Grayson went to a small round table near the window and pulled out a chair. Why did he keep doing this to himself? He shrugged off his jacket, his temperature from encountering his father in the rectory still cranking. Maybe he kept coming here because he knew he deserved to be punished. What he’d done … Grayson had wanted to forget it. He’d wanted to pretend that it had never happened. Being in the Underneath and hearing Axia speak about it with such nonchalance—as if she had been proud of him—had made him ill.
The truth was, he didn’t remember killing the girl. He didn’t remember anything beyond seeing her in that greasy tavern. She’d hooked him with her eyes, an unspoken offer lingering there. And then an intoxicating, all-consuming need had overcome him.
That was where Grayson’s memory started to haze.
A desire for her had driven him out of his chair. He’d followed her though the tavern’s back door, into a dank, dark alley. He remembered the confusing hunger pangs clenching his stomach, closing off his throat. He didn’t want the girl the way he’d wanted other girls.
He had simply been … hungry.
“If you’ve come to ask me to stop training your sister, you’re wasting your breath,” Chelle said. She stood beside the table with a shining silver coffeepot in one hand and a cup and saucer on a tray in the other. His usual request.
Grayson smiled, but not just because she’d anticipated his order. He could never hold back a smile when Chelle spoke. She sounded like a gruff military general. He sat back in his seat and put an ankle on one knee before glancing up at her. He furrowed his brow. No doubt she’d pour the contents of that silver pot in his lap if he said the wrong thing.
“I’ve come for the coffee, actually.”
Chelle narrowed her round eyes at him in suspicion. She wore what she always did when working her shifts at Café Julius: male waiters’ attire, complete with a white blouse, black vest, and tie. She’d put on breeches today, though sometimes she wore a long black skirt. He liked her in breeches. And the bright red scarf tied around her waist accentuated her petite hips.
Grayson had imagined spreading his palms around those hips. She was beautiful. She was Alliance. And she didn’t like Grayson at all.
“So, may I?” he asked.
Chelle stared at him. “May you what?”
He looked pointedly at the silver coffeepot. “Have a coffee?”
She saw the pot in her hand and seemed to startle, as if just remembering she was holding it. With an ungraceful motion, she set the cup and saucer on the table and splashed in some steaming black coffee. She spilled, drops splattering on the white linen tablecloth. Chelle flushed.
Grayson smiled, liking the color on her cheeks. But then another scent cut through the bitter aroma of roasted beans. Sharp and decadent. At once sweet and tart.
A memory sparked. Grayson, rising from his engorged haze in that London alley. Warm blood smeared over his hands, his shirt. He’d licked his lips and tasted it in his mouth. So sweet. So delicious. And then he’d seen her on the stones beneath him. So much blood. Her blood.
Grayson bolted up from his chair and Chelle jumped back, the flush still on her cheeks. Blood. That’s what he smelled. The rush of Chelle’s blood to her cheeks.
“Did I spill on you?” she asked, looking at his lap. “It wasn’t intentional. I only purposely spill hot liquids into the laps of old men who wink at me.”
Grayson brushed at his trousers, going along with it. “What about young men who wink at you?” he asked, attempting to laugh off what had just happened. What had been happening for some time, actually.
He could smell blood as it sluiced through a person’s veins. He could hear the heart pumping it. And every time, it made his throat hot and tight.
“Forget their laps,” Chelle replied. “I aim for their hands.”
She didn’t smile. Grayson wondered whether she might be serious. He sat down, searching for something else to say to her. After all, she was the reason he always found himself here.
“I didn’t realize you were so devoted to my sister’s training.” He held his coffee closer to his nose, wanted to smell that instead of another whiff of Chelle’s coppery blood. It made every muscle in his body tight, as if he were holding himself together by will somehow.
“I am practical, not devoted. We need the help.” She held his gaze and vaulted a brow with obvious expectancy.
Grayson pushed his coffee away. “No. I’ve already told Ingrid and Gabby and Vander—and you, if I recall. I’m no demon hunter.”
They all wanted him to be one, though. They wanted him to join. Pick up a silver sword or dagger and prowl the streets at night. Protect the city and its people.
“You know about us, Grayson. You know about the Underneath and the Dispossessed,” she said.
He stared into the coffee he no longer wanted. Yes, he knew about them. But they didn’t know about him. They didn’t know how hard it was becoming to fight the urge to shift, and he certainly didn’t wish to tell them.
Chelle exhaled loudly. “Don’t you feel as though you should do something?”
“Like what?” he asked, more curtly than he liked. It made his pulse jump, which was never a good thing. Not anymore. He got to his feet and Chelle stared up at him.