Chapter 41
My body fights to keep me upright. All I can hear over the low din of the garden is my own thundering heartbeat.
I still can’t wrap my fuzzy mind around the fact that Reid’s brother is not only alive and kicking, he’s the White Stag.
A demon the Elders have protected for reasons I cannot piece together.
That he let us go. That Reid kept a secret for him for years until someone died.
We’ve not made it two feet from Deacon’s office when his goons prowl toward us.
My aching, pulsating limbs shimmer with the need to kill, and I recognize one as Baz, the violet-eyed bouncer vamp who let us in, and the other as the charming deviant bartender.
The bartender’s elongated canines flash in the dim garden lights when he opens his mouth to speak.
“Stag wants you both out. And Snow White owes me for three drinks.” Werewolf. Definitely a werewolf.
“We were just leaving,” Reid growls.
Baz takes a purposeful step toward me, nostrils flaring as he scents the blood dripping from my face. Now that he’s towering over me, I clock the same two symbols tattooed at the base of his throat as Deacon has on either side of his neck. “She doesn’t have to pay for them with cash.”
“Baz,” the bartender scolds good-naturedly. As if drinking my blood would be as unfortunate as breaking a diet.
Reid’s thumb tightens on my hip, pulling me closer. “Don’t even think about it.”
“We just need to find my friends,” I manage around my nausea. Infirmary, my brain tells me. Soonish.
“You’re in luck,” Baz drawls, unenthused. “We kicked them out too.”
Reid and I shove past both deviants and through the dark tunnel that leads back into the club.
Leggy acrobats have descended from that cathedral-like ceiling and hang down with nothing but ribbons.
The noxious smell of human sweat, breath, and spilled drinks has vomit rising in my throat.
I need to get out of here. But the room is so dark, and I keep knocking into bodies, and someone in heels steps on my toe, and I can’t even feel the pain because I can barely breathe, and Reid—Reid lied to me, and I almost died, and I just need to find Penny and Sophia, and—
“Whoa there,” Reid says against my ear, catching me as I sag.
“Don’t touch me,” I slur.
He curses under his breath as if he knows he’s in for it, but insists on picking me up and carrying me out of the club anyway. The late autumn night slams into me like a thunderclap, and even though I’m already shivering, I’m grateful—the cold has woken me up a little bit.
“Put me down,” I tell him, and he does.
Penny and Sophia are standing outside, away from the line, huddled for warmth. Penny sees us first, and the look on her face makes me sicker than all the injuries combined. “I’m okay.”
“Oh my god, Viv.” She’s at my side a second later. “What on earth— Who— How did this—”
“She’s okay,” Reid repeats. “She had a fall. I’m going to take her to the hospital.”
Penny’s eyes jump from him to me and back. “I remember you. From Halloween. James told me you were with Viv the last time she was hurt too. That fire at Maria’s.”
“Penny,” Sophia tries. “It’s not what you think.”
“It’s not Reid’s fault,” I say even though I’m furious with him and can’t even look at his perfect wounded face right now. “Just bad timing.”
“You show up here and Viv ends up injured again? I’m calling the police. I’m—”
“They’re dating,” Sophia blurts. “They met at Maria’s the night of the fire. He would never hurt her.”
Reid’s eyes cut to me, and I can’t stomach the guilt there, so I keep my eyes on Penny, willing her to let it go. Penny stares up at Sophia, and I wonder if this fucked-up night might just end here, but then a hurt confusion colors her face, and I realize the error.
“You told James he worked at the Windsor with you guys…that you’d been stuck there late. But if you only met that night at Maria’s…Why would you lie?”
Sophia’s eyes cut to me, wide and guilty, but I don’t blame her. It’s my fault for lying to Penny. It’s my fault for thinking I could live all these different lives at once and never slip up.
“I’m gonna need you guys to clear out.” The werewolf bartender has strolled out into the night and folds his arms as he appraises us.
When his gaze lands on Penny, a gleam sparkles in those vicious olive eyes.
“Except for you, buttercup. You can stay.” He offers her a hand. “I’m Ward. You have plans tonight?”
“I do, yes. I’m so sorry. I’m not trying to be rude, but it’s three in the morning.
My plans have already happened, and honestly, they sucked.
My boyfriend left me for a lovely Parisian woman.
We were kicked out for no reason, and then my friend was assaulted at your club or fell down some stairs or…
something. And”—Penny brings her hands to her face to rub her eyes, smearing her mascara—“and she lied to me. And nothing is making sense. And—I’m sorry, would you please excuse us?
We are trying to have a private conversation. ”
For a moment, nobody says anything.
All I can think is that Penny has picked the worst possible moment to discover a smidgeon of assertiveness. While she has no idea she’s just snapped at a werewolf who could have her face for dinner, the rest of us are plainly aware.
And I’m not that far off—Ward is staring at Penny like she’s been left under his Christmas tree in the shiniest of gift wrap.
“Sorry to hear it, buttercup. I hope things pick up for you.” Ward turns to Reid and me, and his warm grin drops. “You two would be wise not to come back here. Stag won’t be so lenient again.”
“Won’t be a problem.” My head is pounding and I want to dagger the creep.
When Ward leaves us, Penny looks as surprised with herself as I am. “Please, Viv,” she says quietly. “Please tell me what is going on.”
“It’s…complicated.”
Penny’s eyes brim with tears, and I wish Reid had just let me pass out.
“I feel like I barely know you these days,” she rasps.
“Penny—”
But she’s already walking away, hailing a cab and climbing inside.
“Go with her,” I tell Sophia. “I’ll call you later. Just make sure she gets home okay.”
Sophia nods, guilt clear on her flushed cheeks. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s fine,” I tell her. “It’s not your fault.”
They climb into the car together, and when the cab melts into the night, I exhale the only sigh of relief I have coming.
“You never should have lied to her about who I was.”
I glare at Reid. “No, really?”
He frowns, stuffing his hands into his pockets. “I just mean…Never mind. Let me take you back to Harker. You need…” His eyes travel over my split lip, my swollen eye, my bruised arms and torso. “A whole bunch of shit,” he says with a wince.
“Thanks.” I limp down the sidewalk toward the corner subway station, determined to get there on my own.
“Come on. Let me get you help and I’ll call it even.”
That spins me on a dime. “You’ll call it even?”
He doesn’t even have the decency to look sheepish. “I told you not to come tonight, and you lied to me, ignored me, and showed up anyway. I gave you a lure so I could protect you, and you didn’t even wear it. Your stubborn, risky, loner bullshit nearly got you killed.”
Two drunk guys stumble out of the club, and Reid watches with thinly veiled irritation as they ogle me lazily and without concealment, clearly unbothered by my head wound. Men.
“And you’re in—” Reid eyes me up and down with exasperation. “What the hell are you even wearing?”
My swollen eye struggles to widen to show my true horror. “Are you kidding me? Reid. You lied to me. About, like, a thousand things. And now you’re on me about my outfit? How did you even know I’d be here? Stalking again?”
“Are you kidding me, Viv? You’d be dead if I hadn’t arrived when I did.
” The truth in his words seems to sober him a little from his fury.
“I…I should have realized it sooner. You’ve told me you’d never run from a fight.
” I open my mouth to tell him that’s exactly why he shouldn’t have asked me to in the first place, but he cuts me off.
“All I’ve ever done is try to protect you. ”
“Protect me? All you’ve done is lie to me. Not only did you tell me this place was deviant-free, you also said your brother was dead.” I enumerate his indiscretions on my bloodied fingers in case he’s unable to keep track. “Meanwhile, he’s the very man I came here tonight to hunt.”
“Which I told you not to do! Do you know how many people have tried to take him down? People a lot more powerful than you, Viv. If I said leave it be, there was a fucking reason.”
“Yeah, one you kept from me. I asked you what you knew about this place. You told me some bullshit about the owner being a drug runner. And he was your fucking brother!”
I watch as Reid tries and fails to school the fury on his face. Stubborn as a bull, he can’t pull it off. “My brother has taken more hunter souls than any demon alive.”
Demons gain power with age and how many souls they’ve taken.
Nobody lives as long or kills as much as those in the Brood.
If he’s taken as many hunter lives as Reid claims…
To never have been recruited by them nor seen as a threat and killed off is shocking.
To have amassed this kind of power and influence in Astera right under their noses is almost unfathomable.
I want to pry about how any of what Deacon’s done is possible—why Reid was forced to join the Brood but his brother wasn’t—when Reid adds, “He’s more powerful than anyone aside from our High Thane, and he doesn’t hate anyone as much as he hates me.
” Reid spits out the words like they’re bitter on his tongue.
“Anything I said to you today was my attempt at keeping something exactly like tonight from happening.”
But all I can think of is how he just said our High Thane.
He’s a demon. He has been this whole time.
How could I have been so utterly blind?
He’s been protecting his brother. Keeping his secrets. Maybe he even knows why the Elders have let Deacon operate out of Fever Dream all this time. He certainly knows more than he’s telling me right now.
“I’ve avoided his path for longer than I can remember, Viv. Even knowing him—being known by him—is dangerous. For all intents and purposes, he was dead to me. The details outside of that are so complicated—”
“You told him do what you want with who you want, hunter or otherwise. You don’t even care that—”
“Listen to me. I know you, Viv. I know you because I know me.” He takes a breath and tries again with new resolve. “You’re looking for a reason to kill our relationship before it can even exist. If you just give me a second, I can explain—”
And maybe this sinking feeling is realizing that the betrayal I feel right now has got to be nothing compared to how Penny felt when I gave her the exact same speech. I’ve only known Reid for a few months. Penny is my best friend.
Or maybe it’s the ever-present self-hatred. Knowing I pissed everyone off. Failed Harker and the dean and all my fellow students. I have no proof of where Kitty and Lyra went. I failed everyone just as I failed my family. My dad.
Or maybe it’s what’s broken inside me. That angry, volatile thing. That aeon urge to slide my daggers into the supple flesh under Reid’s solar plexus just as much as I want to slide my tongue against his lips. That predator within me that makes me violent even toward those I was beginning to—
Well, it doesn’t matter now.
Whatever it is that makes me say it, I take a breath and tell Reid, “You don’t have to explain anything to me. Whatever this is between us…it’s done.”
Reid’s jaw grinds shut. “Fine by me. Just get your concussion looked at, okay?”
“I can take care of myself.”
He shakes his head and fists his hands in his pockets. “You sure can.”
The bitter night air has seeped well past my sheer skirt and pasties and settled into the marrow of my bones. I realize as I nearly tumble down the subway stairs that my hands have gone numb along with my toes and ears. I don’t even care.
The way I laid into Reid, hurting him like I did when he’d put his life before mine tonight…I feel as cold inside as my skin is to the touch. Colder, maybe. My icy hand finds my swollen eye, and I hold it there until both ache.
Seated in the empty subway car headed uptown, I fish my phone out of my purse for the first time all night and scroll through the expected slew of texts and calls Sophia and Penny sent while I was being pummeled by Deacon.
But I’ve also got three missed calls and two voicemails from Fiona. One from my mother as well.
My throat closes up as I check the time.
But I already know. It’s past midnight.
I missed the Chasm exhibit’s opening.
After releasing a string of curses I press the phone to my ear and listen to Fiona’s voicemails.
The first is full of genuine concern—“Where are you? The guests are arriving. Please let me know everything is okay”—but the second is composed of simple, resigned disappointment.
“You missed the event, and we have no other recourse at this time but to let you go. I’m sorry, Viv. ”
The voicemail from my mother is worse than getting fired.
“Nora just called to tell me what happened. That you skipped the exhibit opening and Fiona was forced to fire you.” She pauses to sigh.
She sounds exhausted. Despite it all, tears of frustration bead in the corners of my eyes as I press the phone closer to my ear.
“Why…” she asks quietly. “Why are you this way?”
That’s the whole voicemail.
I play it three times, staring at the antlers bleeding white ink into my wrist until I throw my phone across the railcar.