Chapter 14
14
brOGAN
"Y ou're being an ass. You know that, right?"
I glared at Elias. I was sitting at the bar waiting for Kenya so I could walk her home since her mate, Alex, had some kind of witchy shit to take care of. Esme hadn't come back tonight, and I guess I wasn't as good at hiding my feelings about it as I thought I was. "You don't know anything about what's going on, so maybe keep your fucking mouth shut."
"I know you're being an ass.” He shot me another look. “Did you enjoy that blonde tonight?”
Heat crept up the back of my neck when I remembered my embarrassing attempts to feed from the woman who’d bought a private dance from me. After the third one, I’d given up and adjusted her memories. “Nothing happened with the blonde.”
“Esme didn’t know that. The poor woman was in tears when she left here." Finished with counting the cash in the register, he shut the drawer and took it back to Kenya.
Crying? She was crying? But I shook my head before I could start feeling any kind of way about it. I had a feeling Esme didn't cry. And she sure as hell wouldn't be crying over me. She didn't give a shit about me. She was using me, using us , for whatever master plan she had to fight the thing that murdered her family.
If that was even true.
Elias came back from the office. "Believe what you want, but I know what I saw. That girl's got it bad for you."
I scoffed. "She's got it bad for something, but it ain't me. She's using us to get what she wants."
"And what exactly is it that she wants?"
I opened my mouth to respond, but then realized I didn't have a fucking clue. Revenge? Information on vampires and magic? To get in my pants? Who the hell knew?
The front door opened and Alex Moss walked in like he owned the damn place. I tensed, my fangs itching to drop as he strode toward us. I didn't have anything against the guy personally, but witches in general—other than Lizzy—made me twitchy, and he was a powerful one. A witch with some seriously freaky djinn blood pumping through his veins. The combination made my skin crawl. He may be Kenya's mate, but that didn't mean I had to trust him.
"Kenya ready?" Alex asked, his strange golden eyes flicking between me and Elias.
"She's in the back," Elias replied curtly. "She'll be out in a minute."
Now Elias, he did NOT like Alex. Said he didn't care for the guy's attitude. But ever since fate had started pairing up members of my family with the local witch coven, lines had been crossed. Specifically, the ones keeping them in their part of the city. Allowing them into our territory wasn’t ideal, but it was something we were gonna have to live with if we wanted to keep the truce between us.
Alex nodded and leaned against the bar to wait, crossing his arms over his broad chest. “The coven had a meeting tonight,” he told us. Then he looked at me. “Lizzy told us about your new friend.”
I turned on my stool and rested both elbows on the bar. “She’s not my friend.”
“Well, whatever she is, she brought that fucking djinn back to our city.”
I stiffened, but Elias jumped in before I could do something that would definitely threaten the peace between our covens. “She did no such thing, and you know it. That fucker would’ve been back sooner or later, with or without Esme showing up. Her being here is just a coincidence.”
“How do you know?” the witch asked.
“Because I do,” Elias responded in no uncertain terms.
An awkward silence fell over us until Kenya finally emerged from the office. Her pretty face lit up when she saw Alex and she hurried over to him. He wrapped an arm around her and pulled her close, placing a kiss on top of her curly hair.
"You guys are being nice, right?" Kenya asked, glancing at me and Elias with a teasing smile.
"Always," I replied, forcing a grin. "Just for you though, sweetheart."
The flash of anger in Alex's eyes at the endearment sent a warm, fuzzy feeling through me, and I grinned at him.
Kenya's smile faltered, and she shot me a look. "You do that on purpose."
I turned my grin on her. "Of course, I do. He's so easy to rile up."
She rolled her eyes at me and tugged on Alex's arm. "Let's go."
"Alex," Elias called as they headed to the door. "You keep our girl here safe, yeah?"
Alex met his gaze steadily. "With my life."
I gave a long, resigned sigh. He might be a witch and one of satan's minions, but he loved Kenya more than anything. I knew he'd do exactly what he said. He'd give his life for her.
"Night, guys," Kenya said, giving us a wave as Alex led her out of the club.
And then it was just me and Elias and my swirling thoughts about crying brujas again. I had a feeling it was going to be a long fucking day.
I sighed heavily and ran a hand through my hair. "I'm heading out," I told him abruptly. "You coming?"
Elias raised an eyebrow, then lifted his chin toward the door Kenya and Alex had disappeared through. "Go on ahead. I want to finish cleaning up."
“Don’t be long. It’s almost sunrise.”
“I won’t.”
I flipped him off as I walked out the door and he sent me off with a muttered obscenity that made me laugh. But in typical vampire fashion, my lighthearted mood flipped the moment the humid New Orleans wind hit me like a cold, wet blanket, and I went back to brooding about Esme.
Despite the accusations I'd flung at her and the logical part of my brain telling me that that woman was nothing but trouble—which I kinda knew the first moment I saw her sitting in our club—I couldn't shake the feeling that there was more to her story. That maybe, just maybe, she was telling the truth about why she was here.
And if she was...then I was the biggest asshole in the world for how I'd treated her.
"Fuck," I muttered under my breath, coming to a stop in the middle of the empty street. I tilted my head back and stared up at the dark, early morning sky, trying to clear my jumbled thoughts.
It didn't work.
All I could see was the hurt and anger in Esme's dark eyes when I'd accused her of using magic on me. The way her bottom lip had trembled before she'd turned and walked away. The sound of her calling my name tonight with something that sounded suspiciously like hurt in her tone.
I scrubbed my face with my hands and sighed heavily. I'd really fucked things up. But what was I supposed to do? Just blindly trust some woman—some bruja —who showed up out of nowhere with a sob story about a murderous djinn?
Even if that woman made me feel things I hadn't felt in...well, ever? And made me want things I had no business wanting.
I growled in frustration and resumed walking with no particular destination in mind. I needed to move, to try and outpace my own thoughts. But it was useless. The woman haunted me. Her scent, her voice, the feel of her soft curves pressed against me...
I wanted her. There. I said it. God , how I wanted her. But it would be stupid of me to give into those cravings. Not when giving in to my desires could put my entire coven at risk.
So why did every instinct I had scream at me to go to her? To beg for her forgiveness and tell her I believed her?
I didn't know what to do. I was torn between my duty to my coven and the inexplicable pull I felt towards Esme.
And I had a sinking feeling that no matter what I chose, it would end in nothing but heartbreak.
Most likely my own.