Page 8 of All the Devils are Here

It would still be worth it to keep our captor here.

Even if it meant the rest of us would be in pain forever.

CHAPTER FOUR

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MEGHAN

Club Spectre was exactly as I remembered it. Still early enough in the evening that it wasn’t particularly crowded. Laurent and I left our coats at the check and made our way deeper.

I’d been to the club a couple of times since that first fateful night when we came here with Christine’s mates. And every time I wondered just what kind of monsters were here. Now I knew it was a haven for every kind of otherworldly creature, which was partially why I liked it. Even if I never had a mate or anything like it, I was still fascinated.

Laurent nodded to a man on our left, and I felt his hand on my lower back as we moved down the stairs to the first bar.

“I shouldn’t be surprised you know people here. Though I still don’t think of you as a person who goes to clubs.”

His soft chuckle made goosebumps rise on my skin. “What makes you think I know them from the club and not from elsewhere?”

“Fair point.” I looked around from the female bartender to the few people dancing and the man he’d acknowledged. “Is everyone in here a monster?”

“I wouldn’t say that too loudly, but yes. I think you’re the only human at the moment.”

I couldn’t stop the smile on my face. “That’s just wild.”

The bartender—a gorgeous woman wearing a vest I would kill for—came over to us and looked expectantly.

“What would you like?” Laurent asked.

“Vodka cranberry.” The words were automatic. The drink that was always reliable wherever you went and was easy to drink when you weren’t out to get wasted. I still wasn’t entirely sure being here was a good idea, and Iknewgetting drunk with Laurent would be bad news.

He ordered in smooth French and she nodded, moving away to get our drinks. I took the time to look at him while he wasn’t staring directly at me. The strong line of his nose and jaw, right now with a hint of stubble. Laurent’s eyes were a gray-green I knew too well, and I obviously knew what it was like to feel his full lips on mine. But he’d made himself clear.

We can’t. I can’t.

“Laurent?”

He looked back at me, and my breath went short in my chest, just like in the kitchen. “Yes?”

“Why are you really here with me? I know this probably isn’t what you want to be doing right now. I’ve been to Paris plenty of times, and you’ve never come out with me before.”

Our drinks landed on the bar beside us, and I grabbed mine and took a sip. Maybe it would calm the jittery nerves flowing under my skin.

“Why don’t you tell me why you don’t seem like yourself? A question for a question.”

I swallowed, everything in my body going rigid. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Laurent smiled as he took a sip of his drink, and I would be a damn liar if I said that smile didn’t do things to me. This was a mistake. Coming here withhimwas a mistake.

“Then I don’t know either,” he said with a shrug. “It seemed like the thing to do.”

Like the floodgates had opened, people began to enter the club. The noise level grew, and I took another drink. “A show nearby must have let out,” Laurent said quietly.

“You’re really not going to tell me?”

Laurent shook his head.

I didn’t know what I was doing. Everything felt strange, and the way I was acting, no wonder he’d noticed I wasn’t myself. But I still wanted to know. I didn’t want his pity. I didn’t want anyone’s pity.

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