Page 20 of Vanish Into Light

Tris gave a non-committal grunt – but Rose knew that was for Beck; she saw his hand ghost along the small of Gallo’s back.

“Morgan, you’re the next on the right. Gavin, you’re two doors down on the left,” Beck continued. “The others…” At the end of the hall, at the balcony that overlooked the great hall, rain bucketed down in silver sheets. “Had too much damage, I’m afraid. Rose, you and I will be upstairs. Lance as well.”

“Shit,” Lance murmured, and Rose turned to find him frowning, and rubbing at his temple, brows crimped.

“Problem, Lieutenant?” Beck asked.

“No.”

“Allow me to show you, then.”

Back to the staircase, and another climb. “There’s you,” Beck indicated a black door with a clawed finger. “Rosie and I’ll be just down here.” Three doors further along. He headed that direction.

And Rose…ground to a halt in the middle of the spotted carpet runner, lungs feeling too tight, suddenly.

Beck reached the door of the room – oftheirroom – and paused, his hand on the knob, to glance back at her. Concern tweaked his features, subtle in the way he had always been. “Rosie?”

“I…” She wasn’t afraid; wasn’t feeling the urge to shrink back from him, as she had yesterday.

No, this was nothing to do with Beck.

It was Lance. Behind her.Leftbehind.

She’d cried herself to sleep in his arms last night – but when Beck had reached for her just hours ago, she’d felt the old tug.

A tug she felt echoing now, in the other direction.

Admitting her feelings to Lance last night, finally, had broken down some final barrier, that resistance she’d clung to for so long, in all the five years they’d known each other. Why was itnow, when Beck was finally back, that she could own up to the fact that she loved Lance? Where was the fairness in that?

But life wasn’t fair. Why should love be any different?

She glanced back – but Lance was already stepping into his room. He shut the door without ever looking.

“Rosie,” Beck prompted again, softer, purring.

She turned away from the closed door, and went to him.

~*~

Everyone dumped their gear, acquainted themselves with their – shockingly clean – rooms, and reconvened in the library to start pulling books.

Books that smelled, and left smears of white and green on their hands, and a few that crumbled apart at the first touch.

Lance had always preferred reading on a tablet or e-reader, personally.

He flipped through page after page of spells, rituals, and contemplation of all things satanic; until his eyes and his neck ached, and still felt as though he’d learned nothing useful.

Suddenly, the smell of strong coffee filled his nostrils, and a chipped white mug appeared above the page he was squinting at.

The hand gripping the handle, he noted with a lurch, was tipped with black-edged claws.

He lifted his head, and found Becket bent at the waist, wings tucked neatly back. If not for the glow of his eyes – and those impossible to miss ram’s horns – he might have looked almost normal. And almost friendly.

Lance took a slow, deep breath. He didn’t want to take that mug, not in the slightest. But it was probably best not to antagonize a man who could pierce someone’s heart with the tip of his tail.

Also – that friendliness, that hint of it, some spark behind the eyes, some faint line in lips that weren’t smiling, was…impossible to resist. He wasn’t proud of himself, but he finally took the mug – their fingers brushed in the process, Becket’s nearly as warm as the coffee-heated porcelain – and said, tensely, “Thanks.”

Becket did smile then, if only a little, and straightened, giving him space. “Finding anything useful?”

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