Page 8 of By the Pint

I thought of my five-turned-thirteen-year goal, and I had to press on. Keep trying. Eventually I’d find my way inside his mind. Get whatever guarded secrets Killian needed to start his own version of Blooze. It must be fucking valuable if Killian was cashing in his favour for this, but like I said, that part wasn’t important to me. What Killian did with the info after I’d been turned was Killian’s business.

My gaze landed on the table behind Dima, on the single copy of his hardback book, proudly nestled in a garish plastic stand. His handsome face smiled up from the cover photo.

Wait—

“How?” I picked up the book, abandoning my current thought train. “How did you get a photograph of you?”

He laughed, closed the gap between us again, and placed his palm on the front, right over his own face.

I casually nudged his fingers aside. It was him. But not quite him. The skin a tad too dark, the eyes not quite red enough. But the hair was spot on, and the smile was exactly like the real one. It took up his entire face, his fangs poked out either side. His dimples looked like I wanted to sink my finger into the little photographic dents. Beautiful.

“It’s AI. My flatmate helped me,” Mr Black said. “Took him hours and hours to get the prompts right, and he’s something of a tech genius. A fae. He paints himself, well glamours images, but he told me he can only glamour computer-gamey pictures, not real looking ones like this. He’s very anti-AI. I had to clean his room for six months to get him to agree.”

I searched Dima’s face, tried again to slip into his mind for any indication he was lying. Failed.

“Still, it’s nice to know what other people see when they look at me, since mirrors are a pointless waste of carbon. Are you into quilting? That’s my last copy.”

It took a while for me to process his words.

I was Bordalis Barracudas’ starting fly forward for five years. The youngest player ever to take the InterRealm cup. I didn’t have these moments ofwhat the fuck.

Am I into quilting?I repeated in my head, still trying to place all the pieces together. “Uh … not really. I actu—”

“There are more ‘photos’ of me inside,” he interrupted, doing air quotes. “There’s even a nude one.”

My breath came out all at once. I glanced down at the book and rubbed my thumb over the pretty gold edges. How could I discreetly find the page and commit it to memory with the vampire hovering near me?

Dima snort laughed. “Just kidding.” He took the book from my hands. “Or am I? Want me to sign it for you?”

I managed a conformational “Hnuhhh” sound. Why was he having this sort of effect on me? It was embarrassing. And discombobulating. And it was fucking up the plan.

“To Sean, right?” Dima hovered behind the table, permanent marker in hand.

“Uh, yeah, thanks.”

Great, now I was going to own a book on quilting, containing several pictures of a guy I’d been crushing on since puberty, one of which may or may not be a nude, made out to a fake name.

Dima scribbled in the front, slammed the cover closed, and handed it back to me. “It’s twenty silvers, by the way. For the book.”

I waited for the “just kidding”, but it never came. “Oh, right, of course,” I said. I jammed my fist into the inside pocket of my jacket, fished out my wallet, and handed him a crisptwenty. His fingers brushed the underside of my hand as he took the money. The icy coolness of his touch seared my skin like a cigarette stub burn.

“Maybe I’ll see you at tonight’s party?” He tucked my cash into the back pocket of his trousers, still smiling.

“Uh … yeah … maybe.” I stared down at him, willing my legs to kick themselves into action and march me the hell out of his booth.

How had I lost control so thoroughly?

I always had control. Iwascontrol.

It was because I couldn’t get a good read on him. That’s why I felt so … off.

It cannot be possible that a man who’d built an entrepreneurial empire, thought only of rotary fabric cutters and … jelly rolls? What, even, in the sweet mercy of the Eight and a Half Kingdoms were—

Actually, you know what? Never mind.

Maybe alcohol would help loosen his thoughts. Either alcohol, or …

So perhaps I would go to tonight’s bloodbath. Get him a little drunk. A little … in the zone for me. Maybe I’d get mine. I only wished I could see far enough into his thoughts to know if he’d wait for me, or if there were others he’d planned to hook up with.

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