Addict (10 page)

My stomach responded in the affirmative. I gave in. I needed that burger. I didn’t even know what kale was. “Fine. But this doesn’t make us friends.”

“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Trent promised.

Chapter Five

I might not have liked Trent at that point, but I did like being around a wolf. I feel comfortable around werewolves. They’re kind of like my people even when they’re assholes. So I tipped back my beer and settled in beside him as we watched the show currently playing in Ether.

“Donovan’s saying something about how much he respects Marcus and how happy he is to have him back.” Trent gestured to the two men pretty much everyone in the club was watching.

Marcus had apparently tracked the king down to the club level of Ether. Donovan had been talking to a couple of shifters when Marcus had approached him. It had quickly dissolved into some seriously angry dinner theater.

“Yeah, well, Marcus isn’t having it,” I pointed out as Marcus began speaking rapidly. His hand jabbed at the air. He had the general look of a man who wasn’t going to take it anymore.

For the most part, Marcus is a private man. It was only after I became his lover that he allowed me to see the range of his emotions. He tended to play things close to the vest. Every once in a while, though, his Italian temper flared, and the man could rage. At those times he didn’t care that he had an audience. This particular audience was out of luck since the entire argument was being conducted in rapid-fire Italian. Turns out the king has an ear for languages. So Trent and I were making a game out of figuring out what the men were saying.

“Obviously.” Trent laughed as the king put his hands up in submission. “That would be his ‘Sorry, I fucked up’ face. I think he conceded that Marcus can stay your trainer.”

“Like he has a real choice in the matter.” I snorted. We’d already bonded. It wouldn’t work so well with anyone else.

“Well, Donovan might have conceded, but it doesn’t look like your guy is done. That dude is pissed.” Marcus leaned over the table that separated him and the king, his eyes narrowed. Trent took a long swig from his third beer. It was kind of nice to eat with someone who could keep up with me. It made me feel less like a freak. “I’m surprised His Highness is putting up with this. Anyone else and his ass would be on the ground unconscious.”

“Not just anyone else,” an amused voice said from behind us.

I turned and saw Dev Quinn watching the byplay between his partner and Marcus. He held three bottles of beer in his hands. He passed them out, keeping the last one for himself.

The fertility god hopped onto the barstool beside me like he owned the place, which he did. “I think you’ll find there are four people in the world who can get away with embarrassing the hell out of Dan. Zoey does it on a regular basis. I save it up for those times he’s truly pissed me off. Then there’s Marcus. Dan loves Marcus. Marcus saved him after his turn. He can get away with almost anything.”

“Who’s the fourth?” Trent asked curiously.

“Our father-in-law.” Quinn had a rueful smile on his face. “Of course, Harry would never yell at Daniel. Daniel is perfect.”

“I bet he yells at you.” From what I understood, the queen’s father was human. I wondered how he took his baby girl being claimed by a fertility god.

“Less and less as the years go by, but in the beginning, I was his whipping boy,” Quinn explained. He winced as he watched his partner. “Shit, what did Marcus say?”

The king had left placating mode and was now getting in his mentor’s face. Marcus didn’t look inclined to back down. It wasn’t hard to figure out which buttons Marcus would push. He’d already pushed them once.

“I think Marcus just pointed out that the king might let his wife play around with other men, but he doesn’t do that.” I hoped I wasn’t about to have to get between them.

Quinn sighed and called over a waitress. “I’m going to need something stronger than this.” She went off to do his bidding. “I wish he hadn’t gone there.”

Something was off in this situation. Quinn was entirely too calm. I should have ignored it. I should have let it go. I couldn’t. “Shouldn’t you be all pissed off that Marcus is back?”

It was harshing my buzz. Quinn was supposed to get his panties in a wad, and I was going to laugh.

The fertility god smiled brilliantly. He might be an asshole, but he was also a hottie. “I’m perfectly thrilled to have Marcus home and happily settled down with a mistress.” He pushed the neck of my sweater aside. “I see he’s already fed tonight. That’s healing quickly, Kelsey. Either you’re more wolf than any of us suspects or Marcus is feeding you, too.”

I felt Trent stiffen at the words, and he took a sudden interest in his beer. Wolves and vamps don’t always get along. Wolves tended to get pissed when vampires took she-wolves as lovers. I wondered if Trent truly viewed me as a she-wolf. I am, of course, but wolves tend to recognize my scent. None of that explained why Quinn would be so smugly self-satisfied at the thought of my relationship with Marcus. I wasn’t an idiot, though. I could take a logical leap. “You think if he’s involved with me, he’ll leave your daughter alone.”

“Oh, Kelsey, I know Marcus,” Quinn admitted. “He’s intensely loyal once he’s involved with a woman. He won’t ever leave you, not even for his so-called destiny. And I knew exactly who was coming back with you. I never let those things get by me. I simply wondered if you would tell me. Now, Alan Kent is sitting at the bar. He said you were looking for him. Is there anything I should know?”

I turned to the gorgeous faery, with his perfect face and more arrogance than anyone should be allowed. He might technically be my boss, but he wasn’t getting an inch from me. “I was under the impression there wasn’t anything you didn’t know. Excuse me.”

Hopping off the barstool, I glanced at my boyfriend and the king, who seemed to be settling down. It didn’t look like it would come to blows, so I was probably safe to deal with the next situation of the night.

Alan sat at the end of the bar, nursing a beer. He was dressed in jeans, boots, and a Western-cut shirt with pearl snaps. It was one of the better ensembles in his wardrobe. Alan was a few years older than me. If I remembered correctly, he’d recently turned twenty-nine. He looked older. He drank too much, even for a shifter. Like Scott, Alan was a pure shifter. Also like Scott, he wasn’t strong. They lived on the periphery of the supernatural world. They would never be able to handle themselves against a wolf or a vampire, so they tended to keep their heads down. It’s a sad truth of our world that if you aren’t an alpha, it’s best to try to not be noticed. I often thought that Scott and Alan would have been much happier in the normal world.

“Kelsey.” He nodded sullenly. Like Liv, his eyes were baggy, as though he hadn’t slept much lately. His thin lips turned down as I took the barstool beside him. I realized his frown wasn’t for me. “Mr. Wilcox.”

My eyebrow arched at that. Alan wasn’t the polite type. He must be completely terrified of Trent. Fortunately, I wasn’t. Trent was a little like a muscular tick. He’d dug in and I was going to have to burn him to get him off me.

I had to back up to be able to see him. The man loomed over me. “I don’t need your help with this, Trent.”

I heard the growl from the back of his throat. It made Alan go a nice shade of white. It made me roll my eyes. If I showed that wolf even a hint that he could intimidate me, I would never get rid of him. “You can watch me from another table, Wilcox. Go away.”

He didn’t try to hide the growl this time. He leaned over, deliberately getting in my space. Trent Wilcox was easily a foot taller and had at least a hundred pounds on me. I smiled slightly and held my ground. “Watch it, baby girl. One day you’re going to push me too far and I won’t care how much trouble I’ll get in.”

He stalked off and pointedly sat down at a table about ten feet away. He would still hear everything. I shrugged because he was probably right. I’d push him too far one day and we’d throw down. Part of me was looking forward to it. I hadn’t killed anything in a couple of months and the wolfy part of me was getting bloodthirsty. Tonight, however, I was going to have to settle for having pushed him back.

Alan peered back at Trent, wariness plain in his eyes. There was a fine tremble to his hands when he picked up his beer and glanced back at me. His lips turned down in a sullen frown.

 Now we could get down to business. “There, now that the hall monitor is gone, we can talk.”

“Don’t know what you want to talk to me about,” Alan replied, staring forward.

So he was going to be stubborn. “I want to talk to you about Scott.”

The trembling was a bit more than fine now. Alan had to force his hands to stop shaking. He set down the beer bottle. I could practically feel the frustration pouring off him in waves. “Since when do you give a shit about Scott?”

I didn’t. I firmly believed the world would be a better place without him. He was a case I was getting paid to solve and nothing more. So why did I say what I said next? “I care about Liv, and she cares about Scott.”

It really should be easier to hold a mean grudge. I consider myself a tough chick. Just three months past I killed an alpha and two beta wolves. Shouldn’t that chick have a hard heart? Hell, apparently I came from a whole line of hardened killers who had to be caught early or put down hard.

But I was also my father’s daughter and he hadn’t been typical, either.

“You haven’t acted like you care about Liv.” Alan pointed his beer bottle at me. There was a lot of accusation in that half-finished malt liquor. “She says you won’t talk to her. She’s been crying about it and shit. I don’t understand chicks.”

“Obviously.” I didn’t like the thought of Liv crying. The truth was, Liv could easily have been convinced that what she did was best for me. Donovan and Quinn could have told her any number of things that could happen if she didn’t get me to comply. I would rather she had told me what was going on, but there was a real possibility that she thought it was for the best. I shoved aside the thought. “Have you talked to Scott lately?”

He shrugged and I noticed the way his shirt hung off his thin frame. I hadn’t seen Alan in a couple of months. We weren’t close or anything, but I think I would have noticed if he’d joined a diet group. He used to have a nice beer belly going. Today, he was painfully thin. Like an emaciated supermodel without the pretty face.

“I see him from time to time.” Alan’s eyes shifted from the bar back to where Trent sat. They moved quickly, as though not wanting to miss anything. “He works a lot.”

“Yes, I heard he got a job managing the bar at the new club downtown.” I saw now that I had to treat Alan like any other reluctant witness. The trick with witnesses is to stay calm. You have to give them a nonjudgmental place to talk. Deep down, they all want to tell their story. They might give you a sob story about not wanting to get involved. Don’t listen to it. It’s crap. Everyone wants to be the center of attention, and that’s what you have to make them. It also helps if you know something about their nature. “It sounds like a pretty good gig to me.”

Alan liked to correct people. It gave him a sense of superiority. If I wanted him to talk, I had to give him a reason to. “What the fuck do you know, Atwood?” I didn’t correct him on my new surname. “It’s a piece of shit job exactly like the rest. He thinks he’s hot shit now that he’s working for Julius Winter? That dude’s no better than Quinn, maybe worse. Scott doesn’t go out anymore. He’s always working, and for what? He’s not making good money, and he has to put up with all the…”

Alan clammed up and fast. His face went white. That look on his face told me Scott was in serious trouble.

“I can help him.” I kept my voice quiet. I didn’t want to spook him further, but I needed to point a few truths out to him. “Do you know what I am now, Alan?”

“You’re the
Nex Apparatus
.” Alan whispered as though he didn’t want to say it too loud.

“I am the king’s death machine.” It was what
Nex Apparatus
meant in Latin. “I’m a Hunter. Whatever is hurting Scott, I can kill it. I just need to know what I’m getting into. What kind of creature is this Julius Winter?”

Alan stood up and started to scratch at his chest as though he couldn’t help himself. His hands moved in paranoid twitches. Sweat ran down his brow despite the fact that Ether was always kept at 70 degrees. “He’s a rat fink bastard is what he is. You know what they do? They give you some and it’s awesome. I mean, it is seriously amazing. Like nothing before.”

I was still and schooled my face into a passive expression. I got the feeling that whatever they were giving away at Brimstone, it wasn’t coupons for happy hour specials. Someone was dealing and Alan was high. If it was affecting a supe this way, it was some powerful shit. Supernatural creatures metabolize drugs differently. Faeries can handle their liquor, but not hard drugs. Give a werewolf or a shifter a shot of heroin and they’ll just get pissed off you used a needle on them. Whatever this was, it wasn’t a street drug. “Did they give you a little taste and then try to charge you through the roof?”