“No, Greyson. Now,” she said, her fingers digging into my flesh so hard it hurt.
“O-Okay,” I stuttered and got moving. She led me to the transportation room, and I was right behind her, I swear… But I remembered the photograph in my desk drawer. The one of Cora. It was the last thing I had of her. I had to go back for it.
Kenzari was at the portal and through it before I turned around, racing back to my desk. I’d snagged the picture and was about to go back when the director stomped through. Following her were about ten of my coworkers.
“Get everything in the incinerator. No trails, no nothing. I don’t want to see one shred of intel on this floor, or I swear to everything holy, you won’t live to see tomorrow.”
The director didn’t make idle threats, and if the breach was for intel alone, we needed to follow protocol to the letter.
But a minute later, the director was gone, and we were surrounded in a room with no exits. The breach countermeasures meant we couldn’t get out of this room, couldn’t do anything but wait to die.
And die we did.
Scott’s soul was sad. He’d been born into a mage family with little power, little money, and few prospects. He’d married a human woman for love, not realizing that even with his limited abilities, he still had a very long mage life ahead of him. Cora had died the century prior in childbirth, their first and only child dying with her. Nowadays, Cora would have thrived. She’d had big ideas and even bigger plans. Scott missed her every day.
He didn’t mind leaving this earth, and he was excited to go where she was if such a thing were possible.
Absorbing his soul was bittersweet, the pain of his death hitting me everywhere as if I were experiencing it through his memories. But his love for his wife was a balm, too. It was a relief and a misery.
My lungs screamed at me, my entire body ached, my brain was a fuzzy mess, and I couldn’t remember why I couldn’t breathe. Two pairs of hands latched onto my arms and then sweet air kissed my lungs.
Breath whooshed through my airways for the first time in who knew how long, and all I could do was cough and sputter and try to ignore the blistering pain in my whole body. I had hoped that sending Scott on to his rest would be a relief, or at the very least a way to gain some knowledge, but I knew no more now than I did before and probably had some burned brain cells to show for it.
But darkness yanked at my heels, pulling me down. I should rest, right? Resting was good.
“Darby Adler, I swear to all that is holy, if you die, I will figure out how to yank your ass from the Underworld and make you pay,” a gruff male voice said. I assumed it was Bishop, but everything was dark, and I couldn’t make out who it came from.
Why was everything so dark?
Did Scott hurt anyone else? Was everyone okay?
“Is she breathing?” J asked, a mild panic in his tone. “Why isn’t she breathing?”
Why was he panicking? I was fine, wasn’t I?
But the darkness didn’t lift, and the world didn’t get clearer, and the sounds drifted away…
A man’s voice whispered in my ear, a muffled consonant of a sound, and then it felt like I was being shoved off a cliff with no safety net underneath me. Light burst everywhere: inside my brain, outside my body, there was brightness so sharp, it almost hurt to look at it.
Time to wake up, kid. There’s no resting yet. Not for a while.
It was another man’s voice—one I was sure I’d heard before. I knew it, but grasping at it just like everything else was so hard.
My eyes flashed open, and even though it felt like my whole body was being ripped apart, I dragged in another breath. A coughing fit racked me, the shake to my ribs an agony I hadn’t yet experienced before now.
Man, I could have done without that.
“Do we need a bus?” J asked, and I wanted to ask who needed an ambulance, but I had a sneaking suspicion it was me.
“Maybe, but I think I know where we can go that might be better suited for her. The last thing we need is her lighting up like a damn supernova in the middle of a hospital. Good thing you guys claimed there was a gas leak.”
Fuzzily, I focused on Bishop’s face.
“Did anyone get hurt?” I croaked, my voice sounding like broken glass.
Bishop knelt down and lifted me in his arms. “Just you, sweetheart. Just you.”
He cradled me there for a moment, the warmth of his body seeping into me. I hurt everywhere, but that one little bit of comfort almost lulled me to sleep.
By the time Bishop danced in the shadows, I was dead to the world.
17
There were few things worse than waking up with a hangover and knowing you didn’t even get to drink. Sunlight streamed in from a nearby window bright enough to sear my eyeballs, lighting my brain on fire. I reached for anything that would cover my head. A pillow, the covers, a shirt, anything, but all I found was a warm chest that most definitely did not have a shirt on it.
I sat straight up, the action alone being one of the top things I regretted in my life. It was only slightly behind losing my virginity to Tommy Salisbury my senior year of high school, and that one time I thought wearing white pants the day after I thought my period was over was a good idea.
Everything hurt. Everything. My arms, my legs, my skin, my brain. Hell, my internal organs felt like someone was taking a blowtorch to them, and it probably wasn’t even nine in the morning.
“Someone kill me,” I rasped, cradling my head in my hands. Anything to get the sun to stop roasting my eyeballs.
“Been there, done that. I would prefer it if you were among the living, if you don’t mind. I can’t see the dead, remember?”
Then I remembered that there was a person, sans shirt, in my bed, and now I knew who it was. I peeked through my fingers to see a bare-chested Bishop laying right next to me. He rested his head on his hands, his arms cocked up in the way men did when they knew they had a killer torso and wanted to show it off.
Was that pose even comfortable? I couldn’t recall the last time I’d laid down that way. It seemed like a really good way to make your arms fall asleep.
Tearing my gaze from tan abs and a set of pecs I could totally rest my head on, I scanned the room. Yep, it was definitely my house, my bed, and he was most certainly laying on top of my covers.
“No offense, because I’m seriously enjoying the view here, but why are you in my bed without your shirt on? Also, why do I feel like I’ve been hit by a truck? Moreover, is there coffee? Or Ibuprofen? Or food?”
I was trying to be funny, but Bishop didn’t smile. Instead, he sat up and leaned toward me. His face was a little haggard, his stubble reaching toward beard territory. He looked like he hadn’t slept, maybe all night, and I didn’t know why.
“I’m without a shirt because you bled on mine, and I didn’t want to stain your bedding. You feel like you’ve been hit by a truck because you went toe-to-toe with a poltergeist and nearly lost. And there are meds, breakfast, and the rest waiting for you in the living room. But I swear, Darby, you have to slow down. I know you think you can do it all, and maybe you can. I’ve never met a woman as strong as you. But not only did you stop breathing last night, your heart stopped as well. That ghost damn near drowned you. And that was after he threw you around like a rag doll and nearly pummeled you to death.”
My brain was slow to respond. Mostly because last night was so far past hazy it wasn’t funny. I vaguely remembered the mangled body of Scott Greyson, but much past that was a blur.
“So basically, what you’re saying is, you’re making me coffee and breakfast, and I’m supposed to sit down and let you wait on me? Because I hate to break it to you, Bishop, but I won’t be the one arguing with you.”
If I went ten rounds with a ghost last night, and he wanted to make me breakfast afterward, then I was pretty much in heaven. Well, as soon as my body quit yelling at me.
Bishop narrowed his eyes at me like I was pulling his leg. “You aren’t go
ing to fight me on this?”
I snorted. “No, Bishop, I won’t be fighting you on this. Mostly because I can’t fight shit right now. I don’t even know if I can walk.”
I hefted my legs over the side of the bed and tried to stand. In answer, the room decided it was time to turn into a tilt-a-whirl right about the moment I stood up, and I dumped my ass right back down on the bed.
“Well, that answers that question,” I muttered, holding onto the covers for dear life.
By the time I could open my eyes without wanting to toss my cookies, Bishop was kneeling at my feet. “How about you pretend your legs don’t work and I’m your transportation for the day. At least until we can get you fixed up.”
Again, I wasn’t going to argue. I gave him a small nod, one that wouldn’t make the room be mean to me, and he picked me up as if I weighed nothing. My head was not a fan, and I clung to Bishop shoulders as if I were being hefted off the face of the earth.
What the hell happened last night?
Bishop weaved through my house like he owned it, gently depositing me on my couch like he’d been here a hundred times before. As quick as a whip, my legs were covered in one of my throws, and I had a steaming cup of coffee in my hands. There was a splash of cream and a scoop of sugar, and I had to wonder if figuring out my food preferences was a superpower of his or if he used his resident oracle for intel.
After my tenth sip of the life-giving brew, I started asking questions.
“Is everyone okay?” I frowned, trying to recall the events of the night but turning up with nothing. “I don’t really remember what happened.”
Bishop rose an eyebrow at me as he turned my gas stove on. A shirtless man was making me breakfast in my kitchen. Did I really die in that damn ravine, or was I dreaming? The hiss of eggs hitting a frying pan made my stomach lurch with hunger, but I managed to stay in my seat and sip coffee like I was told.
“Yeah, no one but you and Mariana got hurt, and she healed up just fine. Greyson only wanted her, I think, and you either looked too much like her that he couldn’t tell you apart, or…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “You sure you’re feeling okay? I kind of thought you would remember.”
“It’s fuzzy. I remember his body, that’s for sure. But I’m positive it would have taken a lobotomy to scrub that from my brain. After that…” I shook my head. This time it didn’t make me want to hurl. Progress.
“So I take it you missed Ingrid coming by to help with the healing process, then?”
I snorted in my coffee. “Um, no. I think I would remember that. Ingrid Dubois came to my house?”
Was that my voice sounding so scandalized? Maybe, but Ingrid was Ingrid. There were things as the enforcer of the Dubois coven that other vamps just didn’t do. Making house calls was one of them. Not that I understood why she would come to my rescue—especially for healing.
I must have looked extremely confused because Bishop chuckled as he plated a pair of fried eggs and began buttering toast.
“You really haven’t made use of the boon she owes you, have you? As an FYI, vampire saliva has clotting properties. You were torn up from Greyson tossing you all over that ravine. With you glowing like a Roman candle, I couldn’t exactly take you to a hospital. Ingrid offered her services.”
It took about three seconds for my mind to process the image of Ingrid licking me for my coffee to almost come up. “Please don’t tell me—”
Bishop’s eyes popped wide. “No. There was zero tongue action in this house at any time last night.” He shuddered from head to toe, his face going green. “Absolutely not. There is a salivary duct in a vampire’s mouth. We used—or rather she—used a syringe and extracted the necessary amount, put it on your wounds, no stitches required.”
My heart rate dialed down about a zillion notches, and an aftershock of a shudder rocked through me.
“That’s good. Umm, for future reference, can I just bleed to death next time? Would that work for everyone?” I was only half-joking.
Bishop narrowed his eyes at me. “How about we just stop going head-to-head with poltergeists? How’d that be?”
He used the royal “we,” but he meant me. A part of me wondered what would have happened if I hadn’t made Hildy follow my father to watch over him. Would he have helped? Would I accidentally absorb him? That’s what I had to have done to Greyson, right? Flickers of memories flashed in my brain. A picture of a woman, my mother’s face telling him to stay, the white-haired man with no face as Greyson was killed.
A plate filled my field of vision, and I dove for it, snatching it out of Bishop’s hands before he could blink. The buttery toast and an egg were gone before he sat down with his own plate.
“How do you always know what food I want?” I asked after a couple of swallows. Bishop had given me four pieces of toast, six eggs, eight rashers of bacon, four sausage links, and several slices of tomato. It was a virtual cornucopia of all the best breakfast foods.
“I had help. Sarina says hi, by the way. She, Cooper, and the director are cleaning up the crime scene mess this morning. A good thing you two have the Code Boo shit worked out already. Blaming the light on a methane explosion came in handy.”
I tried to remember a light in the ravine, but my memory still had some mighty big gaps. I carefully munched on bacon and flipped through what little I remembered. “I don’t remember there being a light. I do remember seeing a bunch of darkness, though, but I’m pretty sure that was the back of my own eyelids.”
“It was right around the time J and I started giving you chest compressions, so you might have skipped that bit. I have to say, you sure know how to show a guy a good time. Poltergeist brawls, mutilated corpses, family fistfights. You’re just a bundle of giggles, Adler.”
I knew he was joking, but he wasn’t wrong. It seemed like more and more that this was my life. This is what happened. My life was fistfights and corpses. It was brawls with ghosts and interrogations and asking vamps for favors.
My life was a damn mess.
Instead of replying, I picked up my coffee mug and took a sip to hide my face. This was why I didn’t date. Why I hadn’t had a boyfriend since college. Last night—while harrier than was the norm—was what my life was made of. How the hell was I supposed to date in the middle of this shit?
Bishop gently squeezed my calf over the blanket. “I was kidding, Darby. Mostly. The ‘you not breathing bit’ wasn’t my kind of good time, but I’d rather spend a fucked-up night with you than a boring one with anyone else.”
“Are you flirting with me, Bishop?” Had it really only been a day since the last time I asked him that?
Bishop stole my plate from my lap and plucked the cup from my fingers. Then he leaned over me, caging my body with his. “Yeah, Adler. I’m flirting with you. Is it working?”
I gave him a slight nod, and that was all it took to make him drop his lips to mine. His kiss was gentle, like I was a fragile piece of glass and he really, really didn’t want to break me. He tasted of fresh coffee and bacon, and it was a hell of a taste. I wanted more, but my body was just not up for it. He seemed to sense this, his mouth gentling further on mine.
He broke the kiss, muttering, “Good,” against my lips before my plate was back on my lap and my cup was in my hand.
I hadn’t even put down my fork.
18
“Please tell me you’re joking,” J said before turning to Bishop and Sarina. “She’s joking, right?”
There was a blonde woman at my door, and I was under no illusion as to who it was. All three of them were barring Mariana’s entry to my house, and I couldn’t blame them. Scott had attacked her for a damn good reason. The fact that I took the brunt of it only pissed them all off.
My father was sitting at my feet, squeezing a hand over my toes that were still under my blanket. He appeared haggard after learning the events of last night. Compounded with the knowledge that I’d almost died, the grooves of his face had only deepened. Hildy had made good
on his promise to keep him alive, and that was all I really cared about, anyway.
“No, I’m not joking. I need to speak to Darby. If you don’t move, I’ll get less polite about it, though.”
Mariana was pushing her luck. As the day progressed, snippets of what had transpired started coming back to me. The way she’d just shown up at the ravine. Some of the images I’d gleaned from Scott, the darkness. She’d left them there to die. That part stuck out.
“Unless you’re coming in here with a damn good apology and some fucking answers, you can stay outside,” I called, my back to the door. I couldn’t even look at her. How could she leave them like that?
“Why else would I be here?” Mariana snapped, not actually answering my demand.
“To cause problems, to get under my skin, to exert your will to move me into a position I don’t want to be in. To make me miserable because you fucking can,” I volleyed back, rage coursing through me as the truth of each of those statements rang true.
Mariana growled but didn’t force herself into my home, which was a teensy point in her favor. “You need to know the truth, and until you know that you’re going to be in danger. Can’t you just listen to me? Five minutes and I’ll be gone.”
Sure she would.
“Five minutes is all you get,” I hissed, finally turning to look at her. “After that, Hildy gets you. After what you’ve done, he’s been aching to talk to you.”
The ghost in question was hanging out on my porch. He’d taken one look at me, saw how little I was healing, and lost his fucking mind. And that was before Bishop made me tell him what really happened. Mariana was living on borrowed time.
Mariana visibly gulped before her spine went ramrod straight again. J reluctantly stepped aside, but he didn’t appear happy about it. Bishop and Sarina did not, so Mariana was stuck three feet into my living room and looking through the gap in their shoulders.
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