‘You would have lasted seconds. And I would have lasted even less if he had so much as touched you. And then I think that would have blown our cover, don’t you?’
She stared at him, momentarily stunned by the sincerity of the revelation. ‘I don’t need you to defend me.’
‘In these four walls you know
exactly
how much you need me.’
‘Then why the hell keep us here? Why not meet him somewhere else?’
‘Because here we’re out of sight. He’ll be back soon enough.’
‘Even that’s too long.’ She stood and headed over to the curtains. She pushed them aside and looked down onto a back alley, more brick buildings less than fifteen feet away. Even outside was like a maze.
She pulled away again to see Jask stood at the sideboard.
‘At least we’ve got a few things here to keep us entertained while we wait,’ he said, hands on his hips as he glanced across at her, a playful glint back in his eyes.
‘That’s not even funny,’ she said. She marched away, rubbing the tips of her fingers back and forth across her bottom lip, her other arm wrapped tightly around her waist.
‘I thought you were the liberated type, Phia.’
‘Liberated with some self-respect.’ She stepped up to the bed. ‘This whole place is sick.’
‘They’re
your
species.’
‘The worst of my species. Not representative of them.’
‘These are the ones your Alliance defend though, aren’t they?’
‘No,’ she said, turning to face him again. ‘I told you – we protect the ones caught in the middle.’
‘Oh, so you’re capable of making judgements on your
own
kind now as well as the third species – deciding who lives and who dies, who’s good enough and who isn’t? Wow, it must be a very dizzying height from that pinnacle you’ve built yourself.’
‘You tell me there’s anything right about this set-up, about the way he looked at me, the way people like him treat women, treat anyone. It doesn’t take any judgement to work out he’s scum – and if you say anything to the contrary, then you are pitifully low in my esteem.’ She stepped up to the camcorder focused on the bed. She switched it on, watched a sordid two seconds before recoiling and switching it off. ‘I want out of here,’ she said, striding back towards the door. ‘Tell him to meet us somewhere else.’
Jask stepped in front of her, blocking her way. ‘We’re staying here until he comes back. I told you – you’re perfectly safe as long as you stay with me.’
‘Because it’s not as though I’m questioning why you’d have anything to do with him anyway. What kind of a hold you’ve got over him to make him jump like that.’
‘There are some things you’re better off not knowing.’
She warily held his gaze before glancing across the room that now felt like more of an enclosure than the cage had.
Because she didn’t know him. Not at all. She’d seen what she’d wanted to see – a decency beneath the reputation – because she’d needed to see it. A conclusion she’d made based on his actions with her – actions that were necessitated out of his need to get her on side. But none of it changed the fact that she did know of his reputation. That he’d obviously had dealings with Travis before. That he’d been
there
before. There where opportunities were aplenty if he liked to indulge his dark desires. Her stomach coiled unforgivably in jealousy at the thought of it. More than that, in disappointment.
This was why she had to keep a distance. This was why she couldn’t let herself feel the way she did. Because of the
very
way she was feeling right then – insecure, anxious, disappointed, jealous even – were all emotions she couldn’t handle.
He’d said she’d be safe. But paradoxically, there at her most vulnerable, she didn’t want to feel safe with him.
She didn’t want to feel safe with anyone. When she let her guard down, that was when bad things happened – that was when things went wrong. She didn’t feel safe
feeling
safe.
Least of all with a third species.
Least of all in that place.
Least of all with Jask.
* * *
Phia perched back on the edge of the sofa. She stared down through the glass table she was hunched over, her arms folded, her elbows on her knees.
She looked painfully on edge. And a far cry from the girl who’d first glowered up at him from the floor of the ruins. This was Phia with the mask slipping and whom he’d made feel a hell of a lot less secure with what he’d just said.
But he’d said it because it was true – he was anything but a saint. Not that she needed to know the details any more than he needed to revisit them.
And he hadn’t expected the place to have that much of an impact on her. She was bound to have rubbed shoulders with the likes of Travis on plenty of occasions if she worked the streets like she claimed she did.
She’d even convinced him his instincts were wrong when she’d shown a completely different side of herself during the ambush. Back when she’d been calm and methodical, strategic even, to get him on side. When she’d weighed up the advantages of doing so and swallowed her own pride to put the suggestion forward. He’d seen the more mature, the more responsible, let alone the smarter side of her. And he’d admired her for it.
Most of all, he’d seen the side of her capable of doing what he wanted.
Only now her clenched hands, her tense body and her furrowed brow filled him with doubt again. It wasn’t only hard to believe she was
part
of such a vicious vigilante group, but that she’d had any experience
at all
out there on the streets, seducing and slaying vampires as a serryn.
Because she should have marched down those hallways and through those rooms like she owned the place. She should have played Travis like the pliable instrument he was in the right hands. She should have laughed off the insults, depersonalised the threats.
Not unlike he’d had to.
She’d been too wrapped up in her own anger to feel his seeping through – to sense that he’d been seconds away from knocking Travis out cold for the way he’d dared to look at her, not least what he’d said.
And under any other circumstances, he would have.
But that sense of protectiveness over her, a need to defend her, was crossing the line. And, fortunately for them both, for their cause, reacting on impulse and lashing out wasn’t him anymore. Because, personal feelings aside, he still had a job to do.
A job he still needed her at her best for.
And now her exposed vulnerability was too useful a way in for him not to use it to test if his instincts were right again. Not to check if he’d made a huge mistake agreeing to her terms. Whether he needed to get her back to the compound and deal with it himself from there on.
He took the seat beside her again. ‘Travis has good connections. He’s also swift and efficient. And they’re both attributes we need right now.’
‘He’s also a repulsive tosser.’ She glanced back at him, her eyes laden with concern behind the defensiveness. She looked back down at the table again. ‘Nobody looks at me like that, Jask.’
‘I got that impression.’
She sighed heavily, her whole body lifting then dropping with the motion.
At times he’d forgotten that beneath the serrynity, she was still human. She’d barely slept, barely eaten, was probably surviving mainly on adrenaline.
‘You must be tired,’ he said.
She shrugged. ‘I’m fine.’
But she wasn’t. And that’s what he needed to tap into.
‘You must have met plenty of vampires who look at you like that. Isn’t it too much a part of the vocation to get that worked up about it?’
Her gaze snapped warily to meet his before she looked away again. ‘I’m prepared for it with them.’
He stared at the mop of dark hair now covering her profile and leaned forward to rest his elbows on his knees so he could get a better look at her. He felt a bastard for the line he was taking, but he had to keep his eye on the task. ‘And how do you feel about how
I
look at you?’
She glanced at him. He was sure he saw her blush, but couldn’t be certain in the scarlet glow. ‘I haven’t noticed any particular way you
do
look at me.’
‘Liar,’ he said. ‘I know I make you uncomfortable sometimes. Like in the changing cubicle.’
She glanced guardedly at him again. ‘I’m claustrophobic.’
‘And I’m much better at reading you than you give me credit for.’
‘After two days? That’s quite a gift.’
‘How many vampires
have
you killed? As a serryn, not a part of The Alliance.’
‘I’m not one to boast.’
‘But you must be used to dives like this. Being up close and personal with the enemy.’ He purposefully looked across at the sideboard, drawing her attention to it. ‘Doing whatever they want you to do as long as you get your kill.’
She held his gaze, her eyes narrowed. ‘What’s your point?’
‘My point is how does such an emotionally vulnerable serryn last this long?’
‘I’m not emotionally vulnerable.’ Her narrowed eyes turned into a scowl. ‘Fuck you, Jask,’ she hissed under her breath, moving to stand.
But he caught hold of her forearm, keeping her seated. ‘Why do you keep doing that: talking to me like that and thinking you can get away with it?’
But he knew what she was doing. She was doing what she always did – creating safe distance every time something he said or did caused a spark in her that made her feel something she didn’t want to feel. The same as every explosion of hers caused an implosion between them. An implosion that would force them further apart.
This time she tried to prise his fingers away. ‘Let me go.’
‘Where? Out there? Without me? Seriously?’
Her glare was unflinching. A glare he needed and wanted to push a little further.
‘I said, let me go,’ she warned.
‘And if I don’t?’
Her eyes flared.
‘It gets to you every time, doesn’t it?’ he said. ‘That I might think you’re useless to me.’
‘I’m not useless to you though, am I? Or I’d be dead already.’
‘You don’t believe that.’
‘Why not?’
‘Because you lied when you said you don’t see the way I look at you.’
‘And how’s that, Jask?’ she asked, her eyes boring into his.
He didn’t know if he was irritated by the interruption or relieved, but as Travis stepped back into the room, he was forced to release his grip on Phia’s arm.
Travis slumped back into the worn leather and threw a piece of paper on the table. ‘Marid’s not been seen for two days. Not that that’s unusual. That’s one of his collectors. He should know where he is.’
Jask reached forward and picked the paper up. He looked back up at Travis. ‘Zee? He works for Marid now?’
‘Apparently. He knows where his lockup is. He’s your best bet.’
‘If this lead proves right, you owe me one less,’ Jask declared, standing. He indicated for Phia to follow him out.
Fortunately she did so without any fuss. Just as she managed to keep her mouth shut until they reached the end of the corridor.
‘You know this Zee?’ she asked, as he led her back down the stairs.
‘I’ve heard of him, yes. And I can’t say I’m surprised.’
‘Bad news?’
‘Bad enough.’
‘
I’ve
never heard of him.’
‘Let’s just say he’s working his way up the ranks. Or trying to.’
‘Vampire or human?’
It was as if their conversation had been forgotten, along with his near proclamation. Her focus was back on task. So too did
his
need to be.
‘Vampire,’ Jask said, looking across at her. ‘In
every
sense of the word.’
Chapter Twenty-Six
T
he chill in the air had intensified since they’d been inside, albeit having been no more than an hour at most.
‘Where are we going?’ Sophia asked, keeping up with Jask’s purposeful strides.
‘A bar called Hemlick’s.’
A place that was only one step down from The Circus. ‘I know it.’
‘Is there any part of Blackthorn that you
don’t
know?’
‘I told you – I work this place. I know all the main bars. Though even
I
don’t venture into Hemlick’s.’
‘Then clearly you do
have some sense.’
‘Enough that I’m still operational.’
Though by reason of fluke more than any other, it increasingly seemed: fluke that the serryn line had jumped just when she needed it; that Rone had overheard the vampires talking about her; that Jask needed her alive.
Away from The Circus, now that she was calmer, she wished she hadn’t become defensive so quickly back in Travis’s room. That she’d asked Jask what he meant by “the way” he looked at her.
She wondered if that was the “look” Daniel had been referring to too.
She glanced across at him to see his gaze fixed ahead, his fair hair blown back by the breeze revealing all his chiselled perfection. Because he was perfection. Everything about him was painfully perfect.
As was the way he’d handled Travis. The way he’d got her in and out of The Circus safely. The fact they’d left with the name they needed.
As much as she’d convinced herself she was adept on those streets, she was clearly nowhere near as adept as Jask. And a huge part of it, as she could now see, was down to his self-control. A self-control that had infuriated her since the moment she’d laid eyes on him because it reminded her of her biggest weakness. The weakness that always got her into trouble.
The weakness that had come into play with her fury at seeing Jake Dehain alive – not only seeing him partying with
her
little sister, but for the wasteful loss of Trudy too. And the subsequent tirade had been an almost fatal error on her part. Instead of warily looking over both shoulders as she had been trained, her attention had been too fixed on getting to the club – allowing her to be swiped off the street by Marid.
But now she knew that falling into Marid’s hands had been preferable to entering the Dehains’ club. Caleb would have taken one look at her and that would have been it.
But she hadn’t seen that at the time – she never saw anything when she was in a rage. Her most instinctive defence mechanism ironically made her at her most vulnerable.
And she had to keep remembering that. She had to learn to keep it contained. And there seemed to be no better teacher than Jask. More than anything, she had to trust his decisions if she was going to succeed.
They headed down the cobbled street. Melancholic music spilled out, cold light embalming the shiny bulbous stones outside the bar.
Jask opened the door, but this time he entered first. He scanned the dense, smoky room before veering left into the far corner. He took the seat opposite Sophia’s in one of the few uncurtained booths.
Even he looked guarded this time, and she knew why. Hemlick’s was implosion central. Vampires, rogue lycans and cons all mixed in the same space – but not for pleasure. They all went there to do deals with each other, to gamble and to barter. And everyone wanted to leave with the upper hand.
Laughter – loud, brash, and maniacal – emanated from one of the booths across the smoky room.
‘As soon as he’s on his own, I’ll take him aside,’ Jask said.
Her pulse raced. ‘He’s here?’ she asked, moving to slide to the edge of the booth seat so she could peer over her shoulder in the direction of the laughter.
But Jask slammed his foot on the edge of the seat, blocking her way. ‘You stare and you’re going to get noticed.’
‘Isn’t that the whole point?’
‘The point is we get him on his own.’
‘Who’s he with?’
‘There’s a small group of them – Zee, two other male vampires and a female too. There are also a couple of cons who’ve got a feeder with them by the looks of it. Seems there’s some kind of deal going on.’
‘What does Zee look like?’
‘Five ten. Cropped fair hair. Pale skin. Black vest.’
‘What if he sees you? Or saw you come in?’
‘No one asks questions in this place. It’s one of the rules.’
‘What happens in Hemlick’s stays in Hemlick’s, right?’
He glanced back at her. ‘Something like that.’
The barman brought a tray of drinks over, sliding it between them.
‘They don’t take orders around here?’ Sophia asked, rooting through the collection as the barman stepped away again without a word.
‘Flat price,’ Jask said. ‘No one drinks here for pleasure.’ He browsed through the bottles himself before taking the two off Sophia that she had selected, placing them back on the tray and pushing them all aside.
‘Spoilsport,’ she said.
‘You need to be on top form, not inebriated.’ He poured them both half a glass from his chosen bottle, before returning it to the tray.
‘I’m quite capable of holding my drink.’
‘Then you’re equally capable of taking it easy. This is work, Phia. Not a night out.’
‘You don’t mix business with pleasure much, do you?’
He scanned the bar, ignoring her question.
‘What do you even
do
for pleasure, Jask?’
‘I thought I made that clear earlier today.’
She pressed her lips together at what could have been mistaken for another compliment. ‘So that
was
pleasurable for you?’
He looked back at her. ‘Are you fishing for flattery?’
‘Was it pleasurable enough to deserve it?’
‘I’d consider a repeat performance if the mood took me. Is that compliment enough?’
She would have been more insulted if the playful glint hadn’t glimmered in his eyes. ‘You can be such an arrogant git sometimes, Jask Tao.’
‘And I’ve no doubt that practice will one day make you perfect, Phia.’
She exhaled tersely, but refused to bite. ‘I’ve never had any complaints before.’
‘Like you said, you’ve never been with a lycan before. We have high standards.’
‘And like I keep telling you – you can only ever learn so much perfecting the art with one mate, Jask.’
‘I beg to differ. As your response down in the containment room earlier clearly demonstrated. So tell me – what is it about monogamy that you find
so
threatening?’
She lifted the glass to her lips, avoiding eye contact. ‘There you go – reading between the lines again.’ She knocked back a mouthful, it almost making her cough with the burn.
‘And there
you
go – deflecting every time I get too close again. Is that what it is? Does monogamy scare you? The commitment of it? Or giving too much of yourself? Making yourself vulnerable? Have you ever been in love, Phia?’
She swallowed harder than she’d meant to. ‘I’m a serryn. It’s not an emotion that’s exactly conducive to my condition.’
‘You’re evading again.’
She dared to meet his gaze. ‘No, Jask – I’ve never been in love and I don’t ever plan to fall in love, either.’
‘Is that what you told Dan? Only he looked like a shunned puppy back there.’
‘Dan and I are friends.’
‘Looked to me like he really cared about you.’
‘Did you care about Ellen? Is that why you killed her?’
He laughed curtly under his breath as he looked away. She had no doubt both were an attempt at containment. He knocked back another mouthful, but this time there was a hint of a sneer behind his smile.
She felt a brief stab of guilt, let alone annoyance that her question had slipped out so curtly. Worse was the disappointment she felt in herself at her hostility. But the feelings inside were too frightening, too intense, for her
not
to be hostile. Feelings that she needed to face if the question was still burning so inextinguishably inside her.
Because she’d seen enough to know that whatever had gone on with Ellen, it was an integral key to the real Jask. And she needed to know the Jask beneath the surface, the snippets of insight he’d allowed her nowhere near enough to sate her curiosity.
And she wondered if she was flattering herself to think he was as curious about her as she was him, especially as questions about her views on monogamy had nothing to do with strategy as far as she could see.
Neither could commenting on what he’d noticed about Daniel’s responses to her.
Her stomach knotted as she reached for the bottle. She scraped her thumbnail over the label, peeling the paper away. ‘Sorry. That didn’t come out like I meant it to.’
She looked back at him, but he only met her gaze fleetingly this time.
She continued to scrape at the label as he reclined in his seat, his attention back on Zee’s table. His eyes were narrowed, focused. Like a predator monitoring its prey, it was unwavering.
‘I’d hate to be on the end of that look,’ she declared.
His gaze snapped to hers.
‘I bet you’re quite the hunter, Jask Tao.’
But he didn’t answer as he looked back across the room again.
‘Do you kill swiftly or slowly?’ she persisted.
This time he frowned. This time she’d captured his attention fully. ‘What kind of question is that?’
‘Just curious. Kane Malloy is renowned for the long game. Caleb Dehain for his swift ruthlessness. I want to know what the other great Blackthorn leader is renowned for. Do you
really
tear?’
‘I protect my pack. Whatever it takes.’
Like he’d protected her. Kept her alive.
‘Something could have happened to me back in that tunnel, Jask,’ she said as she remained focused on her busy thumbnail. She glanced back at him guardedly from under her eyelashes. ‘What would you have done then?’
‘Nothing was going to happen to you.’
‘I know what those cons can be like, rogue vampires…’
He smirked.
‘What?’
‘It’s not
the
tunnel, Phia. Well, there are access points but they’re well and truly sealed from our side. I just wanted you to stay on your guard. Keep the tension going. Though I was worried I might have pushed too far from the second thoughts you were having sat on the edge of that pool.’
She frowned, thinking back to the terror she had felt moving through that dark passage. ‘You were watching me the
entire
time?’
‘Of course I was watching. Me and Corbin had placed bets on whether you would do it. I knew you would. A little bit of water between you and freedom? The way I scared you before you left?’
‘You didn’t scare me.’
‘So why else didn’t you see through your plan of killing me before you left?’
She met the taunt in his azure eyes, her heart having skipped a beat not only that he’d known of her intention, but that he referred to it so nonchalantly. She looked back at the label she’d been massacring. ‘It’s a good thing I didn’t, with how useful you’re now proving to be.’
Leaving the bottle alone, she picked the label from beneath her thumbnail as she plotted a change of direction.
‘So is it always about your pack?’ she asked. ‘Don’t you ever do anything just for you?’
‘What happened between us in the containment room was hardly for my pack’s benefit, Phia.’
As his gaze lingered, she reluctantly looked into her glass to break the intensity. ‘So what
was
it for?’ she asked, glancing back up at him a few moments later.
‘The reason matters to you?’
It did – more than she’d admit to. But the fact he’d asked her so directly made her flounder. ‘If I hadn’t been useful to you,
would
you have killed me down in those ruins?’
He knocked back a mouthful before lowering the glass swiftly back to the table, his eyes narrowing again as he followed movement somewhere across the room.
Sophia followed his gaze to the bar. She knew from the description Jask had given that she was staring at Zee.
But there was someone with him. Another male.
They both stepped past the bar, pushed aside a heavy curtain and disappeared beyond.
Her heart skipped a beat. ‘Where’s he going? Should we follow?’
‘There are only toilets down there.’
‘But they’re on their own.’
‘I said
him
on his own.’
She sat up straight, poised and ready. ‘Come on, Jask, we can take two of them.’
‘And kill the other? If he recognises me, that’s what I’m going to have to do.’
‘So?’
His eyes narrowed with disapproval. ‘You don’t just go around randomly killing, Phia. Death has consequence, even in Blackthorn.’
‘Then let me handle this one. Alone.’
‘No,’ he said, looking back towards the curtain.
‘Why not?’
He looked back at her. ‘Where do I start?’
‘They’re vampires and I’m a serryn. This is what I do, remember?’
‘And I know of him,’ Jask said. ‘You’re not going in alone.’
Her stomach clenched, something behind his eyes telling her his reason was far more than fear of her messing up. ‘I can handle this, okay? That way you might not even need to be involved. I’ll get the information we need. We’re a team, remember? You handled Travis; I’ll handle Zee.’
And she needed to prove she could do it – not just to herself, but to him. The look in his eyes when he’d quizzed her about her serrynity back in Travis’s room was a worry. If he worked out she hadn’t even made a kill as a serryn other than those in the ruins, he’d send her back to the compound. Her hunt would be over. This was her chance, once and for all, to throw him right off the trail.
Besides, she needed to know what she was capable of – to stretch her fledgling wings. And though she hated to admit it, there was something reassuring about the security net of having Jask as backup should it go wrong.
‘And what if he recognises you?’ Jask asked. ‘What if he was one of the ones who helped Marid get you?’
‘Then he’s going to be even more curious, right?’
‘No,’ Jask said. ‘It’s too risky.’