Chapter 3 #2
But it won’t matter. Lennie is high on him right now; nothing matters.
“Turn it off,” I say flatly. “Let them go.”
“Not yet,” Devon says. “I find that cutting the flow off abruptly makes them unpredictable, all that lovely oxytocin just gone.” He snaps his finger, and I catch myself flinching. “That’s a portion of the evening that I would prefer to miss.”
Instead Devon looks down at Lennie resting her head against his chest. He tucks a strand of her strawberry blond hair behind her ear with a genuine tenderness that seems out of character. “I need a moment to talk to your friend, love,” he says.
Lennie pouts. “No.”
“Yes,” Devon says. “Off you go.” He presses gently against her shoulders until she steps back, tossing a scowl at me as she goes.
“I’ll be here waiting,” Lennie says, beaming at him, while also managing to shoot me a significant amount of side-eye. It’s a talent.
Lennie drifts off, but she only makes it about ten feet before turning around to watch us.
Devon’s attention focuses on me then, and I can feel his power pulling at me, like invisible hands stroking my skin. “Knock it off.”
I expect him to press, to try harder, but instead the sensation vanishes. He tips his head sideways, regarding me with interest. “You can sense it, but you’re strong enough to resist.”
“Yes, I’m a very special girl,” I say dryly, and Devon chokes on a laugh.
“That you are, I suppose,” he agrees.
“If this isn’t about territory, what do you want?” I ask. My pulse is slowing slightly. He’s made no move to charge at me or started screaming about me taking over. Both good signs. Relatively.
Devon picks up his beer again, swirling the remains of it in the mug.
“Just thought it might be an opportune moment to introduce myself. Allegiances are … a delicate matter, as always.” Some of the humor leaches from his expression, leaving a darker, more wary look.
“I wanted to reach you first, see what kind of arrangement we might be able to come to, given the announcement.”
Allegiances? Arrangement?
I stare at him. His words were in English, I understood them individually, but I still have absolutely no idea what he’s talking about. I shake my head. “What announcement?”
He laughs, but then stills abruptly, reading my face. He puts down his glass. “You don’t know.” It’s not a question, but his voice still holds a hint of uncertainty, as if he can’t believe it. He looks younger suddenly, more vulnerable.
“Don’t know what?” I ask, feeling my grip on my temper start to slip.
“Of course,” Devon mutters, more to himself than to me. “They didn’t tell you. Far more fun to keep you guessing. That sounds about right, doesn’t it?”
The bitterness in him flares outward, connecting with me like a slap in the face. A not-so-tiny emotional death with me in immediate proximity. I’m used to seeking out the smallest sips, and this is the equivalent of a full-body dunking.
I reel under the sensation, however brief, of warmth and fullness, drinking in the life sacrificed. It sends me stumbling back a step or two, the dizziness and looseness in my limbs reminiscent of a two-day bender, where the room is in constant motion around you.
The color drains from his face abruptly, and he twists sideways, his elbow connecting hard with the table as he clutches at it to keep from falling. His knuckles flash red and then white on the table’s edge. “I’ve … heard … but I never…” He stops talking, making visible efforts to catch his breath.
After a moment, he manages it, straightening up and regaining his footing. He still doesn’t look quite right, though. A little too gray under the eyes.
Guilt immediately swamps me. I should have had that locked down. I don’t have to take life, even when it’s offered. I’m just so used to pulling together scraps …
Control, always control.
“Sorry,” I say quickly, stepping toward him as soon as I recover myself. “I actually wasn’t trying to—”
Devon moves back and holds a hand up to stop me, careful to keep his distance this time. “I think I should go. For now, at least.” He glances around the room, uneasiness filling his expression.
My skin prickles, not with magic this time but fear. I know that look. “What is happening? What announcement?” I fight the urge to grab him and shake the information out of him.
Backing away from me, Devon shakes his head with a tight smile. “Sorry, love. As far as I know, keeping it a secret from you could be part of their game, and I have no interest in interfering. I like my hide a little too well to offer it up to them as a willing prize.”
Their game. Them.
While he might be talking about others like us, children of the Old Ones, the disgust in his tone—not to mention that wallop of bitterness—tells me he’s referring to someone else.
He means the Old Ones themselves. Active. Up to something.
Fuckity fuck fuck.
Our sires aren’t gods, no matter what they might want people to think. They’re not vampires, angels, succubae, or any other mythological creature, either. Those are just the stories that rose up around them over time when humans saw something they couldn’t explain.
But they are old and extremely powerful. They’ve been here forever, occupying a mostly hidden link at the top of the food chain. And they’re easily bored. A dangerous combination.
If the Old Ones ever stopped squabbling among themselves and got organized, humanity would be screwed. Corralled into giant zoos or locked behind glass at some hotel-breeding-farm hellscape.
Fortunately, the Old Ones are more interested in their petty feuds, stoking their own sense of self-importance, and pitting their spawn against one another for entertainment and bragging rights. Petulant emperors turning the lions loose on their own gladiators.
Or, the immortal equivalent of “My honor roll student tortured and killed your honor roll student.”
It’s almost funny and absolutely fucking terrifying at the same time.
“Is one of them here?” I ask Devon. The very thought of an Old One in Beecher makes my stomach plummet like it’s been filled with the smooth river rocks the university uses for landscaping all over campus.
“Why would they—” I begin, but he’s already slipping away, head down, moving between tables and heading straight for the back exit by the restrooms.
Damnit.
Just before he vanishes around the corner, I feel the magic pull back, retreating like a wave from the shore. My skin gives one last shudder and then settles.
Around me, the afflicted stir as one, like an animal waking from slumber.
Shocked murmurs and uncomfortable giggles follow—they don’t understand what happened, just that something did.
Something that made them forget all about their dates, crushes, loves, significant others, and situationships.
All for a stranger, a man they’ve never seen before but somehow couldn’t resist.
There are going to be some awkward conversations across campus tonight.
I catch Chessa’s confused gaze, and she gives me a wide-eyed look over the top of her glasses. She holds her hands up in a “What the hell was that?” gesture. But her hands are trembling.
I shake my head and lift my shoulders in response, lying my ass off. This is why I hate magic. In all the stories, it’s about waving wands and saying the right words and judicious use. In reality, everyone gets screwed.
She nods with a frown, then turns to chase after Daan, who is wandering around like an oversized deer recently released from the thrall of passing headlights.
Lennie rushes toward me. “Where is Devon going?” she demands. “He’s coming back, right?”
“I don’t think so,” I say, distracted once more by what he said before his rapid departure.
What kind of announcement could it be? The Old Ones weren’t really ones for public declarations; they were more of the “fuck around and find out … painfully” type.
At least as far as I know. My decision to stay as far from that world as possible left me in a position of ignorance and sometimes led to unintended consequences. Occasionally life-averse consequences.
“What did you say to him?” Lennie asks. “Did you say something to him about me?”
That grabs my attention. “What?” I shake my head. “No, Lennie, of course not. He just said he had to leave. I think we should go too. Maybe we can—”
“Are you meeting up with him later?” she asks, her brown eyes flooding with tears.
“No!” Not unless I can find him and pin him down on answers.
“I don’t see why not,” Lennie says, swiping at her face, where tears are now spilling down her cheeks. “Freshman year it was Benton from Sig Ep. That was a whole big secret thing.”
I wince. Benton and I had enjoyed a comfortable and mostly unspoken friends-with-benefits arrangement until he started throwing around the word “girlfriend.” “Like I said before, no one knew. I didn’t realize you had feelings for him, and it wasn’t really an official—”
“And do you think I didn’t see you with Carter at the bar? What the hell is that? Why didn’t you say anything?” Lennie demands.
Hurt is coming off her in waves now, faster than I can consume it. It’s like trying to breathe through a wet washcloth, and my control is wobbling. I need to shut this down or move out of range. “It’s complicated, and I—”
She folds her arms across her chest. “What’s complicated?” she demands. “I told you I was interested in him, that I wanted to find out if he was single, and you said nothing!”
Lennie’s voice is growing louder and louder, rising above the general din of the restaurant. But it’s the shrill note within it, an edge that announces an imminent loss of control, that’s turning heads in our direction.
This must be what Devon meant by unpredictable.
“I mean, is it ever enough for you? Carter and Devon?” she asks.
As if she actually knows Devon. Either of them, really. Frustration flares, sending heat up through my neck and into my cheeks. “Lennie—”
“Are we even really friends?” she snaps.
Her wounded feelings have turned to anger, eliminating one of my problems at least. I can’t feed off anger.
“With the way you treat me, I can’t tell.
Maybe you just keep me around for a laugh, to feel better about yourself.
Or maybe because I give you things, like a free place to live over the summer. ”
Stung, I straighten up. “Lennie, that’s not fair.”
Chessa, with Daan in tow, arrives next to us. “Lennon,” she says calmly. “Shut up. You don’t need to be spilling your business all over the—”
“No. No, I won’t,” Lennie says, on the verge of shouting. “It’s like Jo wants me to be unhappy.” She turns to face me. “You think people can’t tell, but it’s like you … thrive on misery or something.”
Heat and cold wash over me at the same time, the feeling of exposure and humiliation simultaneously. I can’t move, can’t breathe. How does Lennie know? Does she know? She can’t know …
“You’re upset,” Daan says with a frown. “Let’s perhaps talk about it at—”
“No! You see it, you know what I’m talking about.
It’s always about her.” Lennie throws her arm wide in an exaggerated gesture.
It’s an accident, a manifestation of drama and big feelings.
But the result is the same. The back of Lennie’s outflung hand—the one with that heavy ring—connects with my mouth, hard enough to be heard.
Heat and pain radiate outward from my top lip into my nose and up to my eyes.
I clap a hand over my mouth, automatically. My eyes start to water, and I taste copper.
The dartboard side of Happy’s gives a collective gasp. But Lennie doesn’t back down. “Jo is just a selfish bitch.”
After a moment the initial pain dies down, but my lip begins to throb where Lennie’s ring made contact.
Fury—that liquid fire that lives in a molten state in my chest, collecting over the years of exhaustion, resentment, and sheer terror of what I might do—bursts through the various dams and barriers I’ve built to keep my emotions in check.
It’s always about me? You have no idea what that even means. Always starving, always pretending. I’m doing my best, and believe me, you don’t want to see what happens if I make it about me.
I clench my fists, willing myself to stay still. That thing in me, the needy hungry thing, writhes, demanding freedom, retribution. Food.
Daan gives me a wide-eyed look. “Are you all right?” he mouths, and under other circumstances, I might be afraid of what my expression was giving away. Not tonight, though. Not now.
Breathe, just breathe. Keep it together, Jo.
“Okay, schatje, come on. Let’s go.” Daan wisely steps up and puts an arm around Lennie, ushering her away.
She immediately breaks into shoulder-heaving sobs. As if she’s the one who was hit.
I exhale sharply and shake my head, forcing my fury down and wrestling for control. It doesn’t matter. Lennie is right, even if she doesn’t know exactly how or why.
Daan leads Lennie toward the front door and Chessa follows behind, grabbing at my sleeve to tug me along with her.
Feeling the curious gazes—on all of us, but specifically me—I veer off to grab our stuff at the booth, as well as a handful of napkins for my bleeding lip.
That’s when I realize Carter’s coat is missing. I glance back automatically, but he’s not where I left him near the bar. I would have passed him. Which means he’s gone. After witnessing I-have-no-idea-how-much of that drama.
I close my eyes for a moment. Fan-freaking-tastic.