
bet you get down on your knees like a dog for him—” He whispered
low enough so that Rhiannon didn’t hear me, but I whirled around
and smacked him across the face.
“Better him than you. Just give it a fucking rest,
dude. I told you I wasn’t planning on bringing Grieve into the
house, but you just fucking didn’t bother to listen.”
He let out a long
sigh but made no move to return my blow.
Peyton padded over
and growled at both of us before transforming back into herself.
She stood, naked. Her clothes were on the floor in the flurry of
debris and she began hunting them out. One of the women standing
nearby helped her find them and she dressed, then went to help her
mother.
Rhiannon brushed a
strand of hair out of her way. “Leo, I heard what you said to
Cicely and believe me, if she hadn’t backhanded you for it, I would
have.”
“The antidote won’t
turn him back into what he was. It will only take away his
vulnerability to light and make him stronger. And who knows what
side effects it’s going to produce?”
I stared at him,
wanting to flail him a good one, but his eyes registered fear. Leo
was scared. He was terrified, and nothing in the world would take
that away. I let out a long breath and pulled one of the chairs up
off the floor where my windstorm had tossed it.
“I understand your
fear, Leo. I just wish you could understand what I’m
saying.”
“You did have sex
with Grieve again,” Kaylin said, wandering up. “Remember—every time
he bites you, you’re under his charm a little bit
more.”
“He wouldn’t let me
bring him back. He said he didn’t want to put you in danger,” I
muttered.
“This isn’t about
gaining access to the house,” Kaylin said. “It’s obvious he’s
fixated on you. You’re soul mates, he wants back with his other
half. And his nature is highly dangerous right now. Just remember:
The venom from his bite can cloud your judgment.”
I swallowed, and it
was a bitter pill. Kaylin was right about that. Every time Grieve
bit me, his saliva injected a toxin into my system that brought me
a little bit further under his dominion.
“But you were willing
to help me get the antidote.” I stared up at him bleakly, totally
confused.
“I believe he can
harness his nature, but it’s going to take a lot of work. We need
to find a safe place to keep him. Somewhere he can’t break out
of.”
“You mean lock him
up?” I let out a long breath. “Like an animal.”
“You know what the
Shadow Hunters can do. Even if he wasn’t born to the nature, if
Grieve does lose control . . .” Kaylin knelt beside me and took my
hand. “I’ll help you, but this isn’t a Cinderella story and you
aren’t rescuing a fair princess caught by the minions of darkness.
You’re rescuing one of the minions, and one who may just get
terribly, terribly hungry.”
I nodded, silent. I
had to find a haven for Grieve—a place where I could hide him, yet
keep myself and the others safe. I couldn’t ask Geoffrey; that
would tip him off to my plans. It wasn’t like I had access to
dungeons or cells or anything like that, and most apartments
weren’t built to keep someone in.
And then I thought
about my earlier plan. I had one ally who might be able to help me,
who wouldn’t feel the need to blab to Geoffrey about my plans. And
he might be able to help us get in and get hold of the antidote.
But was I willing to pay the price? Could I face myself in the
mirror again?
How far am I willing to go to save
Grieve?
Cicely—don’t do it, please. There has to be another
way.
I’m running out of options, Ulean—I’m running out of
time.
Quietly, I turned to
Anadey. “What’s the damage?”
She pressed her lips
together, then let out a strangled sound. “One dead, three severely
wounded and I hope they don’t die before the ambulance gets here.
Four others hurt, but they’ll live. What do we tell the emergency
techs?”
Geoffrey’s whole
tactic about wild dogs did not sit well with me. I stared at Leo,
who was glowering at me, and said, “Tell them the truth. A group of
deranged Fae broke in and tore up the joint.”
“You can’t—Geoffrey
would object—” Leo started but I swung on him.
“I don’t give a
flying fuck about what Geoffrey would say. People need to know that
there’s danger out there in the woods. For the sake of the gods,
they already know it, but nobody’s
doing anything and they feel abandoned. Geoffrey controls the town;
let Geoffrey fucking step up to the fucking plate and do something
about it. Passing off urban legends about wild dogs is just going
to get a bunch of pets killed. And you can tell Geoffrey exactly
what I said. I don’t care!”
With that, I pushed
him aside and swung out into the chill air. I needed to get my head
straight. Kaylin joined me.
He shoved his hands
into his pockets and stared up into the sky. “Snow won’t stop till
we stop Myst.”
“I know. So what do
you suggest? Where should I hide Grieve when we rescue
him?”
“A secret
place—hidden and hard to escape from.” Kaylin began to whistle,
gently, and I turned to him.
“What do you
know?”
“I might have access
to such a place. You’ll remember, I’ve spent the past year off the
grid. Before I moved into your cousin’s house, I hid in a number of
places that might do the trick.” He gave me a contemplative look.
“I’ll help you but I advise you not to tell Leo where you’re
stashing the Fae. In his anger, he might take it upon himself to .
. .”
“To rid the world of
one more member of the Indigo Court.”
“Exactly.”
“What do you want for
helping me?”
Kaylin slowly put his
hand on my shoulder and leaned close. “Not everyone is out to use
or abuse you. Not everyone has an ulterior motive. You suspect my
demon, I can feel it, but not everything that lives in shadows is
an automatic threat. Though I can be deadly, I’m not necessarily
out to get something from you.”
I raised my gaze to
meet his. “You didn’t answer my question.” I’d learned from Lannan
and Geoffrey. “What will you ask in return?”
He flashed me an
insolent smile, but it wasn’t snide nor was it patronizing. “Only
that when I need help, you’ll be there. I watch your back, you
watch mine.”
Feeling like a
drowning woman clutching at a life preserver that might or might
not come from an enemy, I nodded. “Deal. What next?”
“Tomorrow, while the
vamps are asleep, we go dreamwalking and find out where that
antidote is.” And with a laugh, Kaylin threw his arm around my
shoulder and we headed back to the diner.