All That Falls (31 page)

“It doesn’t help,” he murmured.

“What?”

He rubbed his eyelids then opened them. “If the surrounding temperature is very low, clothes or linens can help prevent my body temperature from plummeting or can help me rewarm, but indoors where the temperature is moderate, blankets and clothes don’t do much.” He yawned. “Body heat is the only thing that works.”

“I woke up feeling like a Popsicle,” she said.

“Sorry.”

She took his right hand and rubbed it between hers. “Are you cold?”

“No worse than usual.” His left hand rested on his chest. “Better in fact, for the moment.”

She got up and gathered the things they’d taken from Ileana’s. It was time to concentrate, but before she could return to the bed, someone knocked. She glanced at the door, then at Lysander.

“You can answer it. There’s no danger to us.”

She set the photos and papers on the end of the bed, grabbed the dagger she’d been training with, and walked to the front door. She kept the knife in her right hand and hidden behind her, opening the door with her left.

Mr. Orvin hulked in the hallway.

“Sorry to bother you, Miss Xenakis.”

“It’s okay. What’s happening?”

“The boss got a call about Jersey’s missing brother. He’s just Varden-side of the Sliver, trying to buy a gun and V3 ammunition.”

A gun and vampire-killing ammunition? Hayden’s not violent.
Cerise knew suddenly, with a lurching stomach, that that ventala bitch Tamberi Jacobi had done something terrible to him, something that could only be settled with a V3 bullet.

“The dealer’s keeping him there,” Orvin continued. “I’m going to swing by to pick him up. The boss thought you would want to know.”

“I do. Thanks. Is Hayden okay?”

“He’s trying to buy a gun, so he’s on his feet. That’s a good sign. Sounds like he’s kind of banged up though.”

“Banged up how?”

“The boss didn’t say. Listen, the little songbird’s sleeping. I didn’t wanna wake her up yet. Thought you could stay close to her till I get back with her brother.”

Cerise’s brows knitted. “Hayden’s hurt. I’ll go with you.”

“No need for that. We’ve got a truce on for the moment, but the peace is kinda shaky. Easier for me to go after him alone.”

“We won’t slow you down.”

“We?” He glanced over her shoulder. “Oh, right. It’s like that,” Orvin said with a carefully neutral expression.

“Yeah, it’s like that,” she said with a half smile.
Until he’s gone
. She felt a pang of dread at the thought, but pushed it from her mind.
Just live in the moment,
she thought with another glance at Lysander stretched out like a ray of sunshine before them.
It’s a really great moment.

“You can’t do better than him in a fight, but I can do this quick and easy on my own.” Orvin looked over his shoulder
toward the other door. “She’s had a couple nightmares. She might sleep through, but I told her if she needed something to knock here. Hate for her to find the place empty if she comes.”

Cerise nodded. “You’re right. I don’t want her to feel alone.”

“Great. Here’s the key and the code for that apartment in case you want to check on her. I’ll be back in about an hour. You need anything while I’m out?”

“Just the Molly Times bassist.”

“I’ll get him,” Orvin said with a smile, then he turned and lumbered away.

Cerise closed the door. “Merrick’s bodyguard has a crush on Jersey.”

“They’re an odd match. If they were mythical creatures, she’d be a pixie and he’d be a giant. They’re two feet and several octaves apart.”

Cerise laughed. “Sometimes opposites attract.”

Lysander shrugged.

“They do both have that white-blond hair,” Cerise noted.

“She uses bleach to make hers that color.”

“Lots of women do. Blonde’s always a popular color.” She sat on the edge of the bed, lifting a photograph from the collection of papers they’d brought from Ileana’s. The photos had been taken in a place Cerise didn’t recognize. One of the walls was painted black and had graffiti on it. The three-pronged lightning bolt from the inside cover of the Molly Times debut CD was central to the artwork. Then she came to a skinny male body, nude against rumpled blue sheets, and she froze, recognizing the Misspent Youth tattoo on the naked flank. She squinted and could make out a Ramones’ “Road to Ruin” T-shirt on the floor.

Griffin—

His face wasn’t in the frame, but it was him. Her mind reeled.

“What the fuck?” she said as the blood drained from her head. Feeling Lysander’s hands on her shoulders, she clutched the picture tighter, staring at the image, trying to get her head around it.

“What is it?” he asked.

“What the hell is she doing with this? Who took it?” Cerise pulled so hard the corner tore off. She looked around wildly,
then at Lysander. “This is Griffin. Why would Ileana have had this? Where would she have gotten it?” She lurched to her feet and marched to her phone, then remembered that there was no way to reach Ileana. “I don’t understand,” Cerise barked, staring down at the picture. “Ileana barely knew Griffin. They’d met a few times. His apartment was in her building, sure, but these aren’t our sheets…It’s not our place.” She raised the photo. “Cream-colored carpet with the purple swirl pattern. It’s the carpet in Ileana’s house?”

She thrust the picture at Lysander. He glanced down at it, frowned, then looked back at her. She snatched the picture and examined it again.

“It appears to be. Yes,” he said.

“There was no graffiti in the master bedroom, but maybe she painted over it or maybe this is a guest room.” Cerise’s head jerked from side to side. “What the hell?” she said, her voice ragged and harsh. “I don’t believe it. I would’ve thought a groupie maybe, when the Times were on tour and I wasn’t with them, or some indie rock musician or that waif tattoo artist in San Francisco. But Ileana? No way. She was the farthest thing from Griffin’s type possible.”

Lysander’s dubious expression made her furious.

“What? What do you have to say?” she demanded.

“Nothing if you want me to be silent.”

“No, tell me. What?” she said.

“You’re a muse. You were his type. She’s a muse,” Lysander said.

She clenched her fists. “I can’t believe them. Either of them.”

“Just because she had a nude photo of him doesn’t mean they had an affair. Are you certain it’s him?”

“It’s him, damn it. His body. His tattoo. The Ramones T-shirt I bought! He wore that T-shirt for a fuck date with another woman,” she said with a churning stomach. “You know I wasn’t the one who wanted an exclusive relationship. It was his idea! He pushed and pushed for us—” She shook her head violently. “What the hell?”

“It’s as I said,” Lysander said, folding his arms across his chest. “He wasn’t worthy of you.”

She crumpled the photograph and flung it to the floor.

Lysander looked away with a strange expression passing over his face. Her muscles tightened.

“What are you thinking?” she asked.

He shifted his shoulders uncomfortably. “I’d rather not confess it.”

She caught his chin and turned his face toward her.

“This,” she said, moving her hand to indicate the two of them, “is still new. Don’t hold back. I feel like that picture of Griffin turned my whole world upside down. He and Ileana lied to me and kept me in the dark. They were screwing each other behind my back, and it makes me feel like a fool. I couldn’t take it if you started keeping secrets. The way you confide in me is what makes me trust you.”

He ran a hand through his shorn locks. “The explanation wouldn’t help. It wasn’t a thought worthy of an angel, fallen or not.”

“I’d imagine that not every thought you have is. Tell me anyway.”

He shrugged in surrender. “You and I together, we’re the right fit.” He pressed his palms together, each finger the perfect mirror of its fellow. “If we’d met earlier, Griffin Lane would have been in my spot. At moments, his memory still is. I’m sorry that seeing the picture hurt you, but—in truth, I’m also not sorry you found it.”

She arched a brow, exhaling through pursed lips.

“If I’m being brutally honest I’m not sorry he’s dead and gone. You’re mine now, and I want you to myself.” He shook his head. “I know how dangerous jealousy can be, but in the end, I want you to love only me.”

A wave of hot emotion crashed over her, and she found it satisfying. Jealousy might not be worthy of an angel or a muse, but the passion that inspired it was hard to resist. She licked her lips, staring at Lysander’s gorgeous face, and let herself feel possessive of him.

Archangels are part of heaven’s forbidden fruit, and no woman alive gets to taste this one but me. If Griffin did screw Ileana, to hell with him.

“If you ever cheat on me while we’re together, I’ll kill you.”

He smiled. “I’ll never cheat on you. It’s not in me to do it.”

“No?”

“Loyalty comes as naturally to me as athleticism—or pride,” he said with a self-deprecating smile. “I’ll never give you cause to doubt my fidelity.”

The steadiness of his gaze, unflinching and open, eased something inside her. She wouldn’t have thought anyone could calm her at such a moment, but Lysander could be—and was—larger than life.

The tension in her muscles loosened, and she appraised him with mock cool. “Despite your fallen status, if you continue to play your cards right, you may get your wish and turn out to be the only man I love,” she said.

The corner of his mouth turned up, and he inclined his head. “I accept your challenge. I’m a great card player,” he said slowly.

She clasped her hands together. She wasn’t really in the mood for banter. She wanted to smash something, to sprint full-out across the world, pounding the ground into submission, or to work off her anger some other way…but she made herself play, to prove to herself how little Griffin’s betrayal meant.

“A great card player? That’s not what Richard North says.”

Lysander rolled his eyes. “Richard cheats at cards, and Merrick lets him.”

That truly made her smile. “Richard doesn’t have a particularly firm grasp on reality, and he’s Merrick’s new father-in-law. It’s cool of Merrick to let him win.”

Lysander shook his head with a frown. “I don’t object to Richard taking my money, though I can’t see why he needs it when Merrick and Alissa provide everything for his care and comfort. I object to my other losses.”

“Other losses?”

“Have you heard of something called ‘bragging rights’?”

She laughed, almost surprised at the sound. “Once or twice.”

He tapped his thigh. “My competitive nature can’t abide losing and then being ribbed about it.”

She leaned forward and kissed him. Lysander’s mouth opened against hers, taking as he gave.

A little bit of heaven to wash away the bitter taste in my mouth.

Cerise leaned back and licked her lips. “We could go back
to bed for a while. I’m going to want to talk to Hayden as soon as he gets here. Until then we could rest…or do other things. Have a preference?” she asked.

“A very strong preference,” he said and kissed her again, grabbing her around the waist and propelling them both back onto the mattress.

“Okay then. Make me forget him,” she whispered.

He smiled, eyes dark and calculating. “For certain.”

Things were slow and sweet, like drizzling syrup. They savored each other until finally, in a heap of dampened sheets, she fell into a deep and dreamless sleep.

Lysander had turned the heat up high and covered them with blankets so that Cerise wouldn’t be chilled by his body being pressed to hers. Unlike when she’d slept against him before, this time she woke feeling refreshed.

She opened her eyes to study his handsome face. His lips were slightly parted, his breath sweet and cool against her forehead. She turned her head and through the window she saw late-day sun.

“Oh,” she murmured, raising her head and shoulder to see the clock. Five thirty in the afternoon. “Hell.”

“What about it?” Lysander murmured, pressing his face against her breast. His lips closed over her skin in a lingering and sleepy way.

“We slept all day.”

He licked her with the flat of his tongue, like a cat trying to capture a drop of cream.

“Lysander,” she said, catching his hair in her hand and holding his head still while she leaned away from his questing mouth.

His lids rose a fraction of an inch. “I can still reach,” he said, and his tongue snaked out to lave her nipple. It sent a thrill through her that raised gooseflesh, but it was obvious that one of them was going to have to stay strong.

Her fingers twisted in his hair and gave it a hard tug. “Just because you can doesn’t mean you should.”

“True enough. And just because you pull my hair doesn’t mean you want me to stop.”

“True enough,” she echoed with a small smile. “I actually
want
you to keep going, but I’m telling you not to.”

Relenting, his head fell back onto the pillow. She studied his mouth, wanting to plant a kiss on it, but that would be begging for trouble. Instead she smoothed down his hair and rose from the bed.

She marched into the bathroom and took a hot shower. Thoughts of the night’s revelations made her furious at Griffin again. Lysander had been an excellent distraction, but even he wasn’t enough to overshadow that damned nude photo forever. Did she care anymore where Ileana was or what was happening to her?
No.

The Rellas hadn’t been her friends. They were treacherous liars. Let Etherlin Security hunt for Ileana; Cerise was done with that part of things.

When she came out of the bathroom wrapped in a towel, she was surprised to find Merrick and Alissa in the apartment.

With a casual wave of his hand, Lysander said, “Merrick and Alissa came to speak with us.”

“So I see,” she said.

“Oh, Lysander,” Alissa said with a soft laugh. “When I said you should let her know we were here, I meant you should let her know before she came out of the bathroom from her shower.”

“Why?” Lysander said.

To Cerise, Alissa said, “I’m sorry.” Alissa hurried to a closet and retrieved a bathrobe.