Dangerous Creatures (27 page)

At least
, Ridley thought,
in me.

Bad to the bone.

Bad to the bone and I haven’t even been Claimed yet.

They never went back to that school again, but Ridley didn’t care. She had already learned everything she needed to know.

Ridley woke up thinking about Caitlyn Wheatley for the first time in years. She wondered what had happened to her. Maybe she’d ask Nick the Nerd Warrior to find out. These days, she had much worse problems than Caitlyn Wheatley. Far more annoying Mortals were bringing out her bad side now.

Even if the one she was thinking about wasn’t completely Mortal, and there had been a time, not that long ago, when he would’ve gladly said he’d eaten cat puke for her.

Just as Ridley had made Caitlyn Wheatley say it for Lena. And after Caitlyn Wheatley, so many others.

Ridley lay back in her bed.

She had been the one to do it. She had always been the one.

I had to be.

I was Dark so Lena could be Light.

It was who they were, but it was more than that. It was who their world had expected them to be. After a while, it was who they expected themselves to be.

Has it always been that way? Does it have to be?

Rid pushed the question from her mind. It didn’t matter. She couldn’t change the way these things worked. She should’ve remembered the basic rule of living among the Mortals:
Lay low or stay away.

Otherwise they’d always burn you.

 
CHAPTER 23 

Comfortably Numb

S
irensong was on their way to rock the house.

Ridley hadn’t wanted to go back to Sirene. Link avoided her now, like she was worse than Emily Asher, but Rid refused to send him into Lennox Gates’ club alone and unprotected.

So she was Sirensong’s first groupie.

First, and most hated.

This is not how I imagined my “regular” life
, Ridley thought.

“I don’t feel so hot,” Necro said. She leaned her head back against the rough stone of the Underground. Her face was pale, and as she closed her eyes, she looked weaker than Ridley remembered.

Floyd looked at Necro sideways. “You want to go back?”

“I can take her,” said Rid quickly, fidgeting in her sixties silver shift dress. She and Necro hadn’t exactly been speaking lately, and it bothered Ridley more than she cared to admit. Besides, Sampson and Link were already at Sirene. Floyd could still make it.

Necro shook her head. “No way am I going to not show for my own gig.”

“What’s that?” Ridley reached for the collar of Necro’s leather jacket. Necro yanked her hand away before she could even touch it.

“Personal space, Siren.” Necro glared.

“Wait, you’re bleeding.” Rid moved Necro’s collar down. Blood was spotting the white tank beneath Necro’s black leather jacket, and Ridley wondered why they hadn’t seen it before.

Necro touched her neck, and her fingers came away a deep, dark red. At least, that was what color Ridley thought it was, though it was more deep and dark than red. “It’s nothing.”

“It’s not nothing. You’re hurt. What happened?” Floyd looked worried.

“Nothing happened.” Necro stared straight ahead, as if she was willing her friends to disappear.

But they weren’t about to, Floyd in particular. “Nec.”

“I don’t know, okay? I went to sleep. I woke up. My neck was bleeding.” Necro pulled a dirty black scarf covered in white skulls out of her pocket. She tied it around her neck.

“Where?” Floyd was somber.

“In the neck, brainiac.” Necro was as grouchy as she was ill.

“Come on, Nec. Where did you wake up?” Floyd sounded anxious.

Rid interrupted. “Um, I’m guessing she woke up in her bed? What the hell kind of question is that?”

Floyd raised an eyebrow. “Necro’s a sleepwalker.”

“What?”

Necro shrugged. “I wake up in strange places sometimes. I think it has to do with being a—you know. Being me.”

No Necromancer ever wanted to say the word, as if death was catching. Not even Necro said the whole word, usually.

She went on. “I have horrible nightmares, I wake up, I feel like total garbage, and I find my way home. Sometimes I stink like smoke. But I’ve never been actually hurt before.”

Ridley shook her head. “That’s not good.”

“No kidding,” said Floyd. She wasn’t joking around anymore.

“It’s no big deal,” Necro said, stumbling down the length of the tunnel. “Really, guys.”

It was a lie. Ridley had told enough of them herself to recognize a lie when she heard one. She wondered what had actually happened. If Necro was anything like her, she’d never tell.

She held out her arm to help Necro walk, but Necro didn’t take it.

They were more alike than Ridley had thought.

It wasn’t even four o’clock. They still had hours until the gig began, but Link and Sampson were already messing around onstage. From the moment Ridley passed through the door—the bouncer offering no complaints this time around—the music crept toward her. The music and, carrying with it, what it meant.

Who she would have to deal with—or what she’d have to say. That she was sorry. That she was worried. That she cared about him. Them.

Not that she would say it.

Not that anyone would listen.

She stood there watching, from the back of the main room, which would stay closed off to the general public for three more hours, as it did every afternoon. The stage loomed on the far side of the cavernous space, lights up and sound system live, as if the show was about to start—which it wasn’t. They still had time to warm up.

Not that they needed it. Things had been pretty warm this past week. At least, that was how it looked to anyone but a Siren. The lines were long and the crowds were raving, and Ridley still had no idea why or how.

She had an idea but was minus the facts to back it up.

It wasn’t because of the music. Link’s musical taste had gone from bad to worse, as if the whole band was infected with it now. Link was trying out new lyrics while Ridley stood there, and when she could make out the words, they were so bad she wished she couldn’t.

“My Chicken Wing / You make my gut sing

You make everything / Really swing.

Dipped in batter / Heart goes pitter-patter

Do your wild thing / My Chicken Wing.”

He continued the set, singing, “
Cole Slaw / Get under my craw
,” and “
Fried Pick-le / Love how you rib tick-le
.” Pretty soon there would be no major food groups left to write about, and he’d have to get a new muse. The way things were going, though, Ridley was fairly confident it wasn’t going to be her.

She sighed, leaning against the doorway as she watched her not-quite-boyfriend rock out on the stage. Within minutes, Necro and Floyd would join in, and soon the whole band would be singing about whatever picnic basket of nonsense Link had decided was worth their time.

And a few hours later, for unseen and unknown reasons, the crowd would be eating it up. Wesley Lincoln, formerly of Meatstik, and of the Holy Rollers and Who Shot Lincoln before that, was making it big-time as Sirensong. The hottest new indie act of the Caster Underground club scene.

Wesley Lincoln, a quarter Incubus and the worst drummer in five boroughs, above or below the ground.
Him, and his cole slaw, and his fried chicken, and his sweet meatballs.

Ridley shook her head. She should text a picture to Ethan and Lena. They’d never believe this. Lena had already thought Ridley was kidding when she’d told her about it on the phone. Talk about being on the lookout for something out of the ordinary. The success of Sirensong should’ve been the first clue.

“Do you mind if I ask you something?” The voice caught her off guard, but she recognized it before she turned to see him.

“Would that stop you from asking?” Ridley looked at Nox.

He shrugged.
Not really.

“Why are you with him? Why bother?” Nox stood next to her now, watching the band.

“What are you talking about?” Ridley moved closer to the stage, ignoring Nox as best she could. What she was or wasn’t actually doing was no business of his, she thought.

“Not meatballs,” Nox teased. “I promise you that much.”

Link was prancing around on the stage, playing the air guitar. At least, Ridley thought it was an air guitar. From the looks of it, it also could have been an air accordion or even some kind of air DustBuster.

Ridley tried not to appear openly annoyed, but Nox just laughed.

“Look at him. The big lump of idiot Incubus muscle and Mortal mental limitations.”

She glared at him. “I’m sorry, are you talking about my boyfriend?”
My almost-ex-boyfriend. But Lennox Gates doesn’t need to know that.

“Am I? I’m not sure, to be honest.” Nox looked at her over his glass, amused. “Is that what he is? Really?”