Bad Blood (38 page)

“We have another name on the list.”

“Who?” He poured himself a double shot, then topped Olivia’s glass.

“Someone named Daw, I believe.” Chrysabelle looked at Mal, then slanted her eyes toward the door. She was ready to go, ready to get this over with.

Mal nodded. “It was a great pleasure to meet you, Olivia. Thank you for your hospitality.”

“You’re welcome anytime,
cher
,” she said.

“He won’t do it,” Augustine stated, hoisting his drink.

“What?” Chrysabelle asked.

“Daw. He won’t take the job.” Augustine swallowed a finger’s worth of bourbon and set the glass back down. “I can give you the name of someone who will, though.”

“Why hasn’t he already stepped up, then?”

“And go against the Prime’s son? No one’s that foolish. But with Sklar gone, it’s anyone’s game.” He smiled. “Anyone but mine.”

“His name?” Chrysabelle didn’t smile back, a sure sign that she was reaching the end of her patience with this day.
Or with you.

Augustine rummaged around behind the bar and came up with a pen and paper. “His name is Khell.” He scribbled some lines down, then held the paper out. “And here’s where you can find him—La Belle et la Bête.”

Chrysabelle took the paper. “Beauty and the Beast?”

“Your French is
tres bien
.” Olivia smiled at her. Augustine raised an appreciative brow.

“Mal’s is better.” Chrysabelle tucked the note into her pocket. “What kind of place are you sending us to?”

Augustine acted like he hadn’t heard her comment about Mal. “It’s the oldest othernatural bar in the Vieux Carré. Goes without saying vampires aren’t welcome.” He spared a half-second look in Mal’s direction. “Khell’s a mutt, but he’s got enough wysper in him to be effective.”

“Thank you,” Chrysabelle said. “Olivia, nice to meet you.”

“You too, darling.” Olivia grinned, but her gaze skipped to Mal. “Y’all come back now, ya hear?”

Chrysabelle didn’t speak again until they were outside and halfway down the sidewalk. “Loudreux is going to get his for making me kill Sklar.”

Mal nodded, unsure what to say since his offer to kill the cypher had gone flat. “You didn’t really kill him.”

“But I’m responsible for his death.”

“Technically, I’m the one who persuaded him.”
Killed him.

“And you did it because of me.” She stopped and wheeled to face him. “It is what it is, don’t try to sugarcoat it.”

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

She stuck her finger into his chest. “But when this is done, when I’ve found my brother and my comarré life is
truly behind me, Loudreux’s day of reckoning is going to come. So help me, holy mother.”

Mal nodded again and got the car door for her, an inordinate sense of pride rising up in him. Loudreux was in deep. Without the restraints of the comarré mores, there was no telling what kind of vengeance Chrysabelle might wreak. The side of his mouth curved up as he rounded the car to his side.

He’d never wanted to kiss her so badly in his life.

Doc leaned on the bathroom counter and stared at himself in the mirror. Dinner had knocked the last of the alcohol out of his system, so there was no way to pass off what had happened as a hallucination.

He pushed off the counter and stalked to the other side of the space. Ridiculous how big the bathroom was, but folks on Mephisto lived large. He reached the shower wall and turned again, faced with his own reflection.

Maybe it had been a hallucination. Maybe it was one of those things that would wear off over time. Maybe it would kill him. Or Fi. At that gut punch of a thought, blue flame burst off his skin, shooting toward the ceiling.

He tried to calm himself and forced his breathing to slow. The flame wrapped his body, cool as a breeze, then sputtered into nothing.

Fire had never been a varcolai trait. Never. This had come from Aliza somehow. Maybe she hadn’t been lying about never getting rid of her. She must be laughing from the grave. All those years she’d kept him shackled with the curse of being unable to fully shift, and now he was prone to spontaneous combustion.

It had happened right after a sharp jolt had woken him in the wine cellar. Even through the champagne haze, he’d immediately known Aliza was gone from his head. Or so he’d thought. He’d leaped to his feet and let out a whoop. A split second later, he’d been covered in cool, blue flames.

If Aliza had planned this as a punishment so that he’d have to live the rest of his life with a reminder of how Evie had died, she’d done a great job. If she hadn’t planned it and it was just a freak side effect of her being killed while linked to him through a spell, then his life was destined to spiral downward until it stopped at the gates of Hell.

Time to see just how bad this was. He grabbed a tissue, stuck his hand out, and thought angry, horrible thoughts until the flames burst out of him again. He dropped the tissue into the fire on his palm. It went up in a puff of smoke.

His gut knotted. He’d been hoping the flames would be as cool and harmless to everything else as they were to him. Definitely not the case.

How was he supposed to live like this? How was he supposed to make love to Fi if every time his emotions went nuts, he flared up like a Molotov cocktail? She’d be toast.

Literally.

He sank down against one of the tile walls, leaned his head back, and closed his eyes. The cool ceramic felt good. Maybe the fire would go away on its own over time. Aliza had just been killed. Maybe there was some kind of expiration date on the spell. If he could hide it long enough, there might not be a reason to after a while.

“Doc? You in there?” Fi’s voice came from the other side of the door. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, baby,” he answered. “Just getting an early start on my hangover.”

“You want some aspirin or something?”

He could picture her leaning against the door, her pretty brown hair tucked behind her ear, her eyes filled with worry. Over him. “It’s all good. Be out in a minute.”

“Okay. The others just put the TV on to see the news, and Creek thinks we should set up a watch system for the rest of the night.”

“Good idea. Happy to help.”

She didn’t answer right away, but he could hear her breathing, the muted pulse of her heartbeat. Even without varcolai senses, he’d have known she was still there. It wasn’t her nature to give up so easily.

“Something wrong, Fi?”

“No,” she said, a little softer than before. Her voice sounded like that when she was smiling. “I’m just glad you’re all better and this whole mess with the witches and the curses is behind us.”

Frustration made him rap his head against the tile behind him. Flames shivered over his skin. He stilled himself, forced his anger to cool. The flames vanished. “Yeah, baby. Me too.”

And just like that, the lie began.

C
hrysabelle wasn’t surprised that the outside of La Belle et la Bête didn’t live up to the fairy tale it had been named after. The building was gray. Or brown. It was hard to tell from the faded bits of paint not yet worn off by time and weather. Both its first and second floors sported three sets of louvered double doors, split across in the middle with a simple balcony.

All the doors were shut and not a sound emanated from the space. Not a single tourist walking by took one look at the building, and stranger still, none spared a glance at the vampire, fae, and comarré standing on the sidewalk in front of it.

“It’s like they don’t even see us,” she said. Not even her words turned heads.

“They don’t. Not exactly,” Mortalis answered. “Diffusion spell. Keeps the mortals out and the patrons from being gawked at.”

Mal crossed his arms. “Is that why it sounds empty?”

Mortalis nodded. “I can assure you it’s not.” He took a deep breath.

“Not looking forward to this, are you?” Mal asked.

“No.” Mortalis turned toward Chrysabelle. “Keep your wits about you and you’ll be fine.”

“It’s not me I’m worried about, it’s Mal.” She probably should have insisted he go back to the hotel, but considering he’d honored his word about not causing drama, she couldn’t find enough reason to keep him away. Nor did she really want to.

Mortalis shrugged. “It’s not like vampires don’t ever wander in here. The general consensus seems to be if they mind their own business, they’re left alone. However, if word has gotten out about Sklar and the city’s lack of guardianship, that could change the mood. Just be careful.”

“Done. Let’s go.” She held her hand out. “Lead the way. This is your turf.”

“Not in years,” Mortalis muttered, but he pushed through the right-hand set of doors anyway.

As soon as Chrysabelle stepped over the threshold, the sounds she’d expected to hear outside—the chatter, the clink of glasses, the music and laughter—all hit her in a rush. The spell that sealed in the noise was a good one. Inside, the place was as charming as its exterior. Up on a dais in the front of the room, a jazz quartet played behind a singer belting out tunes that must have been very popular, judging by the patrons clapping along. A few gazes skimmed her, but most were directed at Mal. Vampires might be allowed in here, but they were certainly not ignored.

Mortalis and Mal broke away as planned while she went up to the bar. The scales flanking the bartender’s neck and the shape of his teeth gave him away as a varcolai of some kind. She leaned her arm on the bar top, instantly wishing she hadn’t when the sleeve of her silk
tunic stuck to the tacky surface. Hiding her revulsion, she smiled at the bartender the way she’d smiled at Creek’s friend Slim Jim. Comarré charm was a powerful tool in its own right.

The bartender smiled back and headed in her direction, leaning in close to be heard. “Heya. We don’t get many comarré in here. You traveling with tall, dark, and fangy over there?” He nodded toward Mal.

“Not exactly.” She licked her bottom lip. The man smelled like cleanser and gin. Or maybe that
was
the gin. “He’s traveling with
me
.”

The bartender’s brows shot up. “Z’at right? Well, now, I like a woman in charge.”

“I bet you do.” She ran a finger down his arm. His skin was the mottled green-brown of a reptile. What kind of varcolai was he? “You think you could help me find someone?”

The flash of red-green fire in his slit-pupil eyes almost made her jerk in surprise. He spread his arms out wide and grinned, showing off a pair of long, rounded canines. “You’ve found him, baby. What do you need?”

Not this. With a shudder, she realized what kind of animal he was. Time to pull way back. She straightened a little, unsticking her sleeve from the bar. “I need to talk to a fae named Khell. I was told I could find him here.”

The bartender hid his disappointment poorly. “What do you want with him?”

“Business proposition. Can’t say more than that.” She reached under the wrist sheath on her left arm and snagged the slick plastic bill she’d stashed there earlier, then slid it across the bar to him. Five hundred was enough to make anyone talk.

He glanced at the money before covering it with his hand, but his smile didn’t return. “Back corner table behind the spiral stairs. Green jacket.” He moved to walk away, then stopped. “You cause trouble, I’ll take you out personally, understand?”

“Perfectly.” She understood he’d lose, so long as she could get her sacre into his gullet before he went full gator on her. With a roll of her eyes, she turned and gave a short, quick nod to Mal and Mortalis, then headed back to the table the bartender had indicated.

Weaving through the crowd proved interesting, if only for the vast array of fae in the place. There were more types than she could identify. That alone made her a little nervous. Not knowing one’s opponent and what they were capable of could be a fatal error in battle, which meant this had to go well.

She checked behind her. Mal and Mortalis were there. The plan was for her and Mortalis to approach Khell and explain the situation. If he was as eager for the guardianship as Augustine claimed, this shouldn’t take long.

He was exactly where the bartender said he’d be, but he wasn’t alone. A plump redhead sat with him, swinging her foot to the music and drinking a bottled beer. She looked up as Chrysabelle approached, her demeanor becoming less friendly the closer Chrysabelle got.