Chapter 27 Troublemaker
Across his desk, Dax doesn’t look happy.
The dim yellow light of his office adds shadows to the creases on his face.
It’s so dark I can practically see the word ‘pissed’ spelled out on his forehead.
He might not have caught us, but I still feel like I’m sitting on the hot seat.
Of course, I’m the only one in it. Gray managed to escape.
Apparently, Trace strong-armed Dax into hiring him the night we left, which is the only explanation I got before he and I parted ways.
“Where did you go last night?” Dax asks, stern and demanding. He’s tense, riled up, and I can see it in the way he sets his shoulders.
“A party,” I say, a little taken aback by his tone.
“You didn’t answer any of my calls, or open any of my texts,” he states plainly. I saw his messages, and I also saw Jill’s. He pulled her into it, too, so I’m sure I’ll have to do damage control on that end once we’re done working things out.
“No offense, Dax, but what does that matter? We’re not dating.”
His jaw ticks. “No. We’re not.”
“Okay, so why am I on the hot seat?” I cross my arms over my chest, defiant. “I get that you’re jealous, and I’m sorry, but we agreed—”
“I know what we agreed on!” he booms, slamming his fists on the desk. I startle, dropping my hands to my lap and bite my bottom lip. Dax takes a deep breath, and then says, softer this time, “I know what we agreed on.”
“Okay, so what’s the problem?”
He sighs and leans back in his chair. “I got ahead of myself, I guess.”
“Did you think we would? Date, I mean,” I ask. I want to give him my full attention and patience on the subject. Just because I didn’t have any romantic feelings doesn’t mean he didn’t develop any along the way.
“Maybe? I don’t know.” He claps a hand over his face and groans. “I thought it would happen on its own. We were going at a pretty natural pace, ya know? It got in my head that we might end up dating or something.”
“You never said anything,” I say quietly.
“I know,” he groans again. “That’s my fault. I should have.”
Dating Dax seriously did cross my mind at one point, but I was still fresh out of a long-term relationship, so I put that on hold.
More than anything, he was a friend. We started sleeping together because it felt good, because it was better than the one-night stands that made me feel miserable about myself.
At least after sex with Dax, I knew we were still friends.
That’s why I never let myself move past that marker into more intimate territory.
Finally, I say, “We got comfortable.”
“We did,” he agrees.
Silence settles between us. Neither of us knows what to say, and that makes me anxious for what happens next. Do I lose my job for breaking things off? Do I lose a friend? I’m not even sure how to grapple with those two possibilities.
“I’m sorry I didn’t answer you last night,” I say.
“As long as you’re okay,” he says stiffly.
“Dax…”
“I know.” He stops me before I can start. “This is over between us.”
The way he says it out loud, with such resignation, makes me want to cry.
But it is over. I want Gray, now more than ever, and I don’t think that’s going to stop for anything or anyone else.
For so long, it never felt like a possibility that I could find and fall for someone so hard in such a short period of time.
But it happened, and I want it all. Even if Gray’s hot, oiled ex wants to wring my neck.
“It is.” I nod.
“No more special treatment,” he says. “Just a normal employee to boss relationship. Got it?”
“What’s special treatment?” I ask. In all the times that we were together, I can’t recall a single time where he gave me any sort of special treatment apart from the other girls. He was pretty fair in all of his dealings.
“Fucking on the clock.”
Oohhh, yup. That tracks. I give a little nervous laugh and try not to squirm in my seat. “So, I get to keep my job then?”
“Why wouldn’t you?” He looks at me like I’m crazy for even asking.
“I don’t know. When things go sour, that’s kind of what I expect—All or nothing ending.
” I motion my hands from my chest out to the sides to emphasize my point.
It’s happened before with Ronnie, so why couldn’t it happen with Dax?
At least last time I only lost the apartment post break-up. I still sort of had my dignity.
You get to keep your job, I remind myself.
“If anyone should get fired, it’s me.” He gives a hard laugh. “Good bosses don’t mess around with their employees.”
“We can still be… friends, right?” I feel bold for even asking.
“Give me some time, Millie, but yeah, eventually.” He gives a short nod and crosses his arms tight over his chest.
Fair, but it still sucks to hear it said aloud.
“Now get to work.”
“On it.” I stand from the wooden chair, grateful to be rid of its hard surface under my sore butt.
On my way out, I don’t look back, and Dax doesn’t call for me again.
When the door shuts, it feels like a literal and metaphorical door closing.
Part of me feels relieved, if not a little sad, and the other part of me feels giddy for everything else that comes after.
When Tannis said they’d teach me how to fight, I didn’t expect a full-on training montage.
Sweat drips down my face in rivers. One fat glob after another, racing along my cheeks, down my neck, and streaking along the curves of my back.
My borrowed athletic gear went from damp to soak cycle in thirty minutes, and we’ve been at this for an hour.
It started out easy. A little light stretching, some basic self-defense, added explanation and instruction from Tannis—easy peasy. Except it’s not.
I’m about to puke up my dinner, I think, feeling my stomach turn. I should have turned down the chicken and baked potato waiting for me after work, but Tannis insisted. They said I would need ‘plenty to burn’ and now I understand why.
“Take a break,” Tannis commands. “I’ll be right back.”
I collapse almost instantly, grateful for the reprieve. Spinning around a pole for eight hours in heels to throwing hands at a vampire twice my size deserves some sort of reward.
Waiting dutifully on the sidelines, Gray brings me water and sits down.
“How do you feel?”
I crack open the bottle and take a sip. “Like I could vomit.”
Gray gives a short laugh. It should annoy me, but it doesn’t. This is my fault.
I didn’t take him or Tannis seriously about this ‘training’ when I should have.
After I ate, Tannis had one of his live-in mortals bring me a change of clothes and lead me to the basement once I changed.
Not only was there a wine cellar and a wine bar down here, there was a fully stocked personal gym with its own area code.
“Tannis was a soldier,” Gray says simply. “They were on the battlefield, dying, when I turned them.”
“You what?” I sputter, water dribbling down my chin. He turned Tannis?
“I turned Tannis. Is that so hard to believe?”
“Are you two even related?” I ask. If I remember correctly, he also turned Dante. Someone isn’t shy about making new vampires.
“We are, yes.” Gray nods.
“How is that possible? Weren’t you a vampire before him?”
“For about ten years before they turned, yes. Like I said, I enjoyed court intrigue far more than any battles.” Gray stretches his long legs out in front of him and leans back on his elbows against the padded floor.
“Our families were part of the surrounding nobility, and so we often saw each other, regardless. See, Tannis was the only living son and child left to their parents. When word reached me that Tannis had been mortally wounded, I went to the front lines and saved their life.”
I’m sure my face is making some dumb expression when I say, “That’s actually kind of heroic.”
“It isn’t. I had ulterior motives.”
“What were they?” I ask, bringing my knees to my chest. Everything aches in a hard to get comfortable kind of way.
“Tannis is older than me, and was meant to succeed the family. It would have gone to me if they had died,” Gray explains.
“I didn’t want that responsibility. I wanted to fuck, hunt, and do whatever I pleased.
My reclusive behaviors excused any question of my mortality at the time.
Most assumed I drank all night and slept it off during the day. ”
“Makes total sense.” I can’t help the sarcasm that coats my reply.
“It did at the time.” Gray sighs.
“What does that mean?” I ask.
Behind us, Tannis interjects. “This idiot didn’t account for the fact that whatever duties I inherited as the head of our family would have to be carried out in the daylight, too. It made things somewhat difficult at first.”
Both of us turn around at the sound of their voice.
I feel a little guilty for talking about them when they weren’t around, but their expression borders on amusement over annoyance.
It makes me wonder if they were tuned in from the start.
They step forward and offer me a fresh towel, which I take gratefully.
“I was young,” Gray deflects.
“Young and stupid,” Tannis adds. They circle around us and squat to eye-level.
“Thankfully, I was in good enough standing that many believed my wounds from the battlefield were so great that I suffered a long-term illness as a result of my miraculous recovery. I evaded the daytime without question. Everyone simply thought I was too weak and sickly to get out of bed.”
“See? It all worked out in the end,” Gray says with a grin so wide it makes him look boyish.
“Only because it was easy to convince people in those days that God worked miracles.” Tannis rolls their red eyes and then turns to me. “He’s a troublemaker.”
Gray tilts his head in my direction and smiles. “Reformed.”