Chapter 3 #3
She nodded emphatically. “They breathe. They have a heartbeat. Like me.” Her grin softened the sharpness of her words, and as she spun back into the rhythm of the music, I let the subject drop and joined her.
The tension in my chest eased as we danced, but my thoughts kept circling back to the man I’d seen earlier.
My furtive glances around the room seemed to land on William too many times.
His expression moved from an amused grin to annoyance.
He’d left the House of Knights to escape Belham’s concerned looks and here I was giving him my own variation of it.
His hollow smile couldn’t quite mask the sorrow flickering in his eyes.
I scanned the room for the handsome stranger once more. William’s mood gnawed at me, and my concern for him was too unsettling to ignore. I decided to talk to him. Just as I leaned in to share my plans with Amelia, someone yelled, “Fire!”
Chaos erupted. Flames burst into life, a riot of orange, gold, and an eerie blue that devoured everything in their path. There were no alarms, no flashing lights or sprinklers—just the frantic sound of people scrambling toward the exits, their shouts blending with the roar of the inferno.
The fire raged through the crammed bar. Two witches emerged from the crowd, their arms outstretched.
They looked at each other, their mouths parted in the beginnings of a spell when they hesitated.
The dilemma coursed over their faces. Breaking a window would let in the wind and spread the fire faster, but suffocating the flames by drawing out the air would doom everyone still inside who required oxygen.
From their scowls, I could see them calculating their next move, likely debating whether they could summon rain without access to the clouds.
The bartenders, servers, and a few employees using the fire extinguishers were rendered useless as they were jostled and pushed out of the way by humans rushing for the doors. Their discarded cups of alcohol made the floor slippery, and the spilled liquor only fed the ravenous flames.
The bartenders abandoned the fire extinguishers and joined the evacuating customers, some slipping out of the fire exit, others taking the front door.
“Get out! Everyone!” I shouted, my voice carrying over the commotion.
William’s hand grasped my shoulder and attempted to guide me toward the door.
The rush of people tossed me back and forth.
William’s hand gripped my shoulder harder and urged me out of the door.
I hesitated, waiting to see if people were leaving the restroom.
People fled out of the restroom in various states of undress, racing past me to safety.
When William urged me forward again, I didn’t resist. At least, that’s the story I’m sticking to.
His hand pressed firmly against my back, he steered me, Rachel, and Amelia out onto the crowded street.
Fire trucks, ambulances, and police cars clogged the area, their lights casting chaotic, flashing colors against the darkness.
A few humans were loaded into an ambulance and oxygen masks pressed to their faces.
Others were off to the side, having their burns treated, although I couldn’t tell the extent of their injuries.
Across the street, restaurant patrons abandoned their meals to gawk through the windows, while pedestrians stopped in their tracks, craning their necks for a better view. Murmured questions were a chorus of noise as the crowd exchanged scraps of information, desperate for details.
William and I studied the burning building. His brows inched together. Smoke clouded my vision further along with the confetti of ashes.
“The alarm didn’t go off and the sprinklers weren’t activated,” I said.
The chaos had sobered Amelia. She blinked several times and took in the charred, wet building. “Do you think it was a murder attempt? Or just a distraction?”
“A fire is a terribly inefficient way to kill someone,” I replied, glancing at the crowd.
Rachel had sauntered over to the fire investigator and seemed to be asking them just as many questions as they had for her. Returning to us, she shrugged and made a face. “They aren’t very forthcoming.”
“It’s an investigation,” I reminded her.
She didn’t seem to think that was enough justification to withhold information.
Everything about the fire nagged at me, and William seemed to have the same concern. His eyes landed on everyone in view for a few moments, as if he was committing their faces to memory.
“Hell of a way to end the night,” Rachel muttered, exhaling slowly as we watched a stream of people recount their versions of the event to the investigators. Each story a variation that boiled down to the same oversimplified conclusion: Some asshole set the place on fire.
That summed it up. Gooseneckers started to disperse along with some of the people involved. I couldn’t believe it when I heard some of them making more plans for the night. Others headed toward their cars, parking garages, and locations to catch their ride share.
“I’m going home,” Rachel announced, her fingers dancing across her phone screen.
“You want to catch an Uber with us?” I asked.
“Gabbi’s here,” she said, smiling at her girlfriend, who was double-parked across the street.
“Get home safe,” she said, gathering us in a tight embrace.
She pressed a peck on each of our cheeks and the mask fell.
She was scared, not knowing whether the fire was a simple case of arson or something worse.
It wasn’t uncommon to be the unwitting target of someone’s rage.
Enemies could be as easily acquired as the flu.
An ego hurt unintentionally—or maybe intentionally.
Envy. Or pure malice. There was also a small cadre of humans who hated the mere existence of supernaturals.
This could be one of their nastier displays.
Burn down one of the few clubs that serviced both humans and the supernatural.
My gut was telling me that wasn’t it. This was a distraction. But for what?
Rachel quickly headed toward her girlfriend, who hugged her like she was never going to let go.
Rachel eventually pulled away. Her lips immediately moved rapidly, and I assumed by her exaggerated hand movements that she was reenacting the fire bursting into the room.
Rachel was more dramatic than I realized.
“I’m taking you two home,” William said firmly, his tone brooking no room for argument.
He didn’t move, carefully scanning the small group of patrons who lingered.
His eyes swept over a small group of vampires and landed on a member of the House of Salvino.
This was a smaller house whose members consistently made their disdain for me known because they believed I was the reason there was one less vampire house.
Like the event that led to my job as a liaison, I had been in the wrong place at the wrong time.
During an awkward date with a witch who seemed more interested in my ties to the houses than me, I’d overhead a conversation between the House of Pellings’s Elite and a young woman.
Initially, I thought it was a date, but after further observation, it appeared he’d invited himself to join her on her solo date.
He was definitely drawn to the beautiful woman and made it obnoxiously known. He spoke with ASL accompanying his gestures as he made the offer to change her and “make her perfect.”
She rejected the proposition both using sign language and very choice words when he persisted. “I don’t need to be changed. And you want me perfect for you. I’m perfect for me.”
I was becoming increasingly uninterested in my date, who’d gone from being covert about his interest in the Houses of Knight and Hollows to showing that our time together was nothing but an information-seeking mission.
Sad part about the situation was that getting the information didn’t seem to be for him.
I suspected he was there on behalf of the werewolves.
I was more than happy to ignore him in lieu of being the woman’s hype team. When she asked the vampire to leave, he refused. She left. He went after her, and I intervened. Following him out the restaurant, I got his attention, distracting him as she waited for her car.
The House of Pelling’s Elite had looked down his hawkish nose at me.
A disdainful glower was directed at my bracelet, which had been met with a slew of titles.
Those who believed my position gave me insurmountable influence over the largest and most powerful houses referred to me as Power Bridge, House Influencer, Vampire Whisperer.
Other titles were less flattering and some downright insulting including Vampire’s Pet, the Houses’ Servant, Belham’s Claim, Corrine’s Marionette, and even Blood-whore.
New to my position, I’d foolishly believed I carried more influence over the smaller houses than I did.
The Elite’s hubris and sense of entitlement aptly reminded me I didn’t when I came across the woman again at Cloak and Dagger.
This time she looked disheveled and despondent and was noticeably a newly changed vampire.
A century of living as a vampire had given the Pelling’s Elite an unwavering sense of entitlement and arrogance.
I speculated that he’d taken my warning as a challenge.
Catching snippets of the disgusting conversation about the newly turned vampire, some vampires wondered why the Elite hadn’t gotten rid of Darby, and some crudely referred to her as “his mistake” instead of making her their problem.
Vampirism had failed to repair her hearing.
Seeing it as a flaw, the Elite had abandoned her to the members’ care.
His disinterest in her permitted the cruel treatment she received.