Chapter 8
THE ROSSI and Wolfe crowd got a little rowdy, voices raised in argument.
We all glanced over to see if we’d have to muscle them apart.
Jame Wolfe stared down his brother, Tonner, doing that silent were-dominance thing again. Ben Rossi smoothly and firmly pulled Sven—who looked like he’d had several too many drinks—off to one side to have a private conversation with him.
“Not good,” Jean said, popping the last bit of a carrot she’d dipped in chocolate into her mouth.
I pushed back to stand.
“We got it.” Myra’s hand landed on my shoulder.
I let Jean and Myra stride over to check out the argument before it escalated into a fight.
The Wolfes and Rossis closed ranks on opposite sides of the table and glared at each other in silence. This silence, filled with the ever-present tension between the families, was somehow much more worrisome than the quick shouting match.
Myra walked over to talk to the Rossi clan while Jean approached the Wolfe family.
“Still surprises me about Jame and Ben,” Ryder said.
“Because they’re gay?” I said without looking away from the vamps and weres.
Out of the corner of my eye, I saw him shake his head. “Everyone knew that.”
“I didn’t know it.”
“You didn’t get hit on by Ben in high school.” He sounded like he was smiling.
Finally, Ben and Jame brought Tonner and Sven back together. Ben’s hand was planted on Sven’s shoulder, and Jame had his arm around Tonner’s back.
Tonner and Sven didn’t look like they were in a forgiving mood, but after a quick talk with Myra and Jean, money was exchanged between the two creatures and no blood was spilled.
Jame and Ben both patted their stubborn relations on the back, and everyone went back to playing pool.
Jean, I noted, had been invited to the Wolfe side of the game, so Myra lifted one eyebrow and gave her a challenging smile as she casually joined in with the vampires.
The universal schoolroom you’re-in-trouble taunt of “Oooooooh” rose from both teams.
Sometimes being a cop meant remembering you were just a regular person like anyone else in town. Even the irregular ones.
“So why are you surprised Ben and Jame are together?” I said, picking up the conversation again. “Don’t think workplace romances are a good idea?”
“Their families don’t exactly get along. Never have. I can’t imagine what major holidays are going to look like for them.”
I lifted my chin toward the pool game. Sven and Tonner were laughing loudly as Ben flipped them both off with a flash of fang and then took his shot. Jame leaned against the wall next to his pack, watching his partner. After Ben’s shot and groan, Jame rolled his eyes and slapped a few bills into his brother’s palm.
Someone, or maybe two someones, had just lost a bet. But in doing so, it looked like they’d restored harmony between the groups.
“If anyone can make it work, it’s those two stubborn men,” I said.
Jean was up, leaning over the pool table and shifting her butt just a little as she did so. As one, every Wolfe head tipped to the side, watching her butt like puppies watch a stick.
I turned back to the table and picked at the remaining French fries on my plate. I was stuffed. I felt amazing. Full, grounded, satisfied.
“Why haven’t I been eating lately? Eating is wonderful.”
“That’s a good question,” Ryder said. “Why haven’t you been eating lately?”
Terrific. I’d said that out loud. Another reminder that I’d been home, alone, talking to myself far too much lately.
“No time?” I suggested.
“No sleep?” he countered.
I dragged my fingers back through my hair, and let it fall. He watched me, savoring every move, as if there was something about me worth savoring.
I made a face at him, which broke the intensity in his eyes. He grinned and went back to pushing his remaining fries through a puddle of ketchup and Tabasco sauce.
Thank gods. If he’d kept looking at me like that, I would have crawled over the table just to find out what Tabasco sauce and ketchup tasted like on his mouth.
“Maybe you haven’t been eating because something else has been on your mind. Your dad?”
Yeah, that. He wasn’t wrong. There wasn’t a day that went by that I didn’t wish he were still here with me. With us. His death had been so sudden.
I loved him. I always would. But it was more than just his death that had disrupted my life. It was also this job, this family responsibility that I still wondered if I was handling as well as I should.
“You want to talk about that?” Ryder asked gently. “You went pretty quiet.”
I didn’t want to talk about what was really bothering me—the crazy secrets of gods and monsters in this town. My job to look after them all, and to be there when god power needed to change hands.
But maybe I could talk about Dad.
“I think about him every day. Think about what he’d do when I’m responding to a call. Keep expecting him to stop by and see me and my sisters. But I’m getting…well, better isn’t really the right word, but maybe I’m getting used to the way things are now?”
“Grief is a terrible houseguest,” he said. “It shows up when we least expect it and leaves long after it’s overstayed its welcome.” His eyes darkened, and he stared into his empty beer glass.
“Something wrong?”
“No.” He was lying. Then he looked back up, some of the darkness gone from his eyes. “This is nice. Why don’t we do this more often?”
“Because we are hardworking people who forget to put ourselves first every once in a while.”
“About that.” He leaned forward, took my hand, and rubbed his thumb gently, maddeningly, across the back of it, soft, slow strokes. My breath bunny-hopped and I worked to pull it back under control. “I’ve been thinking. Maybe it’s time we put ourselves first.”
“You mean burgers and fries every once in a while?”
“I mean go out. Date. I’m asking you if you’d like to date me, Laney. Just to see…just to see where things could be between us.”
Everything in me wanted to say yes. I’d been waiting to hear those words out of Ryder’s mouth since I was in elementary school and thought dating meant sharing the green M&M’s.
But I paused. Ryder’s hazel eyes were filled with patience, softened by compassion and maybe something more.
He licked his lower lip, biting it just a bit as he watched me.
That look was filled with a lot more than compassion. It was filled with a heat and fire I wanted to lose myself to, wanted to be devoured by.
“I thought you didn’t like workplace romances.”
“I never said that.”
My heart whispered with need. I’d never know if Ryder was the man I dreamed he was, if being with him how I’d always wanted to would live up to my imagination if I didn’t try it. Dating was a good start. All I had to say was yes.
I opened my mouth to say yes.
“Delaney.” Myra strode across the room. “We need to talk. Now.”
She was scowling. Pale. Jean was already jogging toward the door, her phone at her ear.
Something was wrong.
“What’s wrong?” Ryder asked.
“Police business,” she said. “Not for you.”
I stood, reached for the back of my chair, and only then remembered I hadn’t brought my jacket. “Sorry. I need to go. Report to the station tomorrow morning.”
He stood too. “I can come along.”
“No,” Myra and I both said. “We’ll get you sworn in tomorrow, officially,” I added. “Then you can come along. Tomorrow. Don’t be late.”
I had to jog a little to catch up to Myra, who was already hauling it across the room and out the door.
“Talk to me,” I said.
“I’ll tell you in the car.” She wrapped her arm around my waist, which seemed like a strange thing for her to do as we stepped outside.
“What?”
Ryder jogged out the door. “You forgot your purse. Delaney?”
Myra swore quietly.
And that was when it hit me.
God power.
I’d never felt it before, not like this, not so strong. But I knew exactly what it was. God power, uncontrolled, wild. It slammed into me, trying to reshape me. Trying to change me.
A wave of sensations swallowed me whole, pulled me down with electric fingers and explosions of color. I felt my knees give out, heard my moan as I fell. Ryder’s voice, Myra’s voice, were faint echoes behind a chorus of sound raised in raw power.
The world shuddered under that song, then rebuilt itself to meet the call of this mighty, unstoppable, exquisite force.
A universe of sensation—beautiful sensations, terrifying sensations—filled me.
And then silence and blackness closed it all down.