Page 80 of Elven Shadow

It was only just the first few threads, but even a few threads in the wrong hands could be deadly.

And the snag that had started it all was Rebecca’s refusal to let an idiot like Aldous get their entire team killed on a mission that had been beyond pointless in the first place.

Now she had a changeling idiot threatening her protection under Shade’s roof, a deadpan shifter stalking her every move, at least one dead the Azyyt Ra’al thrall added to her personal casualty list, and an old-world hex doll she’d never seen before that didnotbelong in this world.

Each one of those things was its own separate universe of potential issues and obstacles for a Bloodshadow Elf trying to hide—and stay hidden—in plain sight.

Add that to the growing tension within Shade and the budding rebellion brewing from the inside, presumably with Rebecca as the “perfect” person for whatever Leonard and Diego were cooking up, and she was in over her head before anything had even happened.

She reached the door to her private room and sent a bolt of silver light cracking into the doorknob. The lock popped open beneath such a ridiculously simple spell. So simple, in fact, that everyone else in this compound seemed to respect its use simply on principle.

Then again, Rebecca might just have been the only Shade member in this building who carried around such deadly secrets with her on a regular basis. Maybe even the only member with anything to lose if someone felt like breaking into a simple lock spell and taking a look through her personal belongings.

Not that she had much of anything with her in her room. She wasn’t that naïve.

But a few specific individualsthoughtshe was.

Aldous clearly assumed Rebecca didn’t have the firepower or the reputation to back her up after she’d refused his disgusting advances. So he’d threatened to banish her from Shade if she couldn’t produce the Darkspawn in some undisclosed amount of time likely to change at whim to suit the changeling’s brainless purposes.

Maxwell underestimated her too. He had to, if he thought he could follow her around indefinitely like this, either to eventually catch her screwing up or eventually wear her down enough that she could no longer resist his prying.

Neither of those things would happen. The only thing Rebecca had to resist when it came to the shifter was the urge to rip him apart for sticking his over-sensitive wolf’s nose in her business.

She’d have to keep a much better eye on Shade’s Head of Security from here on out. If he started digging too deeply—especially into her past and her truth and her identity, even more than he already had just by showing his face in the alley tonight—she’d be forced to do something about it.

At that point, it wouldn’t even matter that she kind of liked the way he looked at her when he wasn’t being a suspicious ass. Therewassuch a thing as having fun here and there, sure. There was always such a thing as letting her guard down far too much.

Just another thing she’d already promised herself she would never do.

The door to her room slammed shut behind her under a swift kick and locked itself again beneath one more blast of silver light aimed at the doorknob.

Rebecca kicked off her heels and inspected them briefly to confirm they hadn’t been damaged during her adventurous night out. Then she stripped down as quickly as possible on her way to the bathroom, leaving a trail of stained, blood-spattered, grime-smeared clothing behind her along the way.

She’d gone out to blow off a little steam. That was it. To help clear her mind and flush out the stale pressure of having found herself thrust into the very center of Shade’s obnoxious new rebellion bubbling up from within.

A rebellion she’d honestly wanted nothing to do with in the first place.

But now, because she’d dared to think she could still move about freely without her every move being followed, she’d jeopardized a hell of a lot more than she’d intended.

Maxwell was a suspicious irritation. Nothing more. For now.

Rebecca didn’t want to have to hurt him, either. Not because he was Head of Security, which would come with its own set of complications on a whole different level, but because he hadn’t given her a reason to clear him from her path. So far.

If hedidgive her a reason, though, if his curiosity grew too much that he couldn’t stop from following her, and watching her, and digging into her private business, Rebecca might have to do something she really didn’t want to do.

All in the name of protecting the secrets she couldn’t afford anyone else discovering.

The wrong move made by the wrong magical, even Shade’s Head of Security, could bring her whole life crashing down around her.

That was a risk Rebecca simply wasn’t willing to take.

She climbed into the shower, turned the water on as hot as it would go, and let the steam wash over her. While the near-scalding temperatures cleared away the physical grime from her night out, the simple act of washing herself cleared the muck from her mind.

Blood, mud, soot, and the remnants of her own charred skin flaking off the wounds she’d healed all fell away together in the steaming water, splattering onto the shower floor to swirl down the drain and out of sight.

Complications of the night notwithstanding—like evidence of the Azyyt Ra’al now in Chicago and that baffling hex doll—Rebecca couldn’t ignore her growing hunch that things were about to change for her here. Drastically.

Joining Shade six months ago was supposed to have been a sure thing. A safe choice to keep her relatively out of trouble and completely off everyone else’s magical radar.

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