by Jane Kindred
Rhea stepped past her and grabbed Theia’s hand, dragging her toward the breakfast counter that separated the living room from the kitchen. “Of course they’re staying. It’s Yule. And Leo’s making honest-to-God glögg. I bet you don’t have that in hell.”
Lucien put his hands in his pockets, gazing after his stolen wife. “Well, actually, hell isn’t really that different. It’s just on another...” He stopped and rolled his eyes. “Oh, for fuck’s sake. I’m devilsplaining. Never mind. Let’s eat, drink and be merry!”
Chapter 27
The food and drink were as amazing as they smelled, and the company, despite the crowded little house, was far more enjoyable than Lucy had expected. After dinner, the Carlisle sisters shared a tradition of “passing fire”—one person lighting the next person’s candle and continuing around the circle as they welcomed the return of the light—and even Colt participated, blowing a little bauble of flame onto the candle in Lucy’s hand with a shy smile.
Colt never did warm up to Lucien, but Lucy took the boy aside before the evening wound down and explained to him that he had to go home and that Lucien was her brother and she trusted him. She wasn’t sure if Colt finally agreed or simply gave up, but it broke her heart a little to see his head hanging as he walked out between Lucien and Theia.
As she headed home, she remembered her car was in Jerome, and she had to get the Range Rover back to Fran. She parked the SUV in the lot at her place and called Allison in the morning to have a car sent to drop her off in Jerome and have the Range Rover picked up and returned. She hesitated a moment when Allison answered, remembering that she—and everyone else at Smok Biotech—had been sabotaging Lucy for months. But it wasn’t Allison’s fault, and if Laurel was right, it was all sorted now. Whether it mattered or not. If Darkrock had uploaded that footage to the cloud, she was screwed—even if everyone in the compound was dead.
Lucy stared at the tiles while she stood under the shower. Was Oliver dead? How could he not be? He’d been in the midst of the flames fifty feet below the ground, and unlike Lucy, he couldn’t transform into a dragon and fly away.
She felt empty again, the way she’d always felt before Oliver. The difference now was that she knew she was empty. All she’d lived for was her work. And now she might not even have that. Oh, some semblance of Smok International would survive, but the usual consulting jobs—exorcising demons and chasing down wayward therianthropic millionaires who’d forgotten to take their meds—didn’t hold the same appeal they once had. Biogenetics was the real excitement. That was where the future was. And Smok Biotech was finished.
The water had run cold. Lucy shut it off and stepped out to get dressed. She wasn’t really feeling the Prada suits today. A pair of khakis and a black cotton turtleneck would do. She slicked back her hair with a little glosser and applied her signature stain to her lips. She was going to have to report back to the council today that the creature was dead...and that Oliver was, too. Might as well grab a suit jacket and wear the boots that gave her a little height. People seemed to respect her expertise more when she was taller.
Even in the daytime, colored lights and strings of white seemed to drape everything as her driver took her through Sedona, the red rock formations above them sprinkled with snow making it look like a holiday postcard. How had she not even noticed it was almost Christmas? What, even, was the point of Christmas? She might as well be spending it in hell. Goddamn Lucien. He always got the better end of the deal.
She’d emailed Nora that she had news to deliver, and they’d agreed to meet at the Civic Center building at noon. Nora and Wes rose to greet her as she entered the meeting room.
“I’ve tried calling Oliver to let him know about the meeting, but his phone seems to be out of service, so it’s just the two of us today.” Nora smiled tentatively as they sat. “I hope it’s good news you have to share with us? No new sightings have been reported recently, so that’s a good sign.”
“It is,” said Lucy. “I’m happy to report that the problem has been handled. You shouldn’t have any more trouble.”
“Oh, that’s marvelous! And just in time for Christmas.”
Wes was a little more reserved. “Was it a werewolf, like we thought?”
“It was a...” Lucy paused. “I’d call it a malevolent shape-shifting entity. That’s really the closest I can come to describing it.”
Nora shuddered. “Well, thank goodness it’s gone. Oliver’s nose is bound to be out of joint when he finds out he was wrong.”
“About Oliver—”
“What about Oliver?” The words were delivered in an amused baritone from behind her.
Lucy turned to see Oliver standing in the doorway looking remarkably none the worse for wear—not even a singed eyebrow to show he’d been in a fire. She started to her feet, relief so complete rushing through her that her knees went weak, and she dropped back onto the chair.
“Oliver...” She’d lost the capacity for professionalism. Or human speech.
“I had a little trouble with my phone. Sorry I’m late.” He came into the room and sat across from her. “So, did I hear right? You were talking about our shape-shifting menace in the past tense?”
“I...”
“Yes.” Nora beamed. “Ms. Smok explained that she’s taken care of it.”
“Oh, she’s taken care of it.”
“I didn’t say...”
“Well, that is terrific news. I have to admit that I wasn’t sold on the idea of bringing in an outsider to handle town business, but I think we were totally out of our league here. Bringing in Ms. Smok was the right call.” Oliver’s smile had a devious twinkle to it. “So, Nora, I trust you’ve handled the payment details?”
Nora pulled a check from her purse and held it out to Lucy. “Absolutely. The fee we agreed on, plus a little extra as a thank-you.”
Lucy took the check, still feeling like she was several seconds behind everyone, and the others rose.
Oliver offered his hand to help her up, evidently aware that she was feeling shaky on her feet. “Can I treat you to a coffee and a muffin over at Delectably Bookish, or are you off to your next appointment?”
“I’m...no, I’m good.”
Oliver raised an eyebrow. “No, I can’t treat you?”
“I mean, yes to the coffee and muffin. No appointments.”
Nora and Wes had left the room.
Oliver closed the door. “Sorry to surprise you like that.”
“I thought you were dead.”
“I gathered. You look like you might even have been a little upset at the idea.” He’d stepped closer to her, so close, but not touching. Lucy was having trouble forming words. Oliver leaned down so that his mouth was next to hers. “Were you? A little?”
“Oh, shut up.” Lucy grabbed him by the collar and breached the distance between their mouths. Slipping his arms around her, Oliver pressed her close, deepening the kiss until Lucy pulled away breathlessly, realizing how horribly unprofessional this was. And that Oliver was still in love with his dead wife, who might even show up at any moment and want to take over.
“We should probably get going. You mentioned coffee and muffins.”
Oliver put his hands in his pockets and studied her for a moment. “You are a damn hard nut to crack.”
Lucy turned and pushed open the door. “I’m not any kind of a nut.”
Oliver snorted. “I beg to differ.”
At the shop, he paused as he unlocked the door. “Before we go in, I should warn you that we’re not alone.”
She’d managed to regain her composure on the walk over, and she glanced at him curiously. “Oh, is Kelly working?”
“No, she has the week off for the holidays, but I have a couple of houseguests.”
Lucy’s skin prickled with apprehension. Had some of his Darkrock compatriots managed to survive a
long with him?
Oliver opened the door and stepped back to let her go first, and Lucy glanced around. “I don’t see anyone.”
“They’re upstairs.” Before the words were out of his mouth, three juvenile white wolves with red-tipped ears came racing down the stairs with wagging tails, bouncing around Oliver in greeting.
Lucy watched with amazement. “You found the other hellhounds.”
“Actually, they found me. When I used my power to call fire, it apparently called them, as well.”
“Why would the hellhounds come to you?”
“It turns out, at least according to a certain siren, that the father I never met was a son of the king of Annwn.”
Lucy blinked. “Of where?”
“The fairy realm of Welsh mythology. Which is apparently not so mythical.”
“So you’re...”
“Half Fae. And it seems these little wolves belong to the Cŵn Annwn, the Hounds of the Otherworld. And they consider me their pack leader.”
“You’re the hunter.”
“The hunter?”
“Leo Ström told me Colt was looking for the leader of the Wild Hunt. Or a Wild Hunt. Leo is my sister-in-law’s sister’s...” Lucy paused. “Oh, hell. There’s too many layers. Suffice it to say, he happens to be the leader of Odin’s Hunt—you can thank him for the extra-snowy winters we’ve been having—and he said there were many Wild Hunts, and that Colt must belong to one.”
Oliver’s expression grew sober. “Where is Colt? Is he okay?”
“He’s fine, but I...”
“Lucy?” His brows drew together with displeasure. “What did you do?”
“They can’t live in this world, Oliver. I had to send him back.”
For an instant, the flames returned to his eyes. “You what?”
“I didn’t hurt him. I told you, he’s fine. But Lucien and Theia came to collect him. He’s gone home.” Lucy folded her arms, tucking one hand tightly at her side, uncomfortable under his continued glare, though the flames had receded. “My mother’s a doctor—she’s the one who took the bullet out of his hip and stitched him up. She said he seemed ‘fundamentally unwell,’ as though something essential to his continued survival was lacking in our world. I imagine the same is true for these three.” She shrugged helplessly. “I’m sorry.”
The wolves had settled around him, sitting on their haunches and watching Lucy intently.
“You don’t know anything about them,” Oliver said at last.
“No, I don’t. You’re right.”
“I’m right about something?” Oliver threw his arms in the air. “Let me mark this day on my calendar.” Light glinted off the ring on his left hand.
Lucy uncrossed her arms. “I think I’d better take a pass on the coffee and muffins.”
“Lucy—”
“See you, Oliver.” She turned and walked out to her car without glancing back, and he didn’t follow her. Whatever had happened between them, whatever she’d thought might happen in the future, he was already taken. Better to make a clean break. She had enough experience with broken bones to know that it was the best chance at healing. This was why she didn’t do relationships. Because all you had to do was disappoint someone once and they would disappear from your life.
And maybe she wasn’t thinking about her almost-relationship with Oliver at all. Maybe she was thinking about how she’d spent the first twenty-five years of her life walking on eggshells around her father, always being so careful never to disappoint him the way her mother had. But the fact remained that not getting involved meant not having to feel like she felt right now. Because somehow, she had fallen for Oliver.
When she got back to the villa, Lucy left instructions with Allison to clear her calendar for the next few days and not to put any calls through to her or bother her unless it was an emergency. It was Christmastime, she realized, so she gave Allison the rest of the week off, as well.
She was tired. Tired of being on alert all the time, tired of trying to suppress her wyvern nature, tired of trying to navigate a world where people kept insisting on dragging her into their emotional nonsense. She stripped out of her clothes and turned off her phone and took the remaining dose of the dreaming compound she’d gotten from the lab—along with her shift control meds—before climbing into bed. Time to sleep. Finally. Maybe hibernate. Fuck the world.
Chapter 28
A persistent rapping dragged her out of a deep and—despite the drug—blissfully dreamless sleep. Who the hell could be at her door? Lucy pulled on her robe and slipped her gun into the pocket. She couldn’t even remember what her last job was. Were there still any hell fugitives left to collect? Not that they would knock.
The pounding was growing louder.
“Goddammit. What the fuck do you want?” Lucy yanked the door open to find Oliver standing on her doorstep. She said it more quietly. “What the fuck do you want?”
“Can I come in for a moment?”
“Why?”
Oliver sighed and looked up at the falling snow—there were already several inches of it on the ground, unusual for Sedona—before meeting her eyes once more. “Does everything have to be a contest of wills?”
“Yes.” Lucy moved away from the door without closing it. That was all the invitation he was going to get.
Oliver stepped inside and closed the door. “I talked to your brother’s sister-in-law’s—I talked to your friend Leo. Polly hooked me up with him. And don’t worry, I didn’t give her any more tokens of my gratitude. You were right about the hounds. They aren’t meant to stay in this realm long-term. Leo put me in touch with the rest of the Carlisle clan.” He smiled and shook his head. “They’re an interesting bunch. Rafe Diamante and Dev Gideon arranged for me to communicate with the other side, as it were. Dev apparently shares his physical form with a Sumerian dragon demon that simultaneously exists within the underworld. Were you aware of that?”
Lucy shrugged. “Yes.”
Oliver tilted his head like one of his hounds. “Your family and extended family are chock-full of extra-humans, and yet you spend your time hunting them down.”
“I hunt the ones that don’t belong here. Can you just get to the point?”
“The point is, I spoke with someone in Annwn and got the boys back to where they belong, including Colt. They weren’t supposed to be in Lucien’s domain. Some necromancer temporarily thinned the walls between some of the underworlds in an attempt to escape hell.”
“Oh, for God’s sake.” Carter Hamilton was like some kind of killer maniac from an ’80s slasher movie that just kept coming. Someone should buy him a goalie mask. And then punch him in the junk.
Oliver smiled. “The Carlisle women all had the same reaction. At any rate, the thinning has been repaired and the Cŵn Annwn are safe and sound. Including Colt. He’s been reunited with them.”
“I’m glad.” And she was. Those little downcast eyes had been haunting her. Lucy rubbed her arms. She hadn’t bothered to turn on the heat, and her wyvern hormones had finally tapered off now that she’d taken her meds.
“You look cold.”
“Yeah. I had the heat off while I was sleeping.”
“I could help warm you up.”
“Oliver.”
“Can you just tell me why you’re so mad at me? I know I overreacted about Colt—”
“I’m not mad at you. I just... There’s a certain time of the month when my infernal blood is more active, and it makes me lose perspective around...certain things. And I think I allowed myself to get a little carried away. So I’m the one who should apologize.”
“I see. So you’re not attracted to me now.”
“I didn’t say that.” Shut up, Lucy.
“Okay, so you just don’t like me now.”
Lucy let a little half smile slip out. “I never liked
you. I told you that.”
“Oh, right. I forgot. Well, would you like to punch me again? We could start with that.”
She wanted to laugh, but the sound that came out was more like a whimper. “Oliver, I...” She closed her eyes so she wouldn’t have to see his expression. “You still love Vanessa. She’s never left your side. I don’t want to come between that. I can’t compete with a ghost.”
“Lucy.” He’d crossed the distance between them, and she opened her eyes to find him just inches away. “I will always love Vanessa. But she’s gone. She’s been gone for half a decade. Phoebe let me say goodbye to her.”
“She told me she had more she needed to tell you.”
Oliver’s eyes flickered with emotion. “She did. She wanted me to know what happened that day—the day she died.”
“I saw it.” Lucy shuddered. She didn’t need to hear that story again.
“Not that part, but before. She was part of a secret task force. So secret, I didn’t even know about it. Because it was about me. Darkrock had dug up my father’s identity, and they knew about my magical blood. They hadn’t seen me demonstrate it, and they wanted to find out what it was I might be able to do so they could find a way to use it for their own ends. Vanessa was chosen to administer the catalyst and to give me a trigger word while I was under a hypnosis spell.”
“You mean—”
“Probably don’t say it just now.” He smiled wryly. “Just in case. But yes. The word she told you to say to me. She wasn’t supposed to try it that night. But when we went into that nest and she saw what had happened to the rest of our team—and knew what was about to happen to her—she breathed that word to me in the instant before her throat was slit. Darkrock had no idea that she’d triggered my magical ability. And neither did I. I just acted on instinct, out of pain, and I...”
He paused for a moment, lost in his thoughts. “At any rate, it was the reason she wanted out of Darkrock so badly. She couldn’t live with the knowledge that she was being used to manipulate me. That’s what she wanted to tell me. To tell me she was sorry. Which, it turns out, was all I still needed to say to her. But Vanessa’s business is finished here. She’s crossed over. And getting the chance to say goodbye to her freed me from the oppressive cloud of her specter that I’d allowed to hang over me.” He touched Lucy’s fingers, and she didn’t pull away immediately. “There’s nothing to compete with. And I know you have some issues with relationships...”