She noticed the Crimson logo written in bloodred script on the side of the bag.
Crimson is Merrick’s bar.
“What’s your name?” she asked.
He shook his head. “It’s better if I don’t even give you that much. It’ll only make you want more.”
She laughed. “You are so full of yourself. I’ve met rock stars who were more down-to-earth than you.”
“That’s certainly true. Being down-to-earth is not something to which I aspire.”
Aspire. She’d been determined to make him an aspirant. Was she still? He had the talent, but he would be a nightmare to work with. Still, his playing…
“I’m Cerise Xenakis.” When his expression remained blank, she rolled her eyes. The fact that she was world famous could not have escaped his attention, especially when he was in the Etherlin, for God’s sake. And how was he still inside? When he’d smiled, she hadn’t seen fangs. Was he ventala or not?
“I’m the Etherlin muse who inspires musicians.”
She waited for him to respond and he finally said, “Congratulations?”
She scowled. “This center belongs to the Etherlin community.”
“It was built for great music. That’s what I bring.”
She held out a hand. “I know. I’m not going to give you a hard time for trespassing. You clearly deserve to be here. I want to talk to you about your aspirations. What do you want to do with your music?”
“Play it?”
Smart ass. She smiled. “Nothing beyond that? C’mon,” she said. “You could’ve snuck into an auditorium anywhere in the world. You chose one in the Etherlin. Wasn’t some part of you hoping to be discovered by a muse? By me?”
“Definitely not,” he said flatly. “I chose this place because it’s the best place to play that’s close to where I live.”
“Close to where you live? Where is that?”
“Will you excuse me? I should go.”
“So go.” She had no intention of leaving him alone. She wanted to see how he was getting in and out.
“I need to snuff the candle. To leave it burning would risk a fire.”
His turn of phrase seemed odd at times. Where was he from originally? Not the Varden. His speech was too precise and too archaic to have been born of its mean streets.
“I tire of waiting,” he said.
She glanced at the girder. The drop was dizzying. She didn’t blame him for wanting to avoid any distractions when he walked out there to get the candle, but what idiotic impulse had caused him to put the candle there in the first place? Maybe he’d gone out there to have a look at the book?
“Sorry, but I’m not leaving,” she said. “I came to retrieve the book that’s sitting next to the candle. Since you’re getting the candle, it would be cool of you to bring me the book. That way both of us don’t have to walk out there.”
“Step aside,” he said.
She glanced at the end of the beam. There was plenty of room for him to get to it without her moving out of his way. “I’m not going to touch you,” she said.
“Of that I’m certain.” He ran a hand through his hair, adding more chaos to locks that already defied a style. “Nevertheless,” he said with a gesture for her to move.
She held out her hands in surrender and backed up. “Take all the space you need. I’ll wait here. You can just drop the book as you go past.”
He turned and strode out onto the beam without a moment’s hesitation or fear. She glanced at his legs and noticed for the first time that his feet were bare. She also noticed the scars on his back. There were many of them. Mostly thin lines where bladelike cuts had been made, but there were also two thick vertical lines just inside his shoulder blades that didn’t look like the other scars. They weren’t flat and shiny white as the others were. They looked like golden brown grooves. The tops and bottoms of the vertical scars came to points that were unnaturally perfect.
What the hell are those marks?
She studied them and then her eyes lingered on his waist and down to the seat of his leather pants. He had an athlete’s butt. Griffin had been good-looking, but he’d been somewhat androgynous. This mystery musician had a stunningly beautiful face, despite its scars, but there was nothing pale or fragile about his body. He could probably play a piano; he also looked like he could lift one. The appeal of that combination was not lost on a muse who inspired great athletes as well as great musicians.
She watched his sure footwork as he turned and strode back toward her, candle and book in hand.
“Do you dance?” she asked, her gaze fixed on his well-defined stomach muscles.
“Often and well.”
“Is there anything you don’t do well?” she asked dryly.
“I don’t lie well. Sometimes it would be convenient if I did.”
She glanced at his face. “You’re odd.”
“That’s the other thing I don’t do well.”
“What?”
“Blend.”
He walked to his duffel bag.
“Hey,” she said.
He glanced over his shoulder.
“You forgot to give me the book.”
“No, I didn’t,” he said, zipping the duffel over the candle and Griffin’s songbook.
“What the hell?” She rushed toward him, but he shouldered the bag and sprinted away. Her socks slipped on the floor, but even if they hadn’t, despite being able to run a five-and-a-half-minute mile, she wouldn’t have been able to keep pace with him.
By the time she rounded the corner, he’d disappeared. She looked around and up. She heard a rustle of wind, but by the time she raced back to where she thought the sound had come from, he was gone. She checked the stairwells, but there was no sign of him.
Where the hell did he go?
She swore in frustration. Griffin’s songbook had probably been sitting on that beam unattended for almost a year, and on the night she’d finally seen it, she’d had the bad luck to run into Merrick’s eccentric friend. The other bizarre thing about the night was that for the twenty minutes she’d spent talking to him, despite being aware of the songbook, she hadn’t thought about Griffin or been pained by his memory.
That still didn’t mean she could leave the songbook with the mystery musician. She needed to read it and then she needed to turn it over to the Molly Times.
Cerise put a hand to her forehead and grimaced. The only thing she really knew about the phantom musician was that he was a friend of Merrick’s. It looked like she would be talking to Alissa sooner than she’d intended.
Cool air grazed Cerise’s cheek, and she glanced heavenward. Everything slammed into place.
The children of men will not recognize him for what he is unless he reveals himself. They will look, but not see.
“In the rafters…” Cerise murmured. “Not in the falling playground. In the fallen’s playground above the stage.”
Ventala don’t have scars, and they don’t have vertical grooves on their backs that could conceal wings.
Merrick’s friend is a fallen angel.
Table of Contents
Cover
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
Acknowledgments
Table of Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
Chapter 10
Chapter 11
Chapter 12
Chapter 13
Chapter 14
Chapter 15
Chapter 16
Chapter 17
Chapter 18
Chapter 19
Chapter 20
Chapter 21
Chapter 22
Chapter 23
Chapter 24
Chapter 25
Chapter 26
&
nbsp; Chapter 27
Chapter 28
Chapter 29
Chapter 30
Chapter 31
Chapter 32
Chapter 33
Chapter 34
Chapter 35
All That Bleeds Page 33