Chapter 22
Laurie
When I opened my eyes that morning and sat upright in the massive guest bed, I was aware of three things: River had been here, River was no longer here, and I had risen from a dreamless, dare I say, peaceful sleep feeling…
not good—let’s not get ahead of ourselves—but definitely not as shit as usual.
I flopped down on my back, staring at the ceiling and doing my best to recall exactly what had happened last night. The memories were hazy, but I could remember River’s presence.
She came in through the wardrobe—like a creep—and she rambled a lot, doing her best to distract me from my usual night terrors.
How she knew I’d been thrashing through a nightmare in the first place, I had no idea.
Maybe I’d been screaming. How I’d managed to fall asleep again, in the presence of a vampire, was also beyond me.
Thinking about it now, the patchwork snippets I could recall were absurd enough that I had to wonder if I’d simply dreamed the whole thing up.
And if it was real, I wasn’t sure how I felt about any of it.
Mortified that she’d seen me in that state, maybe?
Furious that she’d wormed her way in despite the locked door and my carefully laid tripwires?
If I allowed myself a brief moment of weakness, I could admit that some part of me was simply grateful for the slight reprieve.
Unfortunately, the gracious part of me was very small and the rest of me was a complete bitch, so I settled for being indignant about the whole ordeal.
I was also growing vaguely aware of a new sensation, a scent like fresh bread and something sweet floating through the crack in the door. Vampires don’t eat anything remotely close to that, so I could only assume that whatever was exuding that tantalizing aroma was intended for me.
And God, it smelled good. But I refused to take the bait. Still committed to being indignant, I folded my arms and sank deeper into the pillows, determined to ignore whatever my vampiric hostess had in store for me.
Until my stomach gave an impromptu rumble, and the subsequent hunger pangs eventually dragged me out of bed.
Unwilling to admit defeat I settled for frowning about it, even as I huffed in more of that mouth-watering scent.
How long had it been since I’d eaten anything at all?
I couldn’t remember—but the faint dizziness that emerged when my feet hit the floor was an indicator that I was long overdue for a dose of my standard cheap noodles.
I swiped my cell from the nightstand and shuffled toward the door, nudging aside half the linen closet still tied together across the floor, and followed that delicious aroma out into the hall.
The house looked different in broad daylight. Less like a glorified storage unit and more like a glittering treasure trove. Everywhere I looked, sunlight spilled through tall windows, painting every potted monstera and antique picture frame in vibrant gold.
The cluttered hallway eventually spat me out at the kitchen, where River and I had convened the night before, and the sound of something sizzling reached my ears.
I stepped through the archway and stopped short at the sight before me—River, looking more dazzling than she had any right to be, especially in contrast to my abysmal case of bedhead.
She stood tall and willowy in a loose silk robe of deep red, hair swept into a knot of dark curls on the top of her head. A few tendrils were making their escape and trickling down her neck, curling around her ears and over her brows.
The sunlight spilling in from the massive French windows made her look damn-near angelic where she stood—flipping pancakes?
I blinked, once, and struggled to comprehend the scene before me.
She had a whole stack of them already prepared, steaming hot and glowing golden on the center island.
And that wasn’t the only morsel on display.
The whole countertop was crammed with a ridiculous spread of breakfast options.
Everything from buttered croissants, muffins, and hashbrowns to streaky bacon and eggs—fried and boiled every which way.
I stood silent in the doorway, taking it all in with my mouth hanging open like an imbecile.
“Oh, hey! Good morning.” River noticed my presence then and her smile widened when I continued to gawk in complete befuddlement. She swept one hand out over the island spread, still flipping pancakes with the other. “Hope you’re hungry. I wasn’t sure what you liked so I, uh—I made everything.”
It took a moment to remember that I had a mouth—and could use it for more than catching flies. “You’re a vampire.” That statement alone was rather redundant, so I shook my head and tried again. “I mean—you don’t eat any of this. Why do you even have food in your house?”
River slid another pancake onto the precarious breakfast tower and shrugged. “I like having guests over—” a mischievous wink like she cracked some inside joke I wasn’t privy to, “—and I’m always prepared.”
When I did nothing but stare in response, River’s eyes flicked to me, to the countertop, and back again. “You’re not vegan, are you?”
I remembered that I had decided to be indignant and folded my arms. “No, just… not hungry,” and was then promptly betrayed by my stomach which let loose another audible rumble.
River’s brows crept up. “You sure about that?”
My jaw twitched. God fucking dammit.
Scowling at a cereal bowl rather than meeting her gaze, I pulled out a stool and sat down in a huff. “No.”
A hunger strike would get me nowhere–except maybe the floor if I stood up too fast—so I decided I may as well indulge just a little bit. I skimmed an eye over the excessive spread and chose the least threatening item: a single slice of toast, dry, and nibbled like it might bite back.
River seemed satisfied enough with my selection and resumed her frying fiasco, though who was going to consume all those pancakes, I had no clue.
“Did you sleep all right?” she asked over her shoulder, and I shot a glare at the back of her head.
“Are you referring to before or after you broke into my room?”
Her subsequent laughter had no business sounding so musical, and if I felt a slight flutter of something in my stomach at the sound of it, well, that was between me and God—or whoever was out there pulling the strings.
They clearly had a sick sense of humor, pitting me against a vampire so incomprehensibly skilled at worming through my defenses.
I hated to admit it, but regardless of her intentions River really had pulled out all the stops to make me feel at home here. And I had, beyond all logic and reasoning, slept better after her midnight visit.
I kept my scowl locked and loaded for as long as dignity allowed—about three more seconds. The scent of fresh pancakes, the sunlight staining the entire scene golden, the faint sound of the koi pond trickling in the hall… all conspired against me. It was—nice.
It was more than I deserved.
I huffed out a sigh and set down my toast. It was an effort to jam the words out through gritted teeth. “I, um… I don’t think I’ve said it yet, so—thank you. For this—for everything.”
River registered the change in tone and set the spatula down as she turned to face me.
I lowered my eyes, flailing to find the right words and mortified at my inability to communicate without a grimace.
“Look, I’m not… I’m not used to any of this.
” I waved my hand around the kitchen, encompassing everything—the food, her hospitality, the simple fact that she’d welcomed me in.
“But I am grateful. I just… don’t have a lot of practice in showing it. ”
When I risked a peek at her, River was still watching me, pensive like she was putting together the pieces that made me what I was. I tried not to writhe under her scrutiny.
Then she chuckled and shook her head, gliding across the kitchen to start tinkering with the teapot. “You haven’t officially met the rest of my circle—they’re all emotionally stunted in their own special way. Trust me, compared to them, you’re doing just fine.”
She got to work brewing tea and I watched her, absently reaching for another piece of toast.
Her dressing gown was slipping off one shoulder, revealing a clean line of collarbone that caught the sunlight in its shallow dip. But I was interested in her hands, long fingers pinching tea leaves and handling porcelain.
I crunched into my toast, eyes tracking the delicate choreography, before connecting the dots from her hand to her elbow to her shoulder, and up the column of her throat. My gaze kept climbing until it found the soft curve of her mouth, full lips hewn tight in concentration.
She didn’t look like the vampires I’d known before. She had something they didn’t.
Most of them were drop-dead gorgeous, but… empty. Time had stolen something from them, but what that something was I could not tell. Whatever it was, though—a spark of life, of humanity—River still had it. After all the years she’d lived, her eyes were still fiercely vibrant, brimming with light.
She’s so… beautiful, my brain noted—and I promptly inhaled a breadcrumb.
Cue immediate choking, hacking, dying on the spot. River was at my side in a heartbeat. “You okay? Do you need wat—”
I swiped at the glass of water she offered, chugging it down with rabid urgency and deftly avoiding acknowledgment of the thought that had just crossed my mind.
“I’m okay—” I sloughed out a cough, pounding a fist to my chest and wheezing through the asphyxiation while a blushing heat crept up my neck.
“You sure?” River leaned an elbow on the counter and brought her face to my level. Nose-to-nose like that, my pulse ticked up tenfold while she squinted at me. “You’re turning blue—and… red. Purple, really.”
“I’m fine!” I jerked away, cheeks scorching, and was saved—blessedly—by my phone buzzing across the countertop. I hauled myself upright and reached for it, slipping off the stool with a throaty rasp. “I gotta take this—I’ll… be-right-back.”
I hightailed it out of the kitchen before she could respond and motored down the hallway, far away enough that she couldn’t hear me even with her vampire senses and secluded enough that I could recover from whatever fluttering sensation she’d kickstarted in my stomach.
Grinding out another ragged exhale I checked the screen, winced, and answered the call. “Arlon?”
His voice came hollow and despondent through the line. “Laurie? Bad News.”
My throat ached like I’d been gargling kerosene, and I attempted another swallow before answering. “What’s up?”
“That location I got from the guy at the bar? Dead end.”
“What!?” I stiffened and rammed the cell tighter against my ear. “You checked it out? When?”
“I sent a team in at dawn—looked like a lab had been set up in there, but the whole place was cleared out. No paperwork, no tech, nothing to work with.”
I felt a twinge of guilt. The warehouse had been emptied, all evidence carefully erased by River’s coven overnight.
If Arlon’s people had gone in twenty-four hours earlier, they’d have found way more than they bargained for.
Instead, they got a ghost town—and it was partly my fault for not keeping him in the loop.
“We scanned the place top to bottom,” Arlon was muttering, frustration creeping through the static. “Nothing. No new clues.”
I swallowed again, this time grateful for the burn, a pain I probably deserved.
“I’m sorry,” Arlon said again, mistaking my silence for disappointment. “We’ll have to start from square one.”
“It’s all right.” I tried to keep my tone light, feigning the kind of optimism the guy was always trying to coax from me. “We’ll find another lead—just gotta keep looking.”
I hated lying to him, but I had no choice.
Besides—my gaze drifted back down the hallway, where light, cheery whistling emanated from the kitchen—I have a new partner now.
Someone well acquainted with the supernatural world. Someone who could get me to the heart of the organization, while Arlon stayed safe at his desk.
Someone who, admittedly, got my pulse racing for reasons I refused to consider.