“Is Orpheus going to send me away?” she whispered.
I hesitated and considered talking to her about the peace treaty and the ramifications if she didn’t have a prophecy. But even I wasn’t so insensitive not to know that would cause more harm than good. Instead, I took another approach.
“Of course he isn’t going to send you away. He’s just worried about you. We all are.” I moved my head until I captured her gaze and forced her to look into my eyes. “That’s why you have to start sleeping again. It’s not healthy to force your body to stay awake.”
She shied away, her breath escaping through her teeth in a hiss. “No! I can’t. I c-can’t. Sleep is bad.” She tugged at the hair with both hands. Large clumps pulled away between her knuckles. “Badbadbadbad.”
I reached out and tried to halt her obsessive grooming. “Maisie, stop.” For someone so emotionally fragile, she fought me off long enough to get a couple more handfuls. I finally managed to hold her against me and force her hands by her side. I turned to look at her and had a clear view of the bald spot just behind her ear. “You have to stop hurting yourself.” I closed my eyes against the stinging tears that threatened to fall.
She shook her head. “I’ll be better. I promise. Just don’t make me sleep.”
“Shh,” I said, rocking her. “I promise.” Fear for Maisie made my stomach turn. I’d rarely felt more impotent in my life.
“Sabina?” Maisie whispered, her face turned away from mine.
“Yeah?”
“I’ve missed you.”
Well, if that wasn’t just a knife to the gut. A flash of Maisie’s head bent over Adam as she sucked the lifeblood from his veins flashed through my head. Then the look on her face after she’d ripped our grandmother’s head from her body—her haunted eyes and blood-smeared mouth. I blinked away the memories and looked down at the broken wraith who used to be my happy sister. “I miss you, too.”
12
After talking to Maisie, I headed back to the apartment to meet up with Adam and Alexis. Orpheus and the Despina needed an update on our progress, and Adam and I were hoping they’d give us leave to interrogate Tiny Malone. Granted, the information Mistress Bianca gave us about him trying to recruit vampires wasn’t exactly the strongest lead, but it was better than sitting around waiting for Slade to find something else to share with us. Plus, after my talk with Maisie, I was kind of hoping things with Tiny went south. I needed an excuse to hit something. Hard.
When I entered, the scent of stewing meat and herbs wrapped around me like a shawl. I shook out the tension in my shoulders. “Honey, I’m home!”
“In the kitchen,” Giguhl called.
Just inside the doorway, I stopped to admire the scene waiting for me. Giguhl loomed over a bubbling pot on the stove. He wore an apron that read ANGEL IN THE KITCHEN, DEMON IN THE SACK.
“What’s for dinner?” I leaned around Giguhl’s back to peek inside the pot. He shrugged me off.
“Oh, no, you don’t. The last time you tried to help me cook you ended up ruining my coq au vin.”
I nudged him in the side for the reminder. “I thought PW was going to help you cook tonight.”
He stirred the pot with a little too much gusto. Red liquid splashed and sizzled on the burner. “She’s working at Vein.”
My eyes widened. “She’s singing again?”
He shook his head. “Waitressing. The nymphs have gone on strike until the murderer is found so Slade’s desperate for help. And Pussy’s determined to save up enough for her own place.”
The topic of PW moving out was a source of tension between Giguhl and me. When PW had first brought up the idea of renting an apartment in the Black Light District, she and Giguhl were determined to become roommates. But I’d had to put a kibosh on that plan. It’s not that I didn’t want him to live with PW. Honestly, part of me would love the chance for Adam and me to have the place to ourselves. But even though I’d love the demon to have more freedom, magic bound Giguhl to me as my minion. Not only did he need my permission to do almost everything, but he also had no income of his own. And I sure as hell couldn’t afford to pay partial rent for two apartments in New York.
To avoid having that argument with the demon again, I downplayed the chance that PW would be moving anytime soon. “Don’t worry, she won’t make much in tips tonight. Everyone’s probably still staying away from the scene of the crime until the killer’s found.”
He continued as if I hadn’t spoken. “I told her she should tell him no. It’s not safe.”
“She’ll be fine. Slade will keep an eye on her.” I patted his arm. “Is Adam around?”
Giguhl perked up. “In the living room.” A mischievous smile spread on his black lips. “With a surprise.”
I rolled my eyes. A surprise was not something I needed. “Is it Alexis?”
“She’s running late.” Satisfied with the stew’s progress, the demon tapped the spoon on the edge of the pot. “This is an even better surprise.”
I grabbed a beer from the fridge and went to investigate. As I walked down the hall, the demon called after me, “Dinner will be ready in thirty!”
Closer to the door, the low, comforting rumble of Adam’s voice reached me. Every few seconds a higher feminine response echoed down the hall. Recognizing the voice, I sped up and burst through the door.
Three faces looked up at my entrance. Adam rose with a smile. “Red, look who the cat dragged in!”
“Hey, Georgia!” I grinned at the redheaded female who stood gracefully. After a quick, hard hug with her, I glanced at the female werewolf slouching on the couch. “Mac.”
The werewolf wore an artfully ragged jean jacket and a black tank top. Think Joan Jett only hairier around the full moon. Despite her petite frame, she could be intimidating when she wanted to be, which, unfortunately, was often.
Georgia, on the other hand, looked like something off a fashion magazine with her lithe frame and hair the color of a polished copper pot. They were complete opposites, but somehow they complemented each other.
I hadn’t seen the couple since we’d left New Orleans. They’d helped us find Maisie and also fought with us against my grandmother and her goons. Georgia was awesome. And Mac? Well, let’s just say the were and I had a complex relationship.
The were crossed her arms but deigned a terse nod in my general direction. Ignoring her surliness, I turned to Georgia. “What brings you to the Big Apple?”
Georgia looked to Mac expectantly, but the werewolf hunkered down. Finally, Georgia realized she’d be doing all the talking and explained. “Mac’s uncle called her back.”
Mac’s uncle was Michael Romulus, Alpha of the New York werewolves. Since I’d just seen him a couple of nights earlier at Vein, I was surprised he hadn’t mentioned Mac’s imminent arrival. Although, to be fair, we had been discussing a brutal murder.
“Do you know why?” I went to join Adam on the sofa, while Georgia took her place next to Mac across the table from us.
Mac crossed her arms and scowled at the coffee table. “Yeah.”
Adam put his arm around my shoulders. “Before you got here, Georgia said they have a favor to ask us.”
I looked at the couple for confirmation. Georgia nodded, but Mac looked more miserable than ever. Finally, the vamp nudged her lover’s side and wasn’t subtle about it.
Mac sighed and sat up straighter. “Do you remember in New Orleans when you asked me to help you find your sister?”
“Of course,” I said.
“And how you promised a favor in return?”
Heaviness settled in my center. Somehow I just knew this favor wasn’t going to be something I liked. “Yeah.”
“I’m calling it in now.” Her tone was tight, like uttering the words cost her a chunk of pride.
Adam pulled his arm away and leaned forward. “What do you need?” His casual demeanor was gone now.
“I think Mike called me back because he wants me to find a mate.” She tipped her head toward her lover. “Obviously that’s a problem.”
I sucked in a breath. This wasn’t good at all. Even if Michael could accept the fact his niece was a friend of Sappho, which was unlikely given werewolves’ male-dominated culture, he probably wouldn’t be too thrilled by the fact she’d fallen for a vampire. Mating between the races had been forbidden centuries earlier by the Black Covenant. Abolishing that provision was on the table for the peace talks, but it was also one of the big sticking points of the negotiations. Naturally, as the product of such a forbidden match and the participant in one now myself, I was also pretty invested in the outcome of that line item.
“So what are you going to do?” I asked.
“What choice do I have? I’m going to have to tell him about Georgia and me.”
Adam and I exchanged a tense glance. “Well, it probably won’t be easy, but Mike’s a reasonable guy.” Adam’s tone was overly bright with false optimism.
“You have to understand. I’m an old maid by were standards. Most of my friends and cousins were married off by the age of twenty. I’m pushing forty.”
Georgia patted her girlfriend’s arm. “You’re just a baby.”
She was right. By vampire standards, forty was pretty young. Georgia had told me back in New Orleans that she was seventy-five—twenty years my senior. But werewolves had shorter life spans than the other dark races. No one really knew why. The average werewolf would live only about two hundred years. Compared to mages who lived to be two thousand and some vampires who’d literally been around since before antiquity, they were little more than violent puppies. That reputation also explained their lack of power at the negotiating table.
“Either way,” Mac continued. “Michael’s been on me for years to settle down. That’s one of the reasons I went to New Orleans. I figured, out of sight, out of mind, you know? But I guess with everything going on he’s decided to do something about his spinster niece. And with the Lupercalia mating rituals coming in a couple of weeks, well, I put it together.” She rubbed her hands on her jeans. “Needless to say, I don’t think he’ll do a miraculous one-eighty and welcome Georgia into the pack.”