Chapter 14
CHAPTER
FOURTEEN
Killian
I stare at her.
Unlike the first time she’d waltzed in here wearing a fancy dress, now she looks more like a fresh-faced punk princess. She’s in a short pinafore style skirt, big boots, thick tights, and a fitted vest over a white shirt.
If she’s going for “naughty schoolgirl who might stab you” vibe, she’s spot on.
I’m so stunned that it takes me a moment to notice the package in her hands, or the redheaded girl who comes in behind her.
They’ve got to be friends. The same virginal nervous energy pops and sparks off the redhead.
She’s…interesting, too. I’m not sure what she is.
She doesn’t have any scent at all, but the weird scent-canceling void that comes with blockers isn’t there either.
Betas normally have overly sweet smells, like cakes or cotton candy.
Something that makes your teeth hurt just by being near them.
Deltas are artificial or chemical with their scents.
Machine grease, gasoline, that kind of stuff. But the redhead is just…nothing.
How odd.
Iris hasn’t moved, either. Her green eyes are on me, drinking me in, licking at my skin. I can feel her touching me like her tongue is on me, and I instantly think I need a cold shower.
But then she turns away from me and tugs her friend to the bar. They both pull up a stool and start chatting with Freya.
“Daddy—” I look down and my little bug is holding on to my pantleg. She spots Iris in that next second and squeals. “Icy!”
Iris’s head whips around, and she grins. “Emmie! Just the space explorer pirate princess I wanted to see.” She holds out the package to her. “Here, this is for you.”
Emmie forgets whatever passes as manners for her and snatches it. The paper rips easily, and she squeals again. “Candy. Daddy? Icy got me the bestest candy ever!”
Just from the fancy packaging and artisan style chocolates inside, I bet they cost a small fortune.
“I hope you like them,” Iris says. “I tried to get a little of everything. These ones my little sister, Rue, loves.”
Emmie nods enthusiastically. “I loves them! Yummy!”
“There’s one rule with these, though.” Iris leans in close and holds her hand to her mouth, like she’s about to reveal a big secret. “You can only eat these at night, right before bed. They help keep the bad dreams away.”
Emmie’s eyes light up. “Oooo, magic candy!” Opening the top, she pulls out one of the chocolates and pops it in her mouth before I can say no. As she chews, she starts to jump up and down. “Yum, yum, yum! No more bad dreams!”
I glare at Iris. Candy you can only have at night? She clearly did that one on purpose, just to make bedtime harder for me. And the smirk on her face when she gets back on her stool says that’s exactly right and she’s proud of it.
Well played.
Freya glances at the redhead, at Iris, and then at me, and I read her like I can Xavier.
I just nod.
There’s no way for sure to know if they’re of drinking age without ID, but if Iris is participating in the Season, she must be. Plus, I’m here.
“Daay…I wov thith.”
I stare at my kid, at her sudden loss of language skills, but then I see the bulges in both her cheeks.
“You look like a chipmunk,” I say.
Emmie sniffs at me and drags Delores to Iris to hug her leg. “Thank you, Icy!”
“Hey, no problem. I had to bring Freya’s things back anyway, so I had to get you a little something.”
I’m about to say something when Emmie rushes to me, grabs my hand, and spits the candy into it. She pushes my fingers closed around them and whispers, “Watch them, Daddy.” She’s about to twirl off, but stops dead, right in front of Iris’s friend.
Eyes wide, she stares in wonder at her vibrant red hair.
“Are you a magical witch? A pretty magic witch? I want to be one when I grow up.” Then Emmie rises on her tiptoes and whispers loudly, “Your hair is red.”
“Emmie!” I scold.
“Yes,” the girl says without hesitation, “it is.”
I roll my eyes as the girl crouches to Emmie so she can touch it with her sticky fingers. “Look, Delores. She is red. Isn’t she beautiful? Like Icy. I’m Emmie.”
“Quinn.”
She gasps. “A queen witch!” Then she pauses. “Or a green witch. Do you want to see my room, green queen witch?”
“It’s Quinn,” the girl says with a laugh.
Emmie nods. “Quinn. So, do you want to see my room? I have an owl collection.”
“If you’re got an owl collection, how can I say no?” Quinn says.
“You can’t,” Iris agrees.
“Both of you come with me.” Emmie drags the two up the stairs.
I lean over the bar and retrieve a clean glass, dropping the sticky candy into it.
“That was interesting,” Freya says as she passes me a beer to drink and a napkin.
I use it to wipe my hand. “That’s a weird way to say annoying.”
Shaking her head slightly, she chuckles. “I don’t know who’s happier she came back, you or Emmie.”
“You’re kidding, right?” I grunt. “Them being here makes everything more complicated.”
“If you say so.” She goes to serve another customer at the bar, and I sweep my glance around the room, skipping over the women who are eyeing me. I don’t need that either.
I don’t need any of it.
The bar’s quiet, as I expect it to be at this hour. It’s getting dark, which makes me both admire and question Iris’s venturing down here. She’s an elite, a virgin Omega, priceless to the Council.
But she’s also not my problem. Sure, she gets under my skin, arouses me when she shouldn’t.
A different man might lie and say it’s interesting as I don’t know her, but that’s fucking Sabine bullshit. Not one Alpha who enters the Season cares about pedigree or getting to know the girl first before wanting her.
They want as soon as the chemistry hits. Oh, they might be in it for a match concerning money, but attraction? No one has to know the person to want to bone them.
A woman approaches, one that maybe I’d be interested in back in the day. But there’s Emmie and I try not to pick up here.
I ignore her until she leaves.
I drink slowly but I become aware of something after a while and my breath catches as warmth trickles down my spine.
Iris is back.
“Quinn’s still with Emmie,” she says. “Is that okay?”
“You’re the ones who barged in here.”
“It’s a bar. I wasn’t aware they handed out invitations,” she says, picking up the drink Freya made for her.
It’s been sitting there a while, she’d be in her rights to want one where the ice hadn’t melted, but she just takes a small sip and reaches into a hidden pocket on her skirt. She puts down a couple of twenties on the bar.
The drinks, with tip would be about twenty, so the overkill, while always pocketed, can be seen as condescending, a flashy show of money.
But with her, I don’t think so. She’s uncertain and it’s more like he isn’t sure how much anything is.
For some reason I find it cute.
“I wasn’t aware you were allowed out. Shouldn’t you be in some ivory castle planning how to catch a mate?”
“That’s only for Wednesdays, so no.” She gives me a look of utter dislike. “I wasn’t at my tower.”
I control the laugh. “But you were working on your plan to catch an Alpha?”
She smiles sweetly. “If you’re hoping I’m planning to catch you, I’m about to dash them. Never.”
“Never say never, darling Icy.”
She hugs the package. “To you, ‘never’ and ‘no’ are pretty much the only words I’ll use.”
“No?” I sidle up to her and slide my tongue over the flesh below her ear, her shudder and gasp the kind of music I could get into. “As in, ‘nooo, Killian, never stop doing that to me…?’”
She shoves me, even though her fingers take their sweet time leaving my shit. “More like, ‘no, Killian, I’ll never want you to touch me.’”
“You’re not even a good liar.”
She puts down the package for Freya and turns to face me, expression a wild and bratty thunderstorm.
“You keep trying to say you’re indifferent,” I say, “but if I felt you up here, you’d let me.”
Iris turns bright red. “I would not.”
“We could experiment.”
“No!”
I don’t think she’s noticed she hasn’t moved. More the opposite, she’s slipped in a little closer and her breathing’s erratic, a jazz snare beat.
“I could spank you.”
“I’m not a child.”
Oh fuck, when I said the word spank her pupils dilated and nostrils flared. She’s turned on and I bet she’s on the verge of dripping.
“It wouldn’t be a childish spanking, Iris. It’d be grown up, and only for very naughty Omegas.”
“Killian,” Freya hisses as she comes up, shooting me a warning look.
“Iris brought your clothes back, isn’t that nice?” I ask.
“Killian, stop,” she says as she puts it away. At first I think she means stop giving Iris hell, but she doesn’t.
She means pay attention.
So I do.
Her glance touches on the door. Fuck.
I know who they are.
Heath Gardener and that movie star who mated his sister. Asher something.
And he’s looking at me. Or his sister.
But her back is to her brother so I go around her and push her to the back to where her redheaded friend is, mouth agape as she stares past me. I grab her, too.
The moment the door shuts we’re out of view.
“What—”
“Heath and Stephan,” Quinn says.
“Oh, god.” Iris slaps a hand over her mouth.
“Not even close,” I mutter, both glad and annoyed her friend is here.
And Emmie on the fifth step leading up, eyes agog as she sits, watching like a TV show.
“You can go out through the door to your left, up that alley and then turn right and keep going until you reach the river, or just go straight ahead and you’ll find your way to the Upper Side. ”
“I don’t want to go to Upper Side,” Iris says.
“Daddy, Icy wants to stay. Can she? And Quinn, too.”
The redhead tugs on Iris’s arm. “We should go.”
“No,” Iris says. “Heath doesn’t scare me.”
“He does me,” Quinn says. “He’s terrible.”
She doesn’t sound scared, but they do need to go. I don’t need trouble before our meeting.
“I wanted to escape our world, have a drink,” Iris says. “I hate everything the Monarch stands for, Quinn. I hate the rules and how everything’s regulated. I wish I could do something.”
“Maybe you can,” I say, leaning into her. “There’s a meeting. People who want to change the status quo.”
“I don’t know…” Quinn says. Her eyes bug. “Nightshade?”
“Did I ask you?” I send her a harsh look but she’s just as mouthy as her friend.
“No, but she isn’t going alone.” Quinn crosses her arms.
“We both want change.” Iris says. “We’ll both come.”
“Give me your phone.” She pulls it out and I tap mine to hers, and it pings. “I’ll text you. Now go.”
The girls go and Emmie starts to get up and come down the stairs, but I stop her with a flick of my hand. “No. Bed. And brush your teeth.”
Her chin trembles. “But my candy…”
“Tomorrow.”
I step out into the bar and a fist hits me, slamming me back into the door.
Oh, fuck, Heath. And his face is thunder. “Where the fuck is she?”
“C’mon man,” says the movie dude, “leave it.”
I run a hand over my chin. I could flatten him, knife him from groin to throat in seconds. But I don’t. Because I’m trying to think of the best response that won’t get his sister into trouble.
“No. Keep your hands off her. She’s young, innocent and her shitty family won’t do anything for her, but I will.”
He’s not talking about Iris.
“Who?”
He steps into me. “Quinn. Touch her and you’ll regret it.”