Last Chance Reform

by Alex Lidell

  I consider Victor’s words carefully. I’ve learned to listen for the words people choose to use. The words they choose to omit.

  “You said ‘made an effort,’ sir. Does that mean they didn’t manage to take all the library’s magic books to Talon?”

  Victor gestures to the stacks. “There are no books remaining here, yes. Asher banished them.”

  Asher. My chest tightens, and I see a corner of Victor’s mouth twitch up. He could just be playing me—I’m sure nothing would make him happier than to sour my feelings for the fae. But unfortunately, I don’t have any evidence to say he’s wrong. Besides Ellis showing me the opening spell when both our lives depended on it, no one has tried to teach me anything about witch magic—though both vamp and fae students receive instruction in developing and controlling whatever powers they have.

  If anything, Reese seems to think witchcraft is a dirty, dangerous little habit that needs to be disciplined out of me.

  Keeping my face schooled, I wait for Victor to continue. Because I have a feeling he’s about to get to the crux of this conversation.

  “Fortunately, Mahogany Hall is not the only source of information on the island. One of the advantages of a long life span is that some of us have developed personal libraries. Mine happens to have a volume that may help us unlock your full potential, Samantha. The question is, are you ready?”

  I swallow. He has a game. I know he does. The problem is, the apple he holds out toward me is too tempting to resist. Do I want to know what I can do to not be afraid of my own power? To stand toe to toe with Reese and Ellis and the damn cadets with something other than my fists for defense?

  My pulse patters in my throat, the thrill of discovery zipping through my veins.

  Whatever his plans, I have my own—I can get out of this project exactly what I want, and I’ll keep my eyes wide open the whole time.

  “Yes, I am.”

  “One thing, Samantha. I would not like this to create any conflict within the school, especially given Commander Asher’s decision to remove all witchcraft texts from the Mahogany. Please ensure your discretion when practicing.” Victor’s eyes meet mine, his dark pupils widening in a way that freezes me in place, a soft, warm gauze slipping over my mind. It feels nice. “I’d like no one to know you are working with me. Do you understand?”

  “I do,” I hear myself say.

  15

  Sam

  The next few days pass in a whirlwind, my thoughts spinning too quickly for me to catch up with. I’m too excited to worry about my next “manners lesson” with Reese, or the fact that Ellis is still ignoring me in the dining hall. On Friday afternoon, Victor sends me instructions to meet him at the chemistry lab that evening—which instantly makes the day drag on as if dialed down to slow motion.

  Deep in the science wing of the academic building, the chem lab is used only by third- and fourth-year cadets who’ve earned the right to select electives. At long last, I wind there through tall white-walled hallways utterly deserted for the night, only single wall sconces every ten feet or so lighting the way.

  Walking in to find Victor wearing a white lab coat, titrating something in a beaker, I have the ironic image of a vamp choosing a Halloween costume—but manage to tamp down the sudden manic burst of laughter just in time.

  “Eye of newt, toe of frog?” I say under my breath.

  Victor looks up, closing the notebook in front of him. “Not at all. This actually has nothing to do with you whatsoever, Samantha. I simply was using the opportunity of an available lab to indulge in a bit of my own research. You will find that with our life span, many vampires take comfort in science. Now, then.” Victor focuses all his attention on me, his dark eyes inquisitive. “Are you familiar with the basic difference between organic and rune-based magic?”

  I pull a metal stool up to the tall granite table where he’s standing. “Not really, sir.”

  He nods, unsurprised. “In short, organic magic is the power that comes from inside a witch, allowing her to control elements directly. For example, summoning witch fire, or brewing up a storm, all tap into organic power. Because organic magic reflects your internal state, it is highly volatile and requires a great deal of personal control and discipline to be used safely. The physical regimen of the school is here for a reason, Samantha. And though I understand athleticism is not entirely your forte—”

  I clear my throat. “Not my forte” is a generous way of putting it.

  “Nonetheless,” Victor continues, “controlling your body helps you control your magic. Control that you, my dear, utterly lack.”

  “Not much for false praise, are you, sir?” I mutter.

  “Flattery never fully goes out of style, my dear, but you do seem to like a direct approach. Now, as I was saying, you are not ready to touch organic magic yet. However, rune-based magic is much more controlled. It’s about one single spell at a time. I have one I would like you to practice.”

  Reaching inside his coat, Victor pulls out a sheet of paper that looks to have been cut with a razor from an old volume, the paper smelling of dust and age.

  “This is a closing rune,” Victor explains. “If drawn correctly on a locking mechanism, it engages the lock. Once you conquer a simple locking mechanism, we will move on to a more complex one.”

  With those instructions and an admonition to practice here each evening before we meet again next week, Victor leaves me, the instructions, and a box of locks in the lab. My curiosity as to why I might need a whole box disappears when, two hours into nothing happening, the first of my locks simply freezes in place as if the metal melted.

  “Weren’t you supposed be working at Dusk tonight?” Mika asks me when I return to the room close to midnight. She’s buried deep in her laptop, those huge old-man glasses perched on the tip of her nose. I’m honestly impressed that she remembers what day it is, much less my schedule.

  “I don’t think I’m Cassis’s favorite person right now.” My chest tightens as I remember Victor’s goons destroying Cassis’s piano, the innocent baby grand cracking into pieces before our eyes. I don’t know whether vampires can cry, but I swear I saw Cassis’s eyes glisten. To make matters worse, I’ve just willingly spent an evening with the very male who destroyed it. A new wave of guilt races through me, tightening my stomach into knots—until Reese’s words whisper through my mind. It’s not your fault.

  It’s not my fault. Someday, I’ll get up the nerve to go see how Cassis is doing, but until then, I have a big fat new fish to fry.

  I plop onto my bed, fatigue weighing down my body. I consider telling Mika what I was doing, but find myself not wanting to talk about it, a warm, comforting gauze drifting over my mind as I fall asleep.

  The following day, I return from lunch to discover my room filled with boxes. Big ones, little ones, irregularly shaped ones—all piled up high enough that I can’t see Mika at all, and only know she’s there because I can hear her typing.

  “Who vomited cardboard all over the place?” Digging my way to my desk, I’m grateful to discover that, despite their size, the parcels are light.

  “From someone who wants you back at work.” Mika calls, an annoying smile in her voice. “There’s a note on the top box on the left.”

  “You read my mail?” I ask, finally able to see her.

  She blinks and looks up from her screen, lowering her massive headphones. “It wasn’t password protected. That’s practically an invitation.”

  “It’s on paper.” I wave the envelope in proof.

  “Well, that isn’t my fault now, is it?”

  Rolling my eyes, I read the note inside.

  I expect you back at work today. Cut wages for missing yesterday. PS. Wear something nice.

  Cassis. Apparently, I’m not as persona non grata as I thought. “What’s inside the boxes?” I ask Mika.

  “Why would I open your boxes?” Mika sounds indignant. “That’s like burglary.”

  “Burglary is when you actually tak
e shit. You have the weirdest moral code in the known universe.” Grabbing a pair of scissors, I start by opening the first neat brown cube and pull out a small black silk…thong. The next box holds a tiny white bandage crop top. A fuck-me set of high heels. Skintight leather pants. Even a plaid skirt that looks like my uniform except with a flirty flair that turns it more toward naughty-schoolgirls porno.

  Mika’s eyes brighten. “So, which one are you going to wear?”

  “None.” I close the boxes back up, wondering how I’m going to get them back to Cassis. I can’t go back to Dusk, no matter how much I want to. Not after what happened. Cassis might forgive me, but I’m still working on forgiving myself.

  “You missed one,” Mika says, tossing the last box toward me, this one much smaller than the others.

  I consider just putting it atop the rest without opening it, but I’m not that virtuous. I can at least enjoy looking at the pretty things, even if I’m not going to keep them.

  Opening the parcel, I discover this one holds not scant clothing, but the latest-model iPhone, a rakish picture of Cassis already set as the lock screen background. The message icon blinks with enough insistence to set off an epileptic seizure—definitely not the thing’s default setting.

  I click it.

  Just in case you were thinking of quitting before your debt is paid, I’m picking you up. -C.

  “Fuck me,” I mutter.

  “Not tonight, luv,” a self-assured voice informs me from the door. “Though I do approve of where your mind is going.”

  16

  Sam

  Mika blushes and presses herself deeper into her computer screen as Cassis saunters inside our room and looks about with a small frown marring his perfect features. He wears a simple white shirt open to his sternum and sleeves rolled up to reveal corded forearms, fitted blue dress pants, and his dark hair slicked back from his forehead in a rakish old-Hollywood style that makes him look unbearably handsome. “I was rather hoping to see these decorating your body by now.” He thoughtfully holds up a silk bralette. “But dress as you choose. So long as you get yourself into the car.”

  “Cassis.” All the air in my lungs seems to somehow disappear. If I got hurt the way he did, would I be walking into my room right now? Courting more problems? Yet here he is, all broad shoulders and mischief and fierce rebellion. “You can’t possibly want me at Dusk after—”

  “If you think one pompous Godfather-wannabe arse is going to bully me into getting rid of my worst bartender, you are sorely mistaken.”

  “You think I’m your worst bartender?”

  “Absolutely.” Cassis waggles his brows. “But you should come prove me wrong.”

  I laugh in spite of myself.

  Cassis reaches out toward me, the air suddenly thick. My body tingles, the anticipation of his fingers brushing my cheek sending waves of heat along my skin. It’s fucking unfair how beautiful he is, how much my body longs for him.

  I swallow.

  He pulls his hand back and straightens his rolled-up sleeves, as if that were his intention all along—though the tension in his eyes says it wasn’t. “I’ll wait for you in the car.” Cassis turns toward the door as abruptly as he came in, fluttering a hand back toward Mika. “Bring the tiny sidekick if you want. Just get there.”

  I sigh. For some crazy reason, he wants this. And I owe him. That’s all there is to it.

  Going back through the boxes, I pick out an outfit at random, ending up in surprisingly comfortable black leather skinnies that fit my curves perfectly (that part’s not surprising, knowing Cassis), black stiletto booties, and a tight silvery-gray crop top. I pull my own leather jacket on last. If Cassis doesn’t like it, he can bite me. The jacket and I have a history.

  When I look in the mirror to brush on some mascara and pearlescent highlighter from the Sephora box and put on giant silver hoops from the Tiffany’s box—which I’d bet my ass are actually platinum—Mika whistles behind me. “You look like Trinity from The Matrix.”

  I roll my eyes.

  Five minutes later, Mika and I are at the drive-up roundabout in front of the Academy, staring at Cassis’s gleaming red Lamborghini.

  The vamp watches me as we walk toward him, his dark eyes trained on my body with so much force, I nearly trip.

  He opens the back door for Mika, then turns to me, boxing me in against the car for a moment. His rich male musk drifts into my lungs on the evening breeze. With one last lingering look up my body, from my legs to the sliver of skin at my stomach to my eyes, he says, “Divine.”

  Then he opens the door for me and walks around the car, leaving me a hot, trembling mess.

  “I thought you drove a Corvette,” I say, settling against the leather seat, trying to keep the sudden breathiness from my voice.

  “I run on many cylinders.” Pressing the gas, Cassis turns out onto the main road, checking the rearview mirror. Thick walls of pines flash by on either side. “Did your shadow bring a laptop to my bar? I don’t know whether to be horrified or insulted.”

  “Just be happy she isn’t asking to set up a server in one of the booths.”

  “Actually, I was going to see if—” Mika starts.

  “No,” Cassis and I both say at the same time.

  Once we get to Dusk, which is alive with its usual evening merriment, classic big band jazz pumping from the speakers, Mika settles into a corner to people-watch—or vamp-watch—while I head toward the bar—and stop. There, on the raised stage where Louise, Cassis’s old baby grand once stood, is a brand-shining-new instrument. A gleaming black Steinway grand, even larger and more overpowering than the last.

  A corner of Cassis’s mouth rises proudly. “What do you think, luv? She doesn’t have quite the same personality as Louise, but we’re getting to know each other.”

  “She is beautiful, Cassis,” I say, running my fingers over the smooth surface. And I mean it. However the vamp got a new piano onto the island so quickly, he did not skimp on quality. “Did you name her too?”

  The vamp’s eyes drop to half-mast. “I have.”

  I wait.

  Nothing.

  Fair enough. Cassis doesn’t owe me anything. It’s me who owes him—starting with an apology and a promise.

  Squaring my shoulders, I turn toward him and grip his dark brown eyes with my own. “Listen. I…I want you to know that what happened last weekend with Victor, it won’t happen again. I’m learning vampire etiquette now, and I can muddle my way through the basics easily enough. This is a vamp club, and you know, when in Rome. Anyway. I just wanted you to know.”

  Instead of easing, Cassis’s normally mischievous eyes flash with anger before he hides it just as quickly. “Whose little idea was it to teach you vamp etiquette?” he asks quietly. “And exactly how did they go about it?”

  “Mine.” Walking up beside me, Reese crosses his large arms over his chest, his lips pressed together as he studies Cassis. I’m shocked to see him in something other than fatigues or exercise clothes—a black suit that hugs his tall body perfectly, his dark hair tidied back into a low knot. His blue eyes gleam with warning out of his sculpted face, making my throat dry. “And I went about it exactly the way you might imagine.”

  Heat fills me as Reese’s commanding voice brings back all too many memories. Very vivid memories. Making things a thousand times worse, I see Cassis’s nostrils flare delicately as his gaze cuts to me.

  Fucking vampires with their fucking sense of smell.

  Collecting what remains of my dignity, I raise my chin, turn on my heels, and march myself behind the bar to take orders.

  Over the next two hours, Dusk hits its stride. My hands fly over the backlit liquor shelves to fill orders as the thong-clad vamp dancers mount their pedestals and gyrate to the music, every movement preternaturally graceful. The large screens all over the bar magnify each dancer’s best moves, adding splashes of color to the image. Everyone is up dancing or drinking or both. Even Reese is nursing a whiskey that Cassis p
ut in front of him. Everyone, that is, except for Mika, who huddles happily in her dark booth with her laptop for company, sipping a huge Diet Coke through a straw.

  Then comes the moment of the night that anyone who is a regular at Dusk knows to wait for, as Cassis adjusts his cuff links and sits down at the piano. I put down the bottle I’m holding, a little rush of anticipation tickling my neck as the vampire’s long pale fingers stroke the keys lovingly and Eddy Arnold’s Anytime You Are Feeling Lonely echoes through the room.

  I close my eyes for a moment, letting the music roll over me, my feet carrying me closer to the piano. No one is going to be ordering anything now anyway. Not while Cassis is playing.

  Anytime you’re feelin’ lonely, the music sings, each note begging for vocals to join in.

  Something cool and metal brushes against my hand, and I open my eyes to see someone thrusting a microphone into my hand, Cassis’s deep chocolate eyes on mine.

  My heart stops, then starts again at a gallop, adrenaline spilling into my blood. Sing. Cassis wants me to sing in front of everyone. And I suddenly can’t remember how to open my mouth. The music races toward the start of the lyrics, and I know that in one more heartbeat, I’ll miss my chance.

  My gaze darts around the room, taking in the many, many eyes all on me, the spotlight that someone adjusted to bathe me and Cassis.

  A few feet away, Reese crosses his arms. When our eyes meet, he shakes his head. Don’t do it, he mouths. Do NOT bring more attention to yourself.

  My fingers fiddle with the mic.

  No! Reese mouths again, somehow making the silent command boom inside me.

  And that’s all it fucking takes for me to find my spine. Drawing a deep breath just in time, I dive into the opening notes, the microphone carrying my clear soprano voice throughout Dusk. Glasses freeze in midair, mouths falling slightly open. I ignore them, letting my vocal cords warm to a gift I haven’t given them in too long. At the piano, Cassis gives me an approving grin, playing more softly to accommodate my voice.