Page 7 of Pining for the Prince
Gwil glanced around. “There’s an obvious camera but several hidden ones as well, not that they would impede you. So what do you reckon? Can we get our friend the present that he wants?”
Hyax pressed his fingers to the glass of the cabinet, a faint glow to his fingertips the only indication he was using his magic. His eye twitched—there was that certain something again—a sourness on his tongue, sharper than before, but then it was gone. “Should be fine.”
“Fine? That sounds… not great.”
He suspected Gwil wasn’t expecting such a lacklustre response.
A job like this would need some thinking about. It’d be a mix of evading the human security system, and not getting distracted by the magical undercurrent he couldn’t pin down. Gwil couldn’t fully appreciate it but it had always warmed Hyax that he at least tried to. “I’ll need to balance a couple of spells at the same time, which can be tricky, and there’s always a risk of something skulking about that could cause a distortion. Are you aware if the museum has any non-standard security?”
“Not that I’ve heard. But there might be artefacts that they don’t know of that could cause an effect.”
Hyax made a soft humming noise. The artefacts in a place like this could have all sorts of energy, and housing them together had always seemed a bit of a risk. “That’s true. Things that survive for thousands of years tend to do so for a reason, but there’s nothing I can specifically sense. There’s lots of odd stuff in this place, one of a hundred things could cause a disturbance and they could be shielding each other.”
A crowd of confused-looking tourists entered the room. “Have you got enough for what you need?” Gwil asked.
“Yes.” There was no need to hang around any longer. “Let’s aim for Tuesday. After the museum closes.”
Gwil had wanted this done and out of the way before then. “Not sooner?”
“Closer to the weekend risks higher footfall from revellers, as we’ll not be using portals, the less chance someone sees us leaving the better. No one is partying on a Tuesday.” He smirked. “Well, no one human.”
“Don’t tell me, no one parties like a fae. You need to prove that to me some day.”
Hyax tilted his head to the side. Was Gwil asking for something more? Sometimes he thought so but he was never direct enough to know for certain. “I don’t remember you ever expressing an interest in me doing so before.”
“You’ve never asked. And to be fair, you’re not even asking now.”
Hyax’s brow crumpled. Gwil sounded hurt and Hyax wondered if perhaps things weren’t as one-sided as he thought. Was this his moment, and the self-absorbed arsehole finally figured out that Hyax had been in love with him for years? “What if I were to?”
Gwil grinned. “We could do something tonight?”
Hyax winced, he already had a commitment for later and he couldn’t change it on a whim. “I have plans already.”
The spell broke. “Then I guess not. Not to worry, no doubt some rich sheikh, or a rock star.”
There was more venom behind those words than Hyax had expected.
“A painter,” he replied, uncertain of what else to say.
“Best let you get on then. I’ve plans too.”
“You do? Where are you going?” Gwil didn’t date, or at least not often. And if he already had plans why ask him if he was available? “Who are you seeing?”
“What business is it of yours?” Gwil started to head towards the entrance. “See you tomorrow, I guess.”
Hyax stood there, watching Gwil leave. Stuck between hurt and angry. Fucking Gwil. How was he meant to understand him when he was always running away? One of these days he was going to pin him down and get some straight answers but not today.
CHAPTER FIVE
Gwil didn’t run. Hundred-and-eighty-year-old vampires did not run. No—he progressed forwards at an accelerated pace, leaving the museum as fast as possible. Once outside, he hailed a black cab and was on his way to the Dock Club, determined not to think about pretty fairies. Maybe he was reading too much into Hyax’s reaction, but he didn’t need to explain himself. Hyax had been his business associate for fifteen years, and they’d known each other less well for a while before that. He’d always had an attraction towards him and in the last few years, he was sure it would have been obvious, had Hyax wanted to see it.
But he hadn’t and now Gwil was on his way across London to a club he didn’t want to go to, to spite a man who probably wouldn’t give a toss he’d gone in the first place.
If a Hollywood producer were to imagine an underground club frequented by London’s finest paranormal inhabitants, then the Dock Club would have been what they’d have pictured. From the outside, it looked like an abandoned warehouse, complete with age-old graffiti, within which were hidden several identifiers and passcodes to get into the club. About halfway up the wall, written in Aramaic was the vampire code word:rhesuspieces. Several other languages Gwil didn’t speak were scrawled in various fonts but he recognised the odd word, including those in Tasharick, the language of Hyax’s particular brand of fae, not that he’d be here tonight with his painter date. This was not the place to bring your human plaything, unless you wanted to risk them getting eaten, turned or something even worse.
The brute on the door was not pure orc, there was definitely some troll in the mix, and he flared his nostrils as Gwil approached, his olfactory sense as good a species-scanner as any shop-bought or warlock-supplied one. “Evening, son of Scaran.”
The traditional greeting to vampires surprised him, he’d not heard that in years. Mind you, that had probably been from an orc too, they tended to be formal beasts, before they ripped the head off their enemy. “Rhesus pieces, my goblin brother.”
