Chase the Dark (Steel & Stone Book 1)

by Annette Marie

  She couldn’t let that happen. She would rather jump off a bridge than live the rest of her life as a human. She would rather rot in a prefect prison for stealing the Sahar.

  Sighing, she rested her head against Ash’s knee and denied the tears of hurt and humiliation trying to escape. She wouldn’t cry over Micah or her mistakes again. She would do whatever it took to prove to her father that she could be a Consul and hoped that if he ever found out the truth, he would have enough faith in her to let it go.

  Thinking of the stern, distant face of her father, who wouldn’t call her by anything but Piperel, she couldn’t make herself believe he would.

  CHAPTER 7

  “THIS is a bad idea,” Lyre muttered.

  “Shush,” Piper hissed.

  They knelt in the bushes thirty feet from the Consulate, trying to decide if the building was deserted or not. The doors had been blocked off with “DO NOT CROSS” tape that undoubtedly had some kind of spell on it. All the windows were dark, everything silent. It looked void of life, which while good, still made Piper feel hollow inside. The Consulate wasn’t supposed to look like that.

  “Are we really going to climb that tree?” Lyre whispered, staring across the back lawn at the towering maple.

  “How else would we get inside? We can’t use the doors.”

  “There are plenty of windows on the ground level.”

  “They’ll be expecting that. I used to get in and out of my room all the time using that tree.”

  “But—”

  “Let’s go.” Without waiting for his agreement, she broke into an awkward jog while staying crouched low. The dark windows stared at her as she rushed across the exposed lawn and into the shadows of the old tree. Lyre followed, grumbling something about crazy teenage girls.

  After one quick glance for signs of life, she swung onto the lowest branch. She climbed swiftly, reached the right branch twenty feet in the air, and glanced down. Lyre grinned at her from the branch below hers, enjoying her surprise. Right. As much as he whined like a five-year-old about doing anything remotely dangerous, he was a daemon and therefore both athletic and annoyingly coordinated. He was faster than her, stronger, more agile, and had better reflexes. It wasn’t fair.

  “So,” he said conversationally, checking out the bone-breaking drop to the ground, “how will this get us in your window? We’re too high.”

  “My window is over there.” She pointed halfway along the outer wall. “We have to jump onto the roof.”

  “Oooh,” he drawled sarcastically. “Of course. That makes perfect sense.”

  She crouched on her branch, took aim, and leaped across the two-foot gap between the branch and the eave. She landed on all fours on the roof and crawled out of Lyre’s way. He sprang onto the roof with irritating ease. Stupid daemon not appreciating his abilities.

  They shuffled down the roof, performed a complicated bit of acrobatics to get onto her windowsill, and pried it open. She’d long ago rigged the screen to pop out and they swung into her dark bedroom barely five minutes after setting out. Piper stopped in the middle of her room. It had been torn apart. Her belongings were scattered all over the floor, her books torn apart, her mattress and pillows slashed open. There was a gaping hole in the back wall of her closet where the choronzon had forced its way into the secret passage.

  Lyre touched the back of her hand in sympathy. She grabbed his fingers and squeezed.

  “The choronzon didn’t do all this,” she whispered.

  “No,” he agreed somberly. “I imagine it was the prefects searching for the Stone.”

  She nodded slowly. Yes, that would explain it. With a sigh, she gave Lyre a push toward the door. “Go get your and Ash’s things. I’ll change and pack some stuff.”

  Once he was safely out of the room, she stripped out of her grimy clothes and hid them under the bed. With a huge sigh, she pulled on some clean underwear. That was so much better. Then she dug into the bottom drawer of her dresser and pulled out her gear. She put on a pair of casual-looking jeans that had hidden sheaths built in. The daggers that went with the jeans were gone. After choosing a bra with good support, she tucked the Sahar’s ring box into it. Yeah, she could put it somewhere else, but it felt safest right over her heart. She picked several tops, layering them one on top of the other in case she didn’t have access to more clothes for a while, and topped it off with a long-sleeved gold shirt. After putting her butt-kicking boots back on, she unearthed two long knives the prefects hadn’t found and tucked them into the empty sheaths in the top of the boots. She was never again leaving her bedroom without at least one weapon.

  For the last of her gear, she put on her armguards. The leather covered the backs of her hands up to her elbows. They had metal plates in them for protection when blocking punches or strikes and the material was imbued with magic-dampening spells that would dilute any spells thrown at her.

  Feeling strong and competent for the first time in days, she found a backpack and shoved some more clothes in it. All her full-size weapons were kept in the sparring room on the main level, assuming the prefects hadn’t confiscated everything. She was zipping the bag closed when Lyre slipped back into her room, two similar black packs in one hand. He too had changed into fresh clothes: jeans that fit exactly right, a casual black t-shirt that wasn’t tight yet left no doubt that he was deliciously toned, and a silver chain around his neck that disappeared under the neck of his shirt. He looked mouthwatering, as usual.

  “Hey beautiful,” he said with a crooked smile.

  She rolled her eyes. “Got everything?”

  “Yep.”

  He passed her his bags and she hauled all three backpacks to the window and shoved them out. They landed in the bushes with a muffled crash. Piper dusted her hands together and joined Lyre at her bedroom door.

  “Any sign of people?” she asked him.

  “Nope.”

  “Excellent.”

  “We should still be careful though.”

  “Yeah yeah.”

  “Piper—”

  “Where is your sense of adventure, Lyre?” She tossed the question over her shoulder as she strode into the hallway toward the stairs.

  “This isn’t supposed to be an adventure,” Lyre muttered as he followed her. “Besides,” he added a little more loudly. “We need to hurry. I don’t like leaving Ash alone.”

  Piper bit her lip as she reached the stairs and crouched to peer down them. She didn’t like leaving Ash either, not when he was still unconscious, but they’d hidden the car well and Zwi was guarding him. The clever little dragonet would distract anyone who got too close and lead them on a merry little chase away from her vulnerable master. But still, they needed to be quick.

  She trotted silently down the stairs and stopped in the foyer, not liking the memories of the space. There was another hole in the wall where Ash had blasted the exit of the secret passage. Blood was smeared on the floor where the draconian had sat while the prefects interrogated them. Anger swept through her at the thought of the supposed protectors of justice.

  “Piper,” Lyre hissed.

  She heard it—voices down the hall, coming closer.

  “Quick,” she gasped, spinning around. The closet beside the front door, one door hanging open, beckoned. “In here.” She shoved Lyre into the half with the door closed and backed in after him. The familiar smell of her father’s cologne wafted off the nearest coat.

  “ . . . didn’t hear a damn thing,” a male voice complained as footsteps drew closer.

  “I thought I heard voices,” a woman replied irritably.

  “You imagined it. Probably because it’s so freaking boring here.”

  Their footsteps stopped in the middle of the foyer. Piper held her breath, pressing back into Lyre. His hands gripped her waist, his body rock-hard with tension. The man and woman argued over whether they should check upstairs.

  “There’s no one there,” the man exclaimed. “There hasn’t been anyone here for day
s. This is the stupidest assignment ever.”

  The woman grunted her agreement. “Fine,” she conceded. “But we’re supposed to be paying attention. I’m going to stand watch for a bit.”

  “Suit yourself,” the man said carelessly.

  The woman passed by the open side of the closet. Barely daring to breathe, Piper turned until she could peek through the gap where the door folded. A blurry silhouette of the woman stood in front of the window beside the front door, barely three feet from the closet, while the man sat, perfectly visible, on the bottom step of the staircase. He was thin and plain with brown hair and a scraggy goatee. He yawned obnoxiously as she watched. Not a daemon or a prefect. Who the hell were these two? And why were they “guarding” the Consulate?

  She leaned back into Lyre and turned her head toward him. “Not daemons,” she breathed. “Not prefects either. The woman is standing by the window right beside us. The man is sitting on the stairs.”

  His hands tightened on her waist. He put his mouth against her ear. “Do they look like they’ll be leaving soon?”

  She shook her head.

  “Damn.”

  They couldn’t wait in the closet forever. Ash was alone and helpless in the car, and if there were people guarding the house, there might be people patrolling the property. They had to get the information out of Quinn’s safe and get out of the house before they got caught.

  “What do we do?” she whispered desperately.

  Lyre’s fingers flexed while he thought as frantically as her. No ideas popped to mind. They should have waited for Ash. He would have known what to do.

  Lyre leaned in close again. “I have an idea,” he breathed in her ear.

  “What is it?”

  “Ummm,” he whispered. “Well, she’s female.”

  Piper blinked. “So?”

  “Aphrodisia will work on her.”

  She stared at the opposite wall, trying to figure out how that made sense. “You want to seduce her?” she asked incredulously. “How does that keep them from discovering us?”

  “You don’t understand,” he murmured. His hands slid up and down her waist in a quick, anxious sort of massage. “If I hit her with the magic, at the very least she won’t keep standing there. And with her male companion five feet away . . .” He grinned against her ear.

  “Oh, you’re bad,” she breathed, stifling a laugh. “Do it.”

  He settled his hands on the tops of her hips. “You got it. Uh, but Piper? I suggest you think unsexy thoughts.”

  She gritted her teeth. Great. She was leaning against an incubus who was about to unleash the full potency of his seduction magic. Even if he weren’t aiming at her, she would get caught in the crossfire.

  At first, it wasn’t too bad. She started to feel hot like her whole body was blushing and her extremities tingled. Warmth flared in her center. She clenched her jaw and peeked through the crack in the closet door. The silhouette of the woman was having trouble standing still. She fanned herself with one hand, then pressed it against the top of her chest. Her weight shifted from foot to foot and she inhaled sharply.

  Lyre laughed silently. The suppressed sound vibrated against Piper’s back and she arched back without thinking. He slid one hand around her hip to press against her lower belly but she could tell his attention wasn’t on her. Damn damn damn. Her thoughts were starting to get foggy and Lyre’s warmth behind her felt so good. Focus. Unsexy thoughts. What was an unsexy thought?

  “There she goes,” Lyre said, his whisper bubbling with laughter.

  Piper looked through the crack as the woman strode past. Her hands were clenching and unclenching as she bee-lined straight for the guy sitting on the stairs.

  He looked up. “What’s wr—”

  She grabbed his face and kissed him—full open mouth, tongue and everything. The guy was so surprised he fell into the stairs. The woman straddled him as she kissed him. It took exactly two seconds for the guy to get over his surprise and grab her around the waist. He rolled over and pinned her under him, equally enthusiastic. The clothes would start flying soon.

  Lyre leaned against Piper’s back as he peeked through the crack too. “You call that kissing?” he whispered. “I can kiss better drunk with both hands tied behind my back.”

  Piper wasn’t watching them anymore. Lyre’s warm breath tickling her ear as he spoke emptied her brain of thought. His laugh made heat swoop through her belly. Her hands found his hair. She tangled her fingers in the soft locks and arched her back, pressing into him.

  Lyre sucked in a sharp breath. “Uh, Piper . . .”

  “Shut up,” she breathed. She shifted her hips backward, eyes closing. “You’re a mean, mean incubus, you know that?”

  “Yeah,” he agreed huskily. He slid one hand over her stomach. The other caressed her jaw, tilting her head back. “But as much as I’d like to make it up to you, all my terrible shortcomings and everything, we can’t waste our chance to get out of the closet.”

  “I like the closet,” she mumbled, turning her head in the hopes of finding his mouth.

  “Uh-huh.” He nudged her forward. She tightened her grip on his hair. “Piper,” he said firmly, “let me go. We have to get out of here before they finish, which, considering that guy’s enthusiasm, won’t take long.”

  She blinked a couple times. “Right,” she whispered. “Let’s go.”

  He waited a few seconds. “You haven’t moved.”

  She searched for the willpower to let go. His warmth against her back felt so good, as did his hands touching her. He hadn’t let her go either, but then, incubi had even worse self-control. Her knees quivered and she desperately wanted to turn around and kiss him until she couldn’t breathe.

  No. She needed the information from the safe. They needed to get back to Ash before someone found him.

  She unclenched her hands and let her arms fall to her sides. Lyre let out a relieved sigh, although she thought there might have been a note of disappointment in there too. “See if the coast is clear,” he murmured.

  Feeling cold all over, she stepped to the edge of their hiding spot and looked around the edge of the door. Ewww. Yeah, those two weren’t about to notice her and Lyre. They probably wouldn’t notice the roof falling on their heads. She gestured for Lyre to follow and they crept out of the closet and across the foyer. The distracted couple didn’t so much as glance their way.

  Once they were in the hallway, they moved fast. Where two mysterious interlopers lurked, more might be found. Piper led the way to her father’s office without spotting anyone else. As she opened the door, Lyre touched her elbow.

  “I’ll go to the kitchen and get some food,” he whispered. “Meet me there.”

  He continued on as she stepped into the office and closed the door.

  The familiar, wonderful smell of home engulfed her, but the sight of the room cut her. It too had been searched with no care for anything. The desk had been broken in half, probably in a search for hidden compartments. The leather chair had been cut open and the stuffing scattered everywhere. Papers covered the floor like a white carpet.

  Lips pressed tight, she strode across the debris-littered floor to the floor-to-ceiling bookshelves, the contents of which were piled at its base. The painting that used to hang beside them was three feet away with a great slash through the canvas. She knelt and pressed the tiny catch in the corner above the baseboard.

  A soft pop told her it had worked. She swung an entire panel of wall open like a door. Behind it, a huge steel safe was embedded in the wall. The metal gleamed, the lock lined up perfectly at 0. She took a deep breath and began to turn it. When she spun the dial back to finish at 9, she lifted her fingers from the cool metal and said a silent prayer. Grabbing the handle, she pulled.

  The door swung silently open.

  The safe had two shelves inside full of file folders. Which one did she need? She didn’t have time to search them. She looked around wildly and spotted her father’s favorite briefcase h
alf buried under the remains of the desk. She grabbed it and pulled. It came free all at once and the desk hit the floor with a loud thump. Piper swore under her breath and rushed back to the safe. She grabbed handfuls of folders and stacked them in the briefcase. When the safe was empty, she forced the case shut and picked it up.

  The ceiling creaked over her head.

  She looked up sharply—there was someone there. It wouldn’t be Lyre; he was in the kitchen. Had the amorous couple heard the desk hit the floor? Knowing she had less than a minute, she rushed to the window and slid it open. When she couldn’t get the screen off, she pulled a knife and cut it. Watching the door out of the corner of her eye, she forced the briefcase through the gap in the screen, letting it fall into the shadows at the side of the building. Then she lurched away from the window, shut the safe door, and swung the panel closed to hide the compartment just as the office door flew open.

  Piper spun around, her back pressed to the panel.

  “Oho,” exclaimed a man she’d never seen before. He grinned. “She was right. The girl did come back.”

  “Of course,” said his companion. “That’s what scared kids do. They go home.”

  Both strangers were middle-aged men. One was tall and wiry, the other tall and beefy. They were dressed casually in jeans and jackets with stubble on their jaws that said they hadn’t been home in a while.

  “Who the hell are you?” Piper demanded. Not daemons, she was sure of that.

  “Good question,” the skinny one said. “We know who you are, Piperel Griffiths.”

  Uh-oh. “I know who you are too,” she mocked, hiding her consternation. “Trespassers who are going to get their asses kicked.”

  “Mouthy,” the heavy one remarked dispassionately. He gave her a considering look. “This is how it’s going to work, Piperel. You will come with us quietly or we will use force.”