Page 38 of Fanged Embrace
When the others looked unconvinced, I lowered my head. “Look, just give me some time to talk with her. I don’t know how or why, but she’s important somehow—all right? Take a chance on my woo woo bullshit and just trust me on this. Weneedher.”
Jordan’s gaze bore into mine and she drummed her fingers once. I held my breath, pleading with my eyes while Laurie’s heavy aura layered weight down on my back.
Eventually, Jordan relented and blew out a long breath, sinking back in her seat. “All right. Keep her close. But I’ll want a full brief when she’s ready.”
At that, the simmering tension behind the door ballooned in size and it hit me like a punch to the gut. “Great—good.” I staggered back a step and inched my way toward the doorunder the critical eye of everyone else in the room, “I, uh… One sec. I’ll be right back.”
I dipped out without an explanation and shut the door behind me. “Going somewhere?”
Laurie had one knee braced on the windowsill, fingers clutching the frame, streetlight washing her skin a feverish white. She flinched at my sudden arrival, knuckles whitening on the sill.
Up close her aura jittered wildly—bright shards of fear shooting off in every direction. “I-I have to go. This is too much. I didn’t sign up to be some vampire’s lackey.”
I moved a step closer, palms open. “That’s not what you are.”
She eyed the distance to the ground floor, then her gaze slid me. Tension crackled; one wrong word and she’d jump just to prove that she could.
“You heard them in there.” I jerked my chin over my shoulder. “They’re wary, sure—but they trust me. And I trust you. So how about we work together instead of bolting in opposite directions?”
“Work together?” Bitter laughter bubbled from her lips, and she wrenched her gaze away. “I killed a man tonight, dude. That’s where working together got me. And I still don’t even know why I did it.”
“Because he was about to put a barbed blade through my heart! So—you know—thank you for the save.” The words came out with a squawk of nervous laughter and I hurried to lower my voice. “And because you’re braver than you give yourself credit for.”
Her lips settled into a grim line and she huffed out a wry exhale. But she wasn’t hurling herself out the window just yet.
“Look.” I ran my fingers through my hair, reaching for the words to put her at ease. “You have intel we don’t. We haveresources and teeth. Together? We might actually shut these labs down before they can mess with anybody else.”
Laurie’s fingers loosened on the frame. The violent ripples in her aura dulled to a shaky static and I did my best to soothe out the creases.
“Think of it as… mutually assured babysitting,” I added. “You watch my back, I watch yours.”
I waited with bated breath while Laurie kept her eyes on the city outside—so long I started mapping the skyline in the reflection of her pupils. But eventually, her shoulders sagged, and she swung one leg, then the other, back onto the floor.
I drifted to the bench and dropped onto it sideways, elbows propped on the back. “Great, that’s settled, then.” I patted the space beside me. “Also: you should crash at my place for a bit.”
Her head whipped around. “I’m not staying with you!” The words rasped out, halfway between outrage and downright panic.
“Why not? I’ve got square footage to spare, no roommates, and a very decent blood-free fridge stocked to the brim.” I shrugged. “More to the point, whoever funded that lab now knows you were inside. Targets tend to be easier to hit when they’re alone.”
Laurie crossed her arms, jaw working overtime. Her aura rumbled around us like a brewing storm—stubbornness edging into fear. “I can’t just… move into a vampire den because you say so.”
“Sure you can. One night.” I held up a single finger. “After that, if you hate the décor—or the company—you’re free to bolt. But until sunrise, you’ll be under my roof, my wards, and my admittedly overprotective eye.”
Laurie opened her mouth, then shut it again, looking like she’d bitten down on a nail. Finally she huffed and slid onto the bench beside me, a cautious arm’s length away.
When she met my eye, that spark was back. The defiantflicker I’d seen in her before. It was small, little more than a candle flame that could snuff out at any moment, but it was there.
She bared her teeth in a disgruntled grimace, blunt human canines so different to my own, and lifted her index finger in front of my nose. “One night.”
And that was that. The beginning of a brand new timeline, treading toward a future I couldn’t possibly predict.
20
Laurie
River’s home was… unusual. From the outside it looked like the stock standard lavish celebrity home, coupled with trimmed hedges and a cherry red convertible parked out front. Inside, however, was something else entirely.
Imagine Versailles crash-landing into an antique emporium, then a botanical garden taking over the wreckage—that would get you close. It was also huge; the home unfolded like a choose-your-own-adventure book, dozens of doorways draped with drooping ferns and random doodads, leading off to God knows where.
