Chapter 10 #5
Meaning our guess about Monica and Co. becoming too much of a problem for Stephan’s taste might have been correct. “We got an address?”
“And a phone number. The former doesn’t exist, and the latter can’t be traced. Which does beg the question, why would he bother sending in goons to kill her?”
“Maybe he’s just being thorough. He did give his real name, remember.”
“That would explain the third goon going after her records, though not why he wouldn’t just give a false name.” She started the van and pulled out into the traffic. “What’s our next step?”
“Moving house. We can’t risk Lanie, Luke, or even Orion coming after us. Sadly for you, I’ve been ordered to keep still for the next few hours and won’t be of much help.”
“That’s okay. Atticus will help me.”
Atticus will not, he retorted.
“Ass,” she said.
Dinner, he replied.
I snorted and closed my eyes. Next thing I knew, things were being shoved noisily into the back of the van, and then the doors were slammed shut.
“Hey, sleeping beauty awakes,” Ginny said as she climbed into the driver’s seat.
I yawned and stretched as best I could in the small space. “How long was I out?”
“A couple of hours.”
“You should have woken—”
“Atticus threatened to smite me if I did.”
I turned around and looked at him. “What is this sudden fascination with smiting?”
I watched a demon movie last night; the witches smited. It looked like fun.
“I didn’t know you were into horror movies,” Ginny said. She handed me a signal blocking box so I could put my earwigs into it, then drove out of the underground parking area into the traffic.
It was research.
“Movies are not accurate representations of witches, magic, or even shifters,” I replied dryly, “let alone a reliable source on demonology.”
I am aware of that, but sometimes the germ of a brilliant idea can sprout from an unreliable source.
“I take it you have one such idea?”
It continues to germinate. I will share when it is ready.
“Well, that didn’t sound pompous much, did it?” Ginny said.
For that, you may carry all the luggage up to the new apartment yourself.
“I was anyway, so that’s not much of a punishment.”
He sniffed, curled up into a ball, his back to both of us, and went to sleep. The silence was bliss.
Our new apartment was in the heart of Brisbane, though it was once again right on the river.
Ginny found the entrance to the underground parking and then punched in the code we’d been given.
The mesh garage door slowly opened, and we drove on until we found a couple of parking spots with the apartment’s number on it.
Ginny turned off the car and flicked the handbrake on. “Let’s get you upstairs first, then I’ll come back for all the other rubbish.”
I nodded, thrust the door open, and hauled myself out, keeping my weight off my leg.
Ginny wrapped an arm around my waist and helped me over to the lift.
Our new apartment was on the top floor and one of only two, suggesting it was going to be much bigger than our previous one.
Ginny once again punched in the code, and the door slid silently aside, revealing a vast, open, and bright space.
A soft gasp escaped us both. The view...
this apartment had to be worth at least five million, given the seamless windows lining the curving wall in front of us gave uninterrupted views over the Brisbane River and the Story Bridge.
Now this, Atticus said as he strolled past us, is accommodation more fitting to one such as I.
“I’m thinking whoever owns this place will not appreciate you clawing the furniture,” I replied, “so behave.”
I am not a heathen. I do that only to annoy you.
We moved into the main room. It was an open-plan living, dining, and kitchen space, the latter containing all the mod cons and all of them top of the line.
The dining table was wood, and big enough to host twelve people, and the high-backed dark cream leather sofa curved around a large coffee table, with several comfortable-looking chairs sitting opposite.
The walls, the floors, and the kitchen were lined with a soft and earthy travertine stone—something I knew only because Mom had something similar in her kitchen—while the ceilings were white.
Lighting was ceiling spots and well-placed lamps.
There were two doors leading off the main space, both of them huge bedrooms.
“I’m thinking this is not regular Society accommodation,” Ginny murmured. “Wouldn’t be your brother’s, would it?”
“Don’t think he has a place up this way.” If it belonged to anyone, it would be Sophie. René was going to talk to her about it, after all.
I do not think it belongs to the Society’s matriarch, Atticus said.
I frowned at him. He was sitting on the coffee table, tail swishing from side to side. “Why?”
Get your scrawny butt over here and see for yourself.
My butt is not scrawny.
Whatever.
We hurried over—or hurried as fast as I could hop, anyway.
And discovered what Atticus meant.
Lying against the sofa’s back, his body following the gentle curve, was René.
Semi naked and absolutely glorious.