Chapter 14
Susie
The bell above the café door chimed softly as we stepped inside.
It was a bright, ordinary sound that felt almost absurd after everything I’d seen beneath the city and experienced, even in what should have been the safety of the hotel.
Sunlight spilled through wide front windows, warming polished wooden tables and catching on glass jars filled with sugar cubes.
The air smelled of fresh coffee, butter, and something faintly sweet, vanilla, maybe.
It was cozy, human, and comfortingly mundane in a way that made the memory of bones and shadows feel like something I’d dreamed rather than survived.
I paused just inside the doorway to take it all in.
If I hadn’t known better, I would’ve thought this was just another Parisian café.
One of those effortlessly charming places tourists tried and failed to photograph properly.
Nothing about it hinted at gargoyles or ancient pacts or creatures who slept for centuries beneath the earth.
My gaze drifted sideways to Raoul. He looked like he belonged here now, his appearance so different from when I’d first met him.
No longer dusty and dressed in clothing two centuries old.
His suit, dark, perfectly tailored, caught the light just enough to suggest it cost more than my entire wardrobe back home.
Yet he stood with that same easy, aristocratic confidence as before, like the world had always been arranged for his convenience.
Maybe, judging by the townhouse I’d barely glimpsed before being whisked away again, it had.
He had a townhouse. In Paris. Of course, he’d owned it since it had been newly built, oh…
three hundred years ago. The age of his home was as mind-boggling as his existence, really.
I swallowed and considered his profile: the cut of his jaw, the exotic darkness of his eyes, and the lush, wavy locks of silver blond hair that brushed his shoulders.
My soulmate—because apparently that was a thing now—was obscenely rich.
Logan had been rich too, in that loud, modern way.
Flashy watches, loud opinions, the kind of wealth that needed to be seen.
A true trust fund baby, born practically with a silver spoon attached.
Logan had seen me and wooed me simply because I’d said no the first three times he’d asked; of that, I was sure now.
Raoul’s was different in so many ways. Quieter.
Older. He didn’t shout his wealth, perhaps barely even gave it any consideration. It simply… existed.
“Try not to look so discombobulated, ma chérie,” Raoul murmured, leaning slightly closer without touching me.
“One would think you had just discovered I possess a bank account. When you were, in fact, there with me when I went to access it.” His sharp gaze had very accurately read what the expression on my face was all about.
He smirked and touched his hand to the small of my back, urging me another step into the café.
I shot him a look. “I’m just recalibrating.
There’s a difference.” A very big difference.
The truth was, I really couldn’t care less if he was rich or not, as long as he was honest and didn’t cheat.
Low bar, really. One Raoul passed on so many levels it made my heart pound in my chest. He’d been…
exactly the adventure I’d hoped to find in a city like this.
In a moment of passion, I’d even let him mark me as his soulmate.
Recalibrating was far too small a word for what my life needed after that.
“Ah,” he said, lips curving faintly. “And here I thought I was impressing you.” He bent closer, and the rich, male scent of him surrounded me. Dark, warm, a little like the flavorful, buttery pastries the French were so fond of, but also with the odd petrichor scent of the city below the streets.
“You are,” I admitted. “I just don’t know if I should be impressed or concerned.
” I’d basically signed my life over to him, letting him bind me soul to soul.
In daylight, it felt like something I should be concerned about, but I wasn’t.
It was a bit like something warm and safe throbbed between us, an assurance that we would always have each other.
“That is the correct reaction,” he smirked, but I saw a hint of concern in his eyes. He was checking in, trying to make sure I was okay. If I said I wanted to turn around right now, I had no doubt that he’d walk right back out that door with me.
“Raoul,” I began, my mouth dry. How could I tell him that I was just a tad overwhelmed, eager to get this over with, and incredibly happy I’d stumbled onto his resting place all the same?
Before I could continue, a somewhat familiar voice cut in, warm and welcoming.
“Susie! Raoul!” Thibault approached from behind the counter, his expression far more open than the last time I’d seen him.
Gone was the guarded curiosity I recalled from when we’d arrived here directly from the catacombs; in its place was something almost fond.
He clasped Raoul’s forearm in greeting before turning to me with a smile that felt surprisingly genuine.
“You returned through the proper entrance this time,” he said lightly.
“Trust me, I prefer it,” I replied. “Much less… skeletal.” My eyes darted from his suit-clad shoulder to the crowded café, but nobody paid us any attention.
He chuckled, gesturing for us to sit at a table in a secluded corner.
“Come. Tell me what trouble has followed you now.” He walked with grace and sat in his own chair in a way that made him take up far too much space.
Then he went still, observing us with gray eyes but moving little else.
I couldn’t even detect the rise and fall of his chest as he breathed.
I slipped into a chair, the wood warm beneath my hands. Raoul sat beside me, composed as ever, while I reached into my bag and pulled out the small pocket mirror. The jade stone sat tucked inside it, innocuous and unremarkable. It still baffled me that something so small had caused so much chaos.
I gave Raoul a look, uncertain, but at his nod, I continued. “This,” I said, placing it on the table.
Thibault’s gaze sharpened immediately. He picked it up with careful fingers, turning it slowly in the light.
Raoul had already told me it was an ordinary stone, no magic, nothing that made it special.
I didn’t expect any fireworks or anything, but somehow, I did expect something.
Except there was nothing at all; he just held the stone and looked thoughtful.
That was it. “Well?” I asked, impatiently.
It made Raoul grin, and I could easily imagine he thought I was being rude again.
Thibault frowned, his brow lowering deeply over his dark gray eyes.
“There is no magic in it,” he said after a moment.
I already knew that, and it wasn’t even what we were here about.
All we wanted to know was who was after it, so we could finally do something about that.
I’d prefer it if I could finish this trip by actually seeing some more fun sights, not be forced to stay cooped up because some weirdo was after me, after this silly rock.
“There is no enchantment. I do not sense a curse, either. There is nothing active.” Thibault paused, his expression shifting. “But…” The word hung in the air, as if the gargoyle had sunk into thought rather than letting us in on whatever he’d just thought of.
Raoul leaned forward, asking what was on the tip of my tongue. “But?” We shared a look, both eager to see this resolved. I couldn’t believe how much I trusted this guy, a guy I’d literally found in a bone graveyard, of all places.
Thibault rolled the stone between his fingers again, as if touching it longer would yield him more answers. “It is shielded; deliberately so. I cannot read it.” His mouth pressed tightly together, grim.
“Read it?” I echoed. Of course, this guy was going to be as mysterious and hard to understand as my vampire had been at first. Figures they were friends. Though I wasn’t going to forget the strange undercurrents I’d sensed at our first meeting.
Thibault remained much more open and forthcoming, though, and that did a lot to set me at ease.
“My abilities allow me to perceive memories attached to objects,” he explained.
“Echoes of those who have held them. This…” He tapped the jade lightly.
“This gives me nothing, as though it refuses to be known.”
A small chill crept up my spine. “So it’s… hiding?” I said. If there was that kind of shielding on the stone, that meant it wasn’t nearly as innocuous as it looked. This really was what those creepy guys in the alley had been after, what Logan had hidden in my compact, and originally, my carry-on.
“Precisely,” Thibault agreed solemnly. I exchanged a glance with Raoul; his expression hadn’t changed much, but there was a new focus in his eyes, a subtle sharpening of interest.
“Who would have the power to do that, and the need? There must be a secret attached to this stone that only someone with a gift like yours can read,” he said. He gestured with an elegant, long-fingered hand at his gargoyle friend.
Thibault set the stone down carefully on the table between us, the green jade glinting peacefully in the warm sunlight. “There is someone who may know more,” he said, his voice dropping into a hushed whisper.
I stiffened immediately and found myself casting a furtive look around the café. “I don’t like the sound of that,” I muttered, wondering if the teenager stirring her coffee with a piece of pastry was listening in. Or perhaps that gray-haired matron chewing on a lavender macaron.
“You will not,” Thibault agreed easily, and he leaned back in his seat, casually crossing his hands over his flat belly. “But it may be necessary.” I had a feeling he was not at all concerned about anyone listening in.