Chapter 3
THREE
Don’t fight your nature.
LUCA
I try not to look at her. It doesn’t help. My body is aware of hers at all times, like I’ve added a Celine-specific sense to my already overtaxed nervous system.
Even now, surrounded by a clusterfuck of stimulants, I’m aware of her in a way that drives me wild. She’s in the hallway, disrupting the club’s natural rhythm of catcalls, bass guitar, and heavy breathing by pacing back and forth.
Pull yourself together, asshole. I suck in more air, soaking up the familiar smell of beer and pheromones that lives in the air of the Fang.
Celine is getting tired of my shit. I can tell. And she’s right to be frustrated. She’s acting normal. I’m the one dangling on the edge of ruining everything. What she doesn’t know is it’s not even my fault.
I’ve always been attracted to her—anyone with eyes would be—but I’m cold-blooded, and I’ve never had any trouble shoving my desire for Celine into the neat little compartment where it belongs.
Until now. Because my basilisk has decided she’s ours, and it refuses to understand the metric fuckton of reasons why she would never agree to that.
“Can I get a Blood Tide? On the rocks.” My eyes flick up to Alistair’s face reluctantly, and my basilisk coils angrily in my chest, sensing a rival. I’ve got no problem with the guy, but I see how often he comes around to watch Celine.
“Sure thing,” I say. Smiling like a dumbass, I drop down to the cooler where I store the blood.
Vampires aren’t sociable, so I didn’t start stocking it until Alistair became a regular.
Human, witch, or bunny-rabbit shifter—he’s never been picky about the blood type and tips enough to offset the cost. Plus, I wasn’t about to risk alienating someone with his reputation.
“Business is good,” Alistair observes while I add blood and tequila to the shaker, running the rim of his glass through cinnamon and cayenne pepper as he studies me. He’s usually better at small talk than this. If he’s uninterested in having a conversation, though, why is he bothering?
“Yeah,” I agree, refusing to be rude no matter how much his presence annoys me. I’m a professional. I can handle a little misplaced jealously without turning into a monster. “The girls have worked hard. They deserve the steady cash.”
“Some more than others,” Alistair murmurs.
My eyes rise slowly from where I’m cutting a piece of celery to garnish his drink. He’s not focused on me or the stage. His head is cocked toward the hallway instead. He’s listening to Celine pace, too. I’d bet a week’s tips on it.
My fangs stab painfully past my gums, venom rushing through my glands. When cold pressure pounds against my retinas, I glare down at the bar top so intensely that I feel like I’m drilling holes in the scarred wood. Pull yourself together, you jealous fuck.
Shifting my full focus to the drink I’m making, I recite the ingredients in my head to distract my basilisk from its territorial rage. Measure. Chill. Shake. Relax. Pour. Don’t kill him.
The monster inside me settles sullenly, but remains homicidally pissed off about the fact that I’m preparing a drink for its newfound nemesis.
I snatch my water bottle out from under the bar, taking a deep swig, then swish it around in my mouth until the bitter taste of my venom is gone. My fangs retract.
That was way too close. I’ve got to get better control of myself. So what if he wants her? That’s good for business. People are wary of Alistair because he’s known for being merciless when cheated or wronged—not because he’s an indiscriminate killer.
“Fascinating,” Alistair murmurs, his voice low. It’s barely a whisper in the crowded strip club. If my senses weren’t focused on him, I wouldn’t have heard him at all. “You’re a mystery, Luca Saratelli,” he says, this time at a normal volume.
I try to scoff, but the dismissive sound comes out strangled, as if I’m choking on my own spit.
I don’t want to be a mystery for him to solve.
I want to be like wallpaper in a rich person’s house—bland, simple, and easy to walk past without noticing.
He’s watching us too closely already, and no good can come from being on his radar.
More venom hits my taste buds, deadly to everyone but me. My mouth is coated with it. Swallowing as much as I can, I beg my basilisk to take a back seat and let me handle this. Reluctantly, it curls further inside me, and I look up at Alistair.
He’s intensely focused, his piercing blue eyes inspecting every inch of my body he can see. I have the strangest sensation that he’s trying to peer beneath my skin to see how I’m put together.
“You’re bleeding,” Alistair says. With a movement too quick to track, his right hand darts out, his thumb grazing my bottom lip. He comes away with a drop of my blood. Before I can stop him, he sucks his finger into his mouth, eyes flaring bright red.
“Fascinating,” he repeats, his shoulders twitching three times before settling back to normal.
Internally, I wince. That’s my venom at work. He’s lucky he didn’t ingest more of it and earn himself a painful end. It would have served him right for tasting my blood without asking nicely first.
I slam his finished drink down on the counter too hard, the cherry tomato rolling off its toothpick and landing between us. Purple lights paint the bruised fruit a deep crimson instead of its normal, cheery red.
“That’s my bad, man,” I say, blinking at the tomato and refusing to meet Alistair’s eyes. I reach for my garnish tray. “Let me get you another one.”
“No need.” Alistair chuckles. “If you can keep a secret, Luca, I’ll come clean. I’m allergic to tomatoes.”
I frown at him. I’ve made Alistair this drink dozens of times since I started working at the club, and he’s never once mentioned a tomato allergy. It’s dark as fuck in here. What if he’d accidentally swallowed one of the seeds, then dropped dead in front of the bar?
“Are you crazy?” I sputter, annoyed that I might have accidentally killed him any number of times. That would have been a huge mess. Alistair gives off a quiet, watchful intensity, but I’ve never thought he was unbalanced before now.
He takes a sip of the cocktail and grins at me. “You make such a lovely drink, I didn’t have the heart to tell you. Plus, I enjoy a little danger.” His eyes dip to my mouth, then he pivots and heads back to his table before I can make sense of what happened.
If I didn’t know better, I would say he was flirting with me.
Shaking my head, I flush the rest of the venom from my mouth and get back to work.
Alistair lives and operates a business on the Fringes, so he can’t be completely sane.
I’ll keep that in mind for the next time he shows up and pays a little too much attention.
“Enough of this shit, Luca. You’re coming home with me after work,” Celine says in a low, determined growl. I picture her creamy thighs wrapped around my head, then shudder, knocking over an entire pitcher of beer while I’m at it.
“Motherfucker,” I hiss, soaking up as much of the spill as I can with a towel I keep stashed back here for emergencies. It’s almost time for last call, and the crowd is thinning.
“Why are you so jumpy?” Celine ducks behind the bar with me, pulling another towel from the stack and mopping at the yeasty puddle. The downy feathers of her right wing graze my wrist and goosebumps spread like wildfire up my arm.
“I don’t know,” I snap. My voice sounds whiny even to me. I toss the damp towels into the bin beneath the bar and sigh heavily.
Celine’s face falls, and she glances at her feet. “Luca, I know I can be bitchy, but I thought you didn’t mind,” she whispers. “Is there something I need to apologize for? I’m happy to say sorry, you’ll just have to convince me I’m wrong first or it will get stuck on the way out.”
My lips twitch, but I hide my smile, not wanting to interrupt the most adorable ramble I’ve ever heard.
Celine looks up, lifting her chin to the stubborn tilt I’m used to.
Her fingers curl around my bicep, brown eyes aggressive even while she’s being sincere.
“You don’t even need to come up with a good argument,” she says.
“If I focus hard on my intent, I’ll probably be genuinely sorry just because you’re upset with me.
Say the word. I’ll apologize right now to get us back to normal. ”
I shake my head, confused, the scream of the electric guitar in the background pulling my focus. I’m trying to understand what Celine is saying to me, but my head keeps repeating the part where she ordered me in no uncertain terms to come home with her.
“I’m sorry,” I sputter, grinning at her to distract from the fact that I’m a shit listener. “But I don’t have a fucking clue what you’re talking about.”
Celine squints up at my face, her eyebrows pulling together. Great. I’ve made her suspicious. “Are you on something?” she asks, scanning the bar like she’s expecting to find a bowl full of colorful, unlabeled pills in place of the limes.
I wave my hand at the stragglers scattered around the room. “No, just a busy night. Why am I coming home with you, and why are you trying to apologize?”
Celine plants her hands on her hips. “You’re coming home with me so we can kiss and make up. I’m not sure why I need to apologize; I was trying to cover my bases—”
“—to get us back to normal,” I finish her thought, frustration churning in my belly. It feels a lot like the venom I flushed out of my mouth when Alistair was here.
“Exactly.” Celine nods, then opens the drawer between us and starts poking through the corkscrews and spare bottle openers.
“Although, if you’re stoned or something, I take everything back.
We can’t binge watch trash TV and drink our weight in boxed wine if there’s a chance I have to babysit you through a bad trip. ”