“What’s going on?” I ask him warily when we’re all alone on the elevator.
His eyes flick up to the tiny red dot on a panel, and the plaque under it informs us there is indeed a camera watching the elevator. Right. He can’t talk to me in here.
When the doors open, he steps off first, but I’m right behind him, scanning the hallway. I really don’t like this cloak-and-dagger stuff. It’s making me paranoid.
Honest people don’t have their friends sneak around like criminals to meet them, right? Clearly, Lake is not as awesome as I am.
“I don’t think bringing in new people at this point is the best idea. I know my opinion doesn’t matter, but we learned a lot about the Devil’s intentions through the trials,” I state, knowing he can’t argue with me in the hallway.
He holds the key card up to a door, and he pushes through it.
Pulling out a compass-looking contraption that looks oddly familiar, Jude moves to the desk in the room. He opens it, does something to it, and then leaves it open.
As he draws all the curtains completely shut, he pulls off his mask, and I lose mine as well.
“We can speak and not be heard, even if the room is bugged now,” he tells me.
“What if someone is pressed to the wall with a glass to their ear?” I point out.
I love it when he looks exasperated with me. It means I have at least some effect on him. The wrong effect, but I’ll take it.
“That device makes it so that only silence can be heard in this room, unless you’re physically in this room.”
“I’m not physically in this room, but—”
“Just stop talking,” he says, his hands up like he ‘just can’t with me’ right now.
“Why did she send you to this place?” I ask him as he pulls out his phone, but doesn’t do anything. “Shouldn’t you tell the guys where we are?”
He shakes his head. “We never text locations. Phones are too easily traced. My GPS is off, but anyone could be reading our messages. They know Lake is paranoid and would send me to another location to meet,” he tells me.
I poke my head through the outside wall, looking down and noting we’re on Bourbon Street. I know this because the guys come here on occasion when they’re taking a much-needed break from all the reaping.
Pulling back in, I face him as he pours himself a glass of the drink I got shit-faced on last night. I’ll pass today. I need to be level-headed.
“How do you know Lake?” I ask him, sitting down on the bed.
“Are you going to talk the entire time we have to wait?” he groans.
“Does she always keep you waiting so long?” I muse.
He rolls his eyes as he throws back some of the drink and starts removing his straps of weapons with his free hand.
“She’s paranoid. She’ll watch the outside of the hotel for a while. She’ll watch the lobby. Then she’ll gradually move up to her own room and watch the door. Then, when she’s certain I haven’t been followed, she’ll come in.”
“That’s a lot of paranoia,” I agree, as though that’s what he’s saying.
He studies me over the rim of his glass when he sits down—weapon free—and stares at me.
“We met Lake over a century ago. She went into the trials a few decades back, and because of her, we were able to get a lot of information about the process of selection.”
Alarm bells go off inside my head.
“Wait, you thought Manella was in charge,” I remind him. “And he wasn’t. Sounds like she’s feeding you bad information.”
“Or the Devil lied. Which is far more likely, since he made it sound like he had our backs right before he shoved us into the third trial to die,” he points out. “Lucifer is playing with us, and Lake is hesitant to meet with me because she’s worried she’s next. There was a culling in the underworld shortly before the third trial.”
My eyebrows lift.
“He eliminated all his guards—both hell’s throat and royal guards. Lake is an escort, and half of her kind have been replaced because the others were already recycled,” he goes on. “She thinks it has something to do with everything going on with us. Something big is happening, Keyla.”
I wave my hand dismissively. “I’ve decided that name no longer fits me. While I have some sentimental attachment to it, and might keep it as a middle name, I need a new name to define me now. Something badass.”
He blinks at me before muttering something under his breath that I probably wouldn’t like, so I don’t ask him to repeat it.
“Why’d you agree to let me come with you so easily?”
“Because if you’re here, I don’t have to worry about the three of them doing something stupid while I’m not there to reel them back,” he fires back without even having to think about it.
I knew it seemed too easy.
“Why do you think I’ll cause problems for you and this contact?” I ask him, reminding him of what he said in the parking lot.
His lips twitch, but he doesn’t respond immediately. “You gave your word you wouldn’t, so the reason doesn’t matter,” he says evasively.
“Why the culling?” I ask him, going back to the matter at hand.
He shrugs a shoulder. “I have no idea. Unless he felt he couldn’t trust any of them, given the Lamar deal. Which would mean he had no part in what happened to Lamar.”
“Which conflicts with our theory that the Devil has been behind all of it. What if he’s just behind part of it?” I ask him, my eyes not moving from his.
He raps his fingers on the edge of the chair, smirking like he’s already figured that part out and I’m slow to the game.
“This is what you were all discussing last night, isn’t it?”
“When you stormed through for an alcohol run? Yes. Yes, it is,” he states with a bored drawl.
Frowning, I look down at my pretty toenails in my elegant, high-heeled sandals.
“Why didn’t the others tell me?” I ask quietly. They spent the night in my room, after all.
“Don’t look so devastated,” he says bitterly. “They’re too busy trying for the impossible to think straight right now. Your fault, really. The evil pussy is just backfiring a little, it seems.”
This is what we do. Line our insults with snark, never being real with each other. Jude is quite literally never going to stop wanting to hate me, because he sees me as…impossible.
“Despite what you think, there is no jealousy between the three of them. It is possible,” I say on a sigh.
“A few nights does not make the impossible possible, comoara tr?d?toare. It takes longer for such resentments to fester, and they always do. Just like there will always be a price. Just like there will always be a favorite.”
That last part makes my eyes roll. “My favorite changes based on who has made me happiest at the moment. I’m rather capricious that way.”
He snorts derisively. “Those are superficial favorites. Eventually you’ll become attached to mostly one, seek that one out more and more. And it’s never been more dangerous before than you, because we can have you individually.”