by Beth Alvarez
She opened her mouth to speak.
He raised a hand before she could. “I just want to know what my next job is. I can’t help you with this, and if I’m going to be here, I might as well be useful. I don’t know the city, the people, or anything about...” The corner of his eye twitched before he went on. “Well, any of the other stuff going on.”
“That doesn’t mean you can’t help.” Felicity dropped all the writing utensils into a cup, positioning it on the corner of the map. “More hands are useful. More eyes.”
“Then I’ll just say it. I don’t want to be involved.”
She couldn’t fault him. “There will be paperwork, whether or not you want to be involved.”
Owen shrugged. “Nothing I’m not used to.”
“All right. It’ll be either Justine or Thaddeus who will contact you with that. Until then, we’ll just pretend nothing is different. Okay?” She wasn’t sure how they were supposed to do that, but he nodded.
“In the meantime,” she continued, “you could go to the bakery and help my dad. He can manage on his own, but I’m sure he’ll appreciate the assistance. If you can keep him there a little late, even better.”
“I can do that,” Owen said, getting to his feet. “I’m good at delaying the inevitable.”
“Thank you.” Felicity smiled. “It helps.”
He grunted softly and pushed in his chair, excusing himself without any further discussion.
Felicity returned to her own seat, leaning against the table and cradling her forehead in her hand.
In the wake of everything, it didn’t feel like only one day since Cole had summoned her home. It hadn’t even been a full twenty-four hours, for that matter—it was still early afternoon.
Was the rest of her life going to be like this? A constant cycle of calamities threatening to tear her relationship apart? She was good at putting on a mask and getting down to business, but she’d thought the death of the rogue vampire Drake du Coudray had been the end of it. They were supposed to have peace, quiet, and happily-ever-after. The little stack of RSVPs that had arrived in the mail that morning served as a harsh reminder, taunting her from where they waited, unopened, in the middle of the table.
Unwilling to take it, she took the stack and, one by one, tore them open.
Most of the invitations had gone to friends in Holly Hill and the surrounding area. Felicity had little in the way of extended family; the few relatives she had were nearby. They’d sent a number of invitations to Kade’s family and friends back east. She almost dreaded getting those replies. What if there ended up not being a wedding at all?
“Can’t think that way,” she muttered, inspecting each of the cards. Everyone from Holly Hill who replied was coming. No surprise there. At least she’d have another job to give Owen whenever he came back. Marking off RSVPs in her binder of wedding notes would take him at least fifteen minutes.
“Gertie’s on her way over,” Penny announced as she shuffled back in from the living room. “She’ll be here soon, since... well, I mean, her shop is all of three blocks away.”
“I’m sure she’s dying for some fresh gossip.” Felicity rolled her eyes.
“Speaking of that,” Penny said, the corners of her mouth twitching. “Is Kade really in his forties?”
Felicity groaned. “Did they really print that?”
“They sure did.” A ghost of a smile flittered across Penny’s face. “They put it under a bold headline. Kade Colton the Cradle Robber.”
The urge to roll her eyes again was so strong that Felicity hung her head, covering her face with one hand. “He’ll be thrilled to hear that, I’m sure.”
“Maybe he’ll think it’s funny. I can’t imagine he would have let Miss Gertie know if he thought it was dangerous information.”
Penny had a point, but that didn’t mean Felicity had to like it. In the face of everything else, what should have seemed a trivial interaction between her intended and the old busybody instead seemed like one more risky tidbit leading to this mess.
The doorbell rang before Felicity could think of a response that didn’t seem bitter and sullen. She pushed herself up. “That must be her.”
“I’ve got it,” Penny said, waving for her to sit back down.
Felicity sank into her chair, closing her eyes and bracing for the difficult conversation to come.
Aside from a few murmured pleasantries at the door, Gertie’s arrival was quiet, which didn’t bode well. Penny returned with the old woman in tow, both solemn.
“Thank you for coming, Miss Gertie,” Felicity began haltingly.
Gertie made a small sound of disapproval in her throat. “I’d say it’s my pleasure, but it sounds like someone’s got some explaining to do. Sweet Penelope here said it was an emergency. I swear, if your sweetheart went and shot his fool self after all-”
“It’s not that,” Felicity cut in, nodding her appreciation as Penny pulled out a chair and helped the old woman get seated. “But it’s complicated. I almost don’t know where to start.”
“That’s easy,” Gertie said. “Just go back to the beginning.”
That was one way to do it. Felicity chewed her lower lip, mentally backtracking as far as she thought was relevant. “Well... okay. A few days ago, Nick-”
Gertie slapped the table so hard that both younger women jumped. “That miscreant?” she exclaimed, a wicked gleam in her aged eyes. She leaned back in her chair, smug as a cat licking cream from its whiskers. “Well, well. It’s about time.”
NINETEEN
* * *
THE LIGHTS STAYED off for what felt like an eternity. Kade didn’t know if it was hours or days before the incandescent light bulbs pinged on. For a long time, the low buzz of electricity was all he heard. Then, gradually, the sound of footsteps drifted to his cell.
He didn’t know if he was the only prisoner in the apparent dungeon, but he suspected he was. He hadn’t heard any movement—or even so much as breathing—that wasn’t his own. With no light and nothing in the cell but him, Kade hadn’t moved much. When he raised his head to meet his Keeper’s eyes through the bars, he was in the exact same place he’d been when the old man left.
“Pleasant news,” Thaddeus said, though his gravelly voice held all the pleasantry of a rake scraping across concrete. “Your case has been reviewed. The organization currently finds you no threat.”
“And you couldn’t have told them that yourself?” Kade rubbed the back of his neck as if to smooth his own hackles.
“My opinion was of little consequence. I am your Keeper. I am not considered a neutral party.” The old man unlocked the door, the hinges groaning theatrically as he opened it. “Come along. There’s paperwork to be done.”
Paperwork. Of course. Kade pushed himself up from the floor, grunting when his body protested. Sometimes he wondered how anyone thought vampires truly dead. He wasn’t made for sitting still; he couldn’t even stay still in his sleep. Felicity teased him about his tossing and turning. More often than not, he woke to find himself face-down in the pillows, sprawled across most of the bed. Usually with his limbs all tangled up in the blankets, indicating she’d lost the tug-of-war over the covers in the night. How she put up with him, he didn’t know.
Thinking of her put a dull ache in his chest. Kade chased the thoughts away as he followed Thaddeus up the stairs. “So I get to go home?”
“Not at all,” Thaddeus said. “The threat level is to be evaluated tomorrow, but I expect it shall be found that Holly Hill is an insecure region.”
“Which means what?” Kade growled. The Keeper could talk circles day and night, and would, if left to his own devices.
“Relocation. Potentially with a new identity.”
“And what about Filly?”
“Whether Miss Hammond will be allowed to maintain communication has yet to be determined.”
“Yet to be determined?” Kade stopped at the bottom stair. “She’s gonna be my wife! We already sent weddin’ invitat
ions and everything, and if you think I’m gonna-”
The Keeper rounded on him with a snarl and before he could react, Kade found himself pinned to the wall. The old man’s gnarled hands gripped his shirt, pulling the fabric so tight Kade thought it might rip. Anger flashed in his dark eyes and when Thaddeus spoke, it was through clenched teeth.
“You are dead, Mr. Colton! Deceased!” the Keeper almost hissed. “Any binding, legal contracts you wish to fulfill must be managed by a Keeper or they are completely invalid. If you wish for anything—anything at all—to go in your favor, you will close your mouth and cooperate. You are a pawn, Mr. Colton, and the organization will see you move or they will remove you from the board. Do you understand?”
Kade stared back at him, unable to find words or the strength to respond. In a decade of working together, he’d never seen the old man react to anything with violence. Never mind the sheer strength he displayed—he’d never imagined the Keeper could be so strong. Now that the initial shock subsided, Kade felt a dull ache in the back of his head where he’d struck the wall. Had he a heartbeat, it might have throbbed.
Slowly, the old man’s knobby fingers uncurled. “Curb your headstrong notions.” His voice was low, threatening, but calm. “Fill out the paperwork I give you. Remain patient and cooperative, and you may be allowed to see Miss Hammond again.”
The words wrapped chains around Kade’s heart and dragged it down as if anchored. Swallowing against the thickness in his throat, he said the only thing he could think of. “Yes, sir.”
They climbed the stairs together and Thaddeus paused at the top. “Walk with your chin up. You are a cocky former hunter, not a kicked puppy.”
“A cocky former hunter with a knot on the back of his head,” Kade muttered. It was swollen and tender now, irritated by his cowboy hat. He considered removing it, but if his Keeper wanted him to carry on as if nothing was wrong, that wasn’t going to help.
“A minor injury,” the old man replied. “You will survive.”
As long as he didn’t agitate the Keeper further, Kade assumed. He eyed the old man’s back and put a little more space between the two of them. He’d always thought the Keeper a fragile geezer. He wouldn’t make that mistake again.
Thaddeus led him past the hunters’ basement barracks and to the first floor, where the old man’s office sat nestled among those of countless other Keepers. His was fairly spacious and had no windows, which was preferable for vampires; anyone else might have hated it. That Thaddeus was given preferential treatment among the Keepers in the Nashville headquarters had never escaped Kade, and he wondered at the question he’d asked the night before. Someone made the rules, and it was probably someone who received preferential treatment.
“The paperwork is ready for you to review.” Thaddeus ushered him into the dim office and motioned toward the neat row of documents at the edge of his desk. “I must attend something else, so I shall leave you for a few moments while you read and sign. Do not stray from this office.”
“Wasn’t plannin’ to.” Kade stalked around the desk to sit in the office’s only chair, staring down at the paperwork.
Forms for relocation and a new identity.
He squeezed his eyes closed.
Thaddeus shut the door on his way out.
Kade had half a mind to jam every one of those documents into the tall paper shredder that sat behind the desk. Instead, he shoved himself back out of the chair the moment the door was closed. He jerked open the desk’s top drawer, scouting for the keys to the file cabinets lining the walls. There was painfully little he could do from Nashville, but the interview—interrogation, he corrected himself—that took place right after his arrival still burned hot in his mind.
If anyone had information that could point to corruption in the organization, it would be Thaddeus. Even if the old man didn’t know it yet.
The starting point was clear. He’d reported the presence of the lycanthrope and fed information to Thaddeus for the Keeper to pass on. If the filing system hadn’t changed, new leads and open contracts went in the second drawer of the tall cabinet to the left of the desk. Judging by what he knew about Thaddeus, he expected it would be there.
Then again, he didn’t know what he knew about Thaddeus anymore. He’d had a firm idea of what the Keeper was like before now; between the trip out of Holly Hill, however long he’d spent in the basement, and that outburst downstairs, Kade was no longer sure he knew as much as he first thought. Thaddeus had always been predictable, operating by the book. The old man didn’t seem much like the Thaddeus he’d known, and that was more unsettling than anything else that had happened.
Things changed. Thaddeus didn’t. Or, that was how it was supposed to be.
The ring of keys was hidden in a small box at the back of the drawer. Kade dug it out and checked the numbers on the keys against those etched into the lock on the cabinet. He jammed the matching key into the lock, twisting it open and jerking out the drawer. His fingers flew over the tabs on the files as he checked titles and dates. Halfway through, he froze.
A worn manila folder, its front smudged with old ink, sat among the new. Its tab shifted under his fingertip, tilting its peeling label toward the light.
COLTON, K. G. - HUNTER.
What was that doing there? He snatched the file and flipped it open.
The latest updates were missing, nothing mentioning his reports on a lycanthrope’s presence or his being summoned back to Nashville, but a number of hand-written additions to the page at the front of his file made his stomach turn.
The words Potential Threat sprawled across the information sheet that bore his ID photo, underlined and highlighted. Below it, smaller text elaborated: Confirmed consumption. Suspected Level 5. See attached.
Swallowing hard, Kade paged through the rest of the papers until he found another sheet covered in bright yellow highlighter and color-coded sticky notes. He slid it out a few inches, skimming the text.
It was a report of the events at Drake du Coudray’s ranch, but the highlighted parts concerned him. Bright yellow lines expanded on the way he’d killed the elder vampire, the way he’d lost hold of himself immediately afterward, and the concerns he’d expressed to his Keeper after leaving Holly Hill to complete his remaining contracts. A sticky note affixed beside them described warning signs. Improved senses and strength didn’t seem threatening, but the rest...
Hypnosis. Telepathy. He didn’t know what mistwalking was, but he suspected it was the way du Coudray had dissolved into thin air whenever he and Felicity fired at him.
It wouldn’t have bothered him if he hadn’t known for a fact he could read Felicity’s mind.
“Come on, now,” Kade muttered to himself, jamming the paper back into place and pushing the file back where he’d found it. “Don’t get distracted. Can’t do a thing about it.” He’d just have to watch what he said and did where the Keepers could watch.
He checked the files in the front of the drawer again. Nothing regarding recent reports, which meant the file had to be out already. Pushing the drawer closed, he locked it and returned the keys to their hiding place. Then, one by one, he opened the drawers down both sides of the desk.
The old man kept paperwork on everything. All he needed was some idea who the lycan contract had been given to before it reached Cole. If he could find the connection between their two Keepers, he’d know where information was being skewed.
Kade found the file in the bottom right-hand drawer of the desk. He slid it out, pausing when he saw a second copy underneath. Had it been forwarded to more than one Keeper? That complicated things already. He pulled it out too, spreading the first copy on top of the papers he was supposed to be reviewing.
It looked like a normal pre-contract alert, the first few pages outlining the situation—just as Kade had explained it—and making no assumptions about the state of the potential quarry. But there were none of the sticky notes or paperclipped sheets that would specify where it had been sen
t, and that didn’t make sense. Thaddeus tracked everything. He wouldn’t have forgotten to write it down.
Unless it was just a duplicate copy that hadn’t been sent yet, Kade mused. He closed it and opened the second folder, smothering the small twinge of relief that came from finding everything inside appeared normal. A note at the top specified the folder had been forwarded to Keeper Edwin Hartford, with instructions to pass it on to Keeper Jones.
So it had only gone through one pair of hands before reaching Justine and, by extension, Cole. That was good; that made things easier. He’d just have to find out who Keeper Edwin Hartford was, then he’d have something to go on. He slid the papers back into order, pausing when his fingertips slipped over something uneven.
Correction fluid.
In all his years working with Thaddeus, he had never seen the Keeper mark out a mistake. The old man didn’t make mistakes. Not even typographical errors. He opened to the guilty page, his brow furrowing.
The revisions on the page were exactly what he’d expected to find in Keeper Hartford’s paperwork, not his own Keeper’s office. Verification of a feral lycanthrope. Locations the monster would likely be found. A recommendation to pursue immediate elimination. All of it written in the old man’s elegant hand.
Keeper Hartford would have hand-typed a copy of the report before issuing it to Justine. Hadn’t he thought the hand-written revisions suspicious?
Or had Thaddeus’s position in the organization—something Kade had never quite figured out—kept him from suspecting anything?
Kade scrubbed a hand over his face, then peeled a sticky note from the top of the pad Thaddeus kept on the desktop. He jotted down Keeper Hartford’s name and the dates on the paperwork, since that was one of the revisions made, and stuffed the note into his pocket.
At least this meant Justine was likely safe to talk to, but right now, Kade wasn’t even sure what he’d say.
He’d never thought his own Keeper would be involved.