His eyes narrow. “I don’t give a shit if you work for the tabloids, but at least pretend like you don’t, all right?”
I grin at that. “First I’m a spy, then I’m a reporter. Which is it, Sherlock?”
“So you’re telling me you’re just nosy?”
“That’s for me to know and you to wonder about,” I tell him. “But I’m willing to trade secrets if you are.”
“Oh, yeah? And what do you know that I’d give two shits about, exactly?”
“I’m sure you’ve got at least one question you’d like answered.” I probably shouldn’t goad him. Scratch that, I definitely shouldn’t goad him, but as long as Reille continues to play possum with me, Xaine’s my only option.
Not that he would appreciate me phrasing it like that.
He snaps his fingers at the wardrobe people, and they skitter off the stage like cockroaches when the lights go on. In a three-count, we’re alone, and only then does Xaine fire off with, “Ok, I’ll bite. Answer for an answer, until someone chickens out, and I get to start. How do you know Jax Trace?”
“He gave me a ride to my audition,” I answer.
“Because he moonlights as a cabbie?”
“Because he’s my guardian angel.” Over the top of Xaine’s impossibly rude noise, I say, “That was a two-fer.”
“Two-fer, my ass,” he sputters. “You didn’t answer the question.”
“Yes, I did. My turn. How long has Reille worked at Scion?”
That seems to flummox him for a moment, and he has to visibly count back to answer. “Six months. Why do you give a shit?”
“Is that an official question?” My palms sweat, but I keep the lighthearted tone firmly in place.
He smiles a little; it’s not the smirk from earlier, but the look of a predator sighting his prey. “It sure as fuck is.”
“She reminds me of someone I met a while back,” I say, controlling my breath the way I do when I sing, letting it out in carefully measured increments. “Trying to see if our timelines overlap.”
“Look, Apple Pie—”
“The name is Lourdes,” I interrupt. “Not ‘Apple Pie’ and not “Fuzzy Bunny.’”
“Whatever,” he says. “You still smell like the farm, and Reille is a SoCal girl, born and bred. There is less than a one tenth of one percent of a chance that you met up with her before.”
Shows what you know.
But I only say, “I grew up in a record store that my family owned, not on a farm.”
“Color me impressed,” he says, but with no little bit of grinning sarcasm. “That where you learned to sing covers?”
“Not your turn.” I hold up a finger, forestalling any more questions. “Why is Reille still working here? It’s obvious it’s over and just as obvious that she has zero interest in interacting with you. So it’s not like she’s trying to get you back by hanging around.”
“We’ve all got bills to pay, Lore, and Reille has really expensive taste in shoes.” Xaine folds his arms over his chest. “And she might hate my guts, but my mark’s still on her. We only broke it off because she couldn’t keep a cork in it.”
“And by ‘it,’ you mean—”
“Jeezus, Lore,” he says, the smirk back in full effect. “Do I really have to explain the birds and bees here?”
“Who was she cheating on you with?”
“None of your damn business.” Xaine gives me the side-eye. “Besides which, it’s my turn. Where, exactly, do you think you know her from?”
Choosing my words carefully, I say, “We were in the hospital together.”
He flinches at that, like I dinged his armor. “Last month? She didn’t mention you.” The corner of his lip twitches as he corrects, “Not that she’s mentioned much.”
“It wasn’t last month,” I tell him. “It was last year. She… got out before I did. I hadn’t seen her since. I’m not even sure it’s her.”
Neither of us say anything for a moment, bringing a natural end to our little game of Twenty Questions. The stylists have dispersed, so I’m technically standing there of my own volition. With a half-hitching shrug, I give Xaine one last smile and turn away, ducking toward my own clothes. I hear him make a noise behind me, the hollow sound of his boots following me.
“Look,” he says, “if you’re here to do Trace’s dirt-digging, I don’t care, so long as you show up to work and sing your ass off.” Whatever patience he possesses visibly wanes.
“I’m not Jax’s spy.” I wave him off, tucking my hands behind me and unfastening the leather top they pinned me into. “You don’t have to worry.”
His baby blues catch on my face. “I’m not worried.”
“Good,” I say, ducking to the side, fishing around for the invisible zipper holding the skintight pants in place. “Then I guess I’ll see you ’round.”
Before I know it, he’s right beside me, hands hitched into the waist of the pants. The sound of the zipper is the next thing I hear.
“Quit trying to get rid of me,” he says cheerfully, so close that his breath moves the tiny hairs at my temple.
Then I really am like a bunny, caught in the clutches of something bigger, stronger, older than I’ll ever be. My heart skips a single beat at the realization, and Xaine hears it; I know he does, because that laser-gaze of his goes straight to my jugular.
“Official question, Lore.”
Frozen in place, I hesitate, Jess’s warnings buzzing around in my head. “Okay, go ahead.”
“On a scale of one to take-me-now, how turned on are you?”
The second the question processes, I laugh, right in the face of the world’s biggest rock star. “Wow, you are…so arrogant.”
That garners me the full smirk and a swift release from his grasp. “So I don’t even rank on the scale? That’s depressing. Or hey, maybe you play for the other team?”
Still grinning, I tell him, “I’m not into girls. I’ve just been told that I shouldn’t take candy from strangers.”
“Trust me, Lore, I hadn’t even gotten to the candy part yet.” Wandering over to the table, he picks up one of the blood packs and contemplates it for half a second before tossing it back on the pile.
He can’t hold still, not for a second. Now that the game is done, he’s off and running, looking for the next thing, which turns out to be one of three acoustic guitars the trio left behind. He sits cross-legged and is already pulling a song out of it as I push the leathers down my legs, tracking the chord progressions. I can’t help but follow along, the notes registering like I’m sight-reading the sheet music.
Over the gentle strains of the melody—one I still don’t recognize—Xaine lifts his eyebrows at me in unspoken invitation. He’s done talking, apparently. Done with the questions and the half-answers from someone he barely knows, someone whose name he’s apparently incapable of using correctly. But he’s not kicking me off the stage. Nope. This is a new game. A new version of “I double-dog dare you.” Even with Jess’s warnings pinballing around my headspace, it’s surreal to see him, to hear him, this guy I’ve listened to on the radio and MTV and YouTube and my iPod, plucking a tune out of that guitar like a busker on a street corner or in a subway station.
Maybe that’s why I dig the quarter out of my discarded pants pocket and toss it at him.
When Xaine shifts the guitar just slightly, the coin lands in the space between his thighs with a tiny plink! And he keeps right on playing, the tempo slow and even. A ballad, for sure, even if he doesn’t sing many of those.
“Cheapskate,” he observes as he moves back into the chorus again.
“Keep going,” I say, abandoning my jeans for the moment and settling next to him, reaching for the second guitar. “I have more quarters, but you have to make it worth trading in my laundry money.”
He slants a look at me. “Tough crowd.”
“Less grumbling, more attention to your fingering, or my change stays where it is.” I lay a harmony over the top of what he’s playing,
bracing myself for the inevitable—
“So you are interested in my fingering.” A half-smile comes at me through a fall of hair that’s black as a raven’s wing. “Where you keeping those quarters, anyway? Last I checked, Hanes doesn’t make panties with pockets.”
Rolling my eyes, I deadpan, “I keep them in my coin slot, duh.”
His reply is another grin. After another few bars, he adds, “Congratulations. You’re the world’s oldest teenager.”
“Pot,” I say, plucking out a counter tune until we’re dueling acoustics, “The Devil Went Down To Georgia”-style, “meet kettle.”
But he’s watching my hands, not my face, picking up speed, fingers flying over the frets. I might have given him shit before, but there’s no faulting his playing now. Truth be told, it takes all my concentration to keep up, to match him note for note, but I’m doing just that. And he’s delighted by it; I can see it in his eyes in the half-second I can spare to look him full in the face. It’s all pieces in a kaleidoscope, tumbling over each other as the world turns: the pluck of the strings, the wooden boards of the stage under my ass, the weight of the guitar in my hands, the blue of his eyes, the music—
“Xaine?” comes the startled inquiry from backstage, and we both miss the next note as Reille strides out, her heels clicking a very different cadence.
Adirato.
She takes it all in, from the impromptu jam to the fact that I’m missing my pants, and then frowns. “I’m sorry, am I interrupting something?”
“Yeah,” Xaine tells her, rapping his knuckles against his guitar. “Take a hike and tell the staff to steer clear. This is a closed rehearsal.”
Then I realize I’m in that dream, the one where I’m onstage, in my underwear, and a bunch of people are staring at me. Glancing out over the previously-empty dance floor, I see a small crowd has assembled, including but not limited to The Trio… who are, for all intents and purposes, my friendly rivals. A flush crawls up my face as I turn my eyes toward the floor, tucking a few strands of hair behind my ear.
“Your phone must be off, Xaine, because the lawyers have been trying to reach you.”
“Tell them to fuck off—”
But then he stops himself. When I lift my eyes, I realize he’s looking not only at Reille, but at a small cadre of uniformed officers and suited minions.
One of the men in blue speaks up. “We just have a few more questions for you, sir, but Ms. Reece insisted that your lawyers be present.”
Xaine’s gaze bounces from face to face for a moment, lip curling in irritation. “I’m busy. Come back later.”
The Dark Prince hath spoken.
“They IDed the body. The girl’s father’s a senator.” Reille doesn’t look all that impressed with the display. “You’ll talk to them now, or they’re going to drag you to the precinct, and we both know how you feel about the precinct.”
But Xaine doesn’t budge. “I answered all their questions the last time. And I didn’t kill that girl so they didn’t come packing any evidence. Seems to me this is a matter of politics, and the police and the lawyers and everyone else can go fuck themselves, because I’m not going anywhere.”
Nope, I was wrong. Now the Dark Prince hath spoken.
Obviously well-versed in Xaineology, Reille clucks her tongue and asks, “Are we done showing off for the pretty girl yet, or do you want to strut and posture some more before we leave?”
Then, as if she’d aimed a laser pointer at my face, every eye that wasn’t on me before turns in my direction. The last thing I want to do at this moment is get up practically naked in front of the assembled crowd, but I do, returning the guitar to its stand and grabbing my jeans. One leg and then the other, and Xaine’s watching the whole show.
With a tiny huff of frustration, I wave a hand at him. “Just go.”
Xaine grins and stands there as if he’s not facing down a shitstorm of mass proportions as he quips, “What’d I tell you about dismissing me?”
The second I have the pants zipped, I reach into my pockets, my fingers bumping against a metal surface. Far from a quarter this time, I come up with the heavy metal disk Jax Trace tucked into my hand back at the motel. I’d forgotten I had it, but here it is, glinting in the stage lights.
When I return my attention to Xaine, he’s grinning at me so hard that he might just break his face on it. And while I have zero intention of rewarding his bad behavior with my gold souvenir, some part of me just can’t let it end. Not like this.
I dig out another quarter and flick it at my new friend with a very noir, “Here’s lookin’ at you, kid.”
He plucks it from midair. “Fresh from the coin slot, and still warm to the touch.” Finding the humor to wink at me in passing, he follows the bevy of suits and uniforms toward the stage door. “Sure you don’t need it for laundry? You have been scooting those granny panties across the floor for the past hour. Two bits would have bought you half a load at the Sip ’n’ Spin.”
“My granny panties are none of your concern,” I say. “And the joke’s on you. I’d have paid far more than fifty cents for a jam session with the Dark Prince Apocalypse.”
As Xaine disappears into the shadows, he shoves the coin deep into his pants’ pocket. “I’m going to tuck this in with the rest of my roll.”
“That’s the scoop I’m giving the tabloids!” I yell after him. “How it’s costing me money to work here!”
“Keep it up, Apple Pie!” he hollers back even as Reille shoots me a disgusted glare and shoves Xaine out into the hallway. “It’ll cost you a dollar next time—”
And the door slams shut, effectively giving him the last word on the matter.
Four centuries on this earth… of course he’s perfected his timing.
People scatter to various jobs around the auditorium, but it takes me a second to realize Reille Reece is still standing there, heel tapping lightly against the stage-hollow flooring, frowning at the exit door.
She doesn’t even look at me when she speaks. “It’s in your best interest to keep your distance.”
“And why’s that?”
“He’s dangerous,” she says, grip tightening down on her forearms. She’s practically hugging herself, but she pries one hand away long enough to trace down the side of her face with a delicate finger. There’s a scar there, the slightest little white line that I wouldn’t have noticed otherwise. “He falls in love at the drop of a hat, but it’s the falling out that hurts like hell.”
“If it’s so imperative that I stay away from him,” I say slowly, “then why did you hire me in the first place?”
“I had my reasons.” The words are brittle; she’s like a piece of glass, with that hairline fracture across her cheekbone.
“Which were?”
It’s a soft prompt, but even that’s too much for her, and Reille switches gears, tipping her chin upward to look down at me. “I haven’t given him the contracts yet. You could leave before things get out of hand. I can make the papers disappear. Tell him you refused to sign them.”
There’s guilt there, and a touch of fear.
“Why would I do that?” I say, and offer up a knowing smile. “I’m closer to where I want to be than I’ve been in over a year.”
Then I get the full force of her glare, and she hits me with a curt, “Fine. It’s your funeral.”
Spinning around, she practically makes a run for the stage door so I can’t ask her anything else. Trouble is, she can’t outrun what happened to us, and if I keep at it a little longer, Reille Reece is going to crack open and tell me everything I need to know.
CHAPTER SIX
Xaine
The impromptu jam session’s still kicking around in my head two days later, right along with the impromptu interruption, and the impromptu senatorial visit that followed shortly thereafter. I’m on one of the VIP room couches, fingers tangled in strands of long, black hair. When the stage manager had asked what I wanted pre-show, I told him to bring me a four-pack of di
fferent blood types. The girls had gotten hammered in short order and shot up whatever special sauce Trick St. John is peddling these days; I’d gone through them one by one to find the flavor of the night, but it still wasn’t quite what I was in the mood for. Boredom’s a bitch, I guess, because this is the vampire equivalent of opening the refrigerator door again and again and still finding nothing noteworthy on the other side. Now three of them are curled up in a college-lesbian, sexually-experimental cuddle pile on the floor, and the fourth is leaning back far enough for me to absentmindedly twist strands of her hair around my finger as the holes in her neck slowly clot. I’m already geared up to go onstage, leather pants to guyliner. Normally I’d be parked in my dressing room, but the sound system is better out here, and the Fuzzy Bunny is the opening act.
I have time to sit here and chill for a bit. Just be. Just listen.
Wasting words, and wonder why my heart is on my sleeve,
You kill some faithless part of me, and I can’t even grieve.
I wallow in the taste of you, the scent of sweetest sin,
Swallow down my deepest fear so I can let you in.
The words are hers, and I have to admit that I like the sight of her perched on the bench of Scion’s baby grand. The recorded guitar strains are also hers, if I don’t miss my guess, and I’m thoroughly getting my rocks off on the combination, even if she doesn’t know it.
And I let it go, let it fall away,
’Cause I am bold, and braver than you know.
So let it burn, let the battles rage,
I’ll fight ’em all so the meek can have their turn
Oh, let it burn…
And that’s all the peace I get, because two seconds later, Reille barges in. She ignores mini-orgy on the floor, tossing a thick stack of papers onto the glass table in front of me. The girl I’m petting like a stray cat gets a single pointed glance. Then the resident redhead turns on one perfect Jimmy Choo heel and heads for the door without a word.
Catlike reflexes mean I’m up and off the couch, disentangling limbs in record time. My hand wraps around her wrist—Jesus, she’s skinny—and I can feel every tiny bone under the surface of her skin.
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