Chapter 9
Ophelia shivered, her hand brushing against Gideon’s as they stepped into Thaddeus’s study.
The gargoyle had reabsorbed his wings, but his skin remained reminiscent of stone.
She reached out, running a finger over its rough texture.
It was so weird how that didn’t set her off like everything else did.
He smiled down at her like he knew what she was thinking.
Ghandi, she couldn’t believe he was really here, with her.
She sniffled, turning away and wiping a hand beneath her eye, waiting for it all to crash down. It would. She knew it would. The things she’d done… Enjoy it while you can, Phe.
Yeah, right. What she should be doing is figuring out how to make Gideon see her for the lost cause she was, but the thought of him looking at her again with the malice he had in judge’s chambers made her want to puke.
“Your benefactor appears to be out,” Gideon said, leading her to a chair by the fire. “Is he usually, ah, indisposed, at this time of day?”
Ophelia sat, grimacing at the rub of upholstery as she drew her legs beneath her, and Gideon handed her a file. “I’m pretty sure Thaddeus keeps a schedule the same way he keeps his marbles—loosely at best.”
Gideon grunted. “Well, read that while we wait,” he muttered, moving to the window.
The sun was just pinking the horizon. The storm had passed, and the sky above a vivid, cloudless blue.
“If he’s not back by the time you finish, is there some place we can get coffee this early?
Breakfast perhaps? You’re far too thin.”
She blinked back tears again at his concern. “Cups,” she said before she’d thought better of it. But she supposed it was the lesser of two evils. She didn’t particularly relish the thought of taking Gideon there, but was even less eager to offer him ramen or leftover sushi.
He grunted and turned back to the window, his tousled, golden hair wheaten in the subdued morning light.
He raised a hand to scratch the stubble over his square jaw and frowned at its rasp.
A smile ghosted across her lips. Not being able to clean himself up must be driving him crazy.
He hated looking anything but put together, and being in a t-shirt and sweats outside of the house wasn’t anything he’d usually be caught dead in.
Which was probably why she’d always preferred him like this.
Ophelia looked away as she opened the file, and her breath caught. Gideon hadn’t been understating things. Her entire life, professional and personal, had been distilled onto the pages. Ophelia’s knuckles whitened at a handwritten note scrawled across the bottom of one of them:
Target is desperate for love.
Fuck them.
“I’ve seen enough,” she said, snapping it closed as she stood. “Breakfast?”
Gideon turned, an errant lock over his cocked brow. “Already? Are you sure?”
“Positive.” She frowned, tempted to throw the stupid file into the fire. “Just let me fix my face.” The looks they were going to get at the café would be annoying enough without everyone staring at her stupid tatuaj.
“I hope you don’t feel you need to do so on my account.” His lips quirked as he came to her side and tucked a strand of hair behind her ear. “However, as enjoyable as the rest of the visual is, you putting on pants would be appreciated. I’d hate to start off the day with murder.”
Ophelia scowled, and the asshole had the nerve to grin at her.
Damn it, he’d do it too, but pants weren’t happening, and neither was leaving the lair without makeup.
She stomped back across Thaddeus’s clustered study, trying to ignore Gideon’s chuckle at her back.
He trailed after her, smart enough to disappear into her room while she continued down the hall to the bathroom.
The concealer she’d spilled over the sink had been cleaned up, but the door was missing.
Ophelia vaguely remembered Gideon being responsible for its demise, and the damage to the frame certainly backed it up.
She buzzed her lips and rummaged around in her makeup bag, her fingers stilling, then pulling out a new bottle of concealer.
Soku.
Ophelia’s eyes welled up for the zillionth time in the past few hours, and she swore, pulling off the packaging. Ghandi, she was pathetic and, thanks to vampirism, she couldn’t even blame it on her stupid period. What the hell was wrong with her?
So, so many things.
She dashed the back of her hand across her eyes, sniffling, and started sponging the thick concealer over her tatuaj. Damn it. Either Soku had gotten her a defective bottle or the frickin’ things had gotten darker again. Ugh. This was pointless. She was gonna need to get a compact of pancake.
Ophelia threw her sponge at the sink and grabbed her toothbrush. But really, what was the big deal? It wasn’t like everyone in town didn’t already know she was a vampire, and if anyone said shit, Gideon would pummel them.
Her lips tipped up around her toothbrush as she scrubbed, having missed his temper more than she’d thought. He’d always been her champion, ready to beat the hell out of anyone who even thought about looking at her the wrong way.
Damn it. Her mirth quickly faded. Gideon never made idle threats, and he was serious about going after the Vampire Court.
She didn’t doubt his abilities, but not even a gargoyle could compete against the entirety of the Crimson Guard.
The elite force was made up of the most powerful vampires in each tribe, and every last one of them was rabidly loyal to the cause.
And to their general, Prince fucking Kremlyn.
Sweat stippled her body as she spat into the sink, her head hanging.
What the hell had she been thinking instigating that uprising?
Memories of blood washed over her. Ghandi, so much blood.
Flesh rupturing from paralyzed victims, assassins stepping from the writhing shadows, their victims being overrun by hordes of rats…
No. She locked it all away, struggling for calm.
That was then and this was now. She’d enjoy this while she could.
Ophelia ran a hand over her face. As long as she stayed in Havers, they were safe.
She had a little over a week before she had to submit all her evidence to the court and go back to Klineville.
Plenty of time for Gideon to write her off.
She puffed out her cheeks and dabbed on some mascara, because why not draw more attention to her eyes?
Whatever, it would have to do. She zipped her case closed and tossed it back onto the sink as she left the room.
At least the stupid marks were muted. She’d stop at Sal’s and grab whatever the grocer had in his depressing selection of cosmetics on her way back.
Ophelia stopped short in the doorway of her room.
Gideon sat at the edge of her bed, staring at her shoes.
Visions of him doing the same a lifetime ago rose with an unexpected warmth in her breast. Ghandi, she wanted that again.
Him. He looked up as her shadow darkened the room, and she shook the sudden longing away, bustling over to her clothes rack.
“Is there a problem?” she asked.
“No,” he said slowly. “I was just thinking about all your things in storage. I could have them couriered here, if you’d like.”
Her fingers stilled on a blouse. “Y-you kept them?”
Out of the corner of her eye, he nodded, looking away, his blunt fingers laced together in his lap. “When the vampires’ offer came in, I hired someone to box up the entire apartment. Getting rid of everything…I suppose it was too much like losing you twice.”
Ophelia kept her back to him. Damn these fucking tears. She sniffed. “Not the cat, I hope.”
“No. Mrs. Johnson down the hall took Octavius.”
“She was always nice,” Ophelia managed, pulling a micro-mini from the rack. She closed her eyes, breathing deeply to steel herself before pulling it on.
“Why do clothes bother you?”
Her eyes flew open at his innocuous question. “What?”
“Clothes, fabric. Last night, that brownie, ah, Soku, said you couldn’t stand how they felt. I can understand your aversion to being touched by someone, but…” He shrugged.
A bitter laugh slipped past her lips. Well, she wanted him to know what a headcase she was, right? No time like the present. “They make the Dam? wear heavy robes. We were sewn into them, then corseted. They cover you head to toe and are lined with crushed glass.”
Gideon looked up at that, his turquoise eyes flashing.
She forced herself to continue. “One of the older Dam? said it was so they could keep track of us by the trail of bloody footprints we left in our wake.”
Ophelia turned from him to the rack. The heated rage coming off Gideon hit her back like a furnace, his silence deafening. She flicked through her clothes, the click of hangers against the bar the only sound in the little room.
A long moment passed, then— “I suspect that explains why shoes aren’t a problem?” His tone was light, but that was bullshit. His knuckles had gone white, and that muscle in his jaw ticked. Ophelia wet her lips, the air stifling with his repressed rage.
“You would be correct,” she rasped. Ghandi, this was going to backfire.
He wasn’t disgusted with her; it was just further fixating his anger on the Vampire Court.
She swallowed the lump in her throat, desperate for a way to backpedal and knowing it was pointless.
Gideon was worse than a terrier with a bone. “Pick out a pair of heels for me?”
He met her gaze, his expression softening at the callback to their life together. He’d loved choosing what she wore. Ophelia looked away, and he cleared his throat. “The gray snakeskin.”
She nodded and bent to slip on her skirt beneath the tunic Soku had given her, praying he couldn’t see her revulsion as it slid over her hips.
“I’m going to kill them, Phe.”
“After breakfast.” She wiped her sweaty palms against her thighs and grabbed her purse.