The same thing happened with some highwaymen, who would have probably settled for the little bit of money I had on me. And with a group of randy soldiers, who were too drunk to outrun me, not that they’d had the chance. And with the personal guards of a stupid lord who thought he’d have a little fun with a peasant girl.
I’d come around inside his coach that time, lying on his lordship’s bloated carcass, his men arrayed almost artistically on the dirt outside. I’d stared at them, dizzy and sick, their blood a cloying stench in my nostrils, and recalled the stories about my uncle Vlad. Who, it was said, had liked to arrange his victims in pretty geometric shapes so he could admire their corpses from the towers of his castle.
Guess it ran in the family, huh?
I’d started trying harder to avoid conflict, after that.
Like giving up sea travel, because my other half in an enclosed space for too long was not a good idea. Like avoiding gambling, because a game gone wrong might end with the accuser strung up by his entrails. And like shunning close friendships, much less romances, because people near me had the life expectancy of a mouse hanging around a cat.
In other words, just as long as the cat didn’t get hungry.
I’d never known when my personal monster was going to get hungry, or been certain that I could stop her if she did. And every time it happened, I’d felt more like a failure, more like a bloodthirsty thing that enjoyed killing, more like the monster people thought me to be. So isolating myself had become the norm, not for my sake, but for everyone else’s. And that was still true, wasn’t it?
It was still true yesterday, when I’d been too afraid to mark Louis-Cesare. I didn’t want him tied to me when I didn’t know who I was anymore, or who I might become. I didn’t want him getting hurt when the crazy came out, possibly for good this time. I didn’t want him to wake up and realize that he didn’t know the woman lying beside him.
But he wouldn’t accept that, wouldn’t listen if I tried to tell him, just like he hadn’t listened in the shower. He thought he could handle it, that he could handle anything, but he couldn’t handle her, and neither could I. She was going to do what she always had—any damned thing she wanted, to anyone she wanted, and that included him.
And that couldn’t include him.
Whatever it cost me, it wouldn’t.
* * *
—
I finally ran out of hot water, threw on some old gray sweats, and ran a comb through my wet hair. And made my way down to the kitchen, where activity was going on, although not of the cleaning variety. Instead, a couple of mighty fey warriors were peeling apples, another was coring and cutting them up, and a third was standing by the kitchen table with a rolling pin in hand.
Despite everything, I felt a smile twitch at my lips. And not just at seeing the fey put to work for a change. But at the table.
It had been cleared off except for a piece of fabric that had once been a tablecloth, before it had become too stained for regular use. It had now become a kitchen aide, one that had been liberally sprinkled with flour and was supporting a large sheet of rolled dough. And there was only one thing Claire used that setup for.
Ah yiss, I thought gleefully. Motherf’king strudel!
Maybe.
“It keeps tearing!” a fey warrior said shrilly.
The fey was the one by the table, with sweat on his forehead and fury in his eyes. And flour in his hair, which someone, probably the determined-looking redhead standing beside him, had made him put up into a sloppy ponytail. More of it was smeared on his cheeks, where he’d wiped his face with a flour-dusted sleeve, leaving him looking like a toddler at play in Mom’s kitchen.
A profane toddler.
He cursed some more in some fey language—I didn’t know it, but that was definitely a curse—and glared at the dough. “This is impossible!”
“It won’t tear if you roll it evenly,” Claire said, which only appeared to madden him more.
“I did roll it evenly!”
Claire gave a disdainful glance at the dough, which even I could see was lumpy and thick in places, and almost see-through in others. Like he’d been pummeling it instead of rolling it with the wooden pin he was brandishing, which still had pieces of dough stuck to it here and there. Ironically, it was almost the only thing in the kitchen not covered in flour.
“You never told me it was this hard!” he accused.
Claire crossed her arms. “You said, and I quote: ‘It’s women’s work. How hard can it be?’”
A fey at the sink choked back a laugh.
The flour-covered one snarled something at him.
“Sorry.” Dish Fey didn’t look sorry. He looked wet. Like, all down his front and dripping into a puddle on the floorboards, where the soapy mixture was turning the flour into something approaching paste.
Housekeeping did not appear to be a fey specialty.
“Raisins or nuts?” Claire asked me, as the chef went back to aggressively beating up his dough.
“Why not both?”
“Need a better dough for both,” she said dryly.
Damn, Claire, I thought, looking at the poor, suffering fey.
That was cold.
A car horn went off in the front yard. I looked out the window, and felt my smile fade. “Be right back.”
I slipped through the side door and moseyed out front, where a shiny black Lamborghini was parked catty-corner on the lawn. I’d have had something to say about that, but Caedmon must have done it, since I’d been too out of it last night to drive. I vaguely remembered us starting and stopping and starting and stopping as he slowly figured out this strange Earth conveyance, because the fey don’t carry cell phones to call a cab. And flagging someone down when seven feet tall and dressed like Robin Hood can be a problem.
So he’d decided to just drive us home instead—in our attackers’ car. And for a first-timer, he hadn’t done too badly. He’d even managed to miss the stone frog near the mailbox when he parked it, which I appreciated.
A couple of chop-shop boys I knew would appreciate it, too.
But somebody else didn’t.
“What did you do to my car?” Blondie demanded, from the driver’s seat.
“Is there a problem?”
“You know damned well there’s a problem! It won’t go!”
Purple Hair didn’t say anything, just stood there, all daytime dominatrix in black leather jeans and jacket, and a low-cut silk shirt the same shade as her hair. She checked me out, in my ratty sweats, and her eyes narrowed in judgment.
Or, you know, because I hadn’t bothered to arm myself, and she was wondering why.
“That’s a shame,” I said, glancing at Claire, who had come out of the kitchen, wiping her hands on a flour-dusted apron. “I wonder what’s wrong with it.”
Claire just smiled. It wasn’t a particularly nice expression. But Blondie didn’t seem to notice.
“Damn it! This is brand-new,” he told us furiously. “If you’ve fucked it up—”
A scaly arm reached through the window and jerked him out, because Claire was suddenly beside the car. I blinked. I hadn’t even seen her move.
I guess the vamps hadn’t, either. Because Purple Hair’s hand twitched, in the general direction of her jacket. I tensed, prepared to jump her, but she paused the action, probably realizing that she was about to make things worse.
She had no idea.
So both of us just stood there, watching Blondie kick his heels several inches off the ground, because Claire is a tall drink of water. One who suddenly had a wealth of iridescent purple scales covering one arm. And three-inch talons, shading from black to maroon to milky white, on the newly armored hand.
Guess I knew why she favored sleeveless dresses, I thought, seeing how the finely made scales transitioned seamlessly into the freckled skin of her shoulder.