Timothy sniffed. “I would never.”
Vivien did make me weak, in more ways than one. She made me forget duty and responsibility. Though I wanted to believe I had done things from a place of cool calculation, my emotions had gotten the best of me. After I’d thought they’d long hardened.
Now the trick was to stay close to Vivien without actually being close to her. I sighed and sat in my throne. There were many judgements I must proceed with, and I could use the distraction.
Though I knew there would be nothing that could erase those glinting green eyes, full of passion, the feel of her lips under mine, or the sting of the slap against my face.
There was no rest for the wicked, and certainly never for Death.
Epilogue
“So this is your new place?” Miranda asked as I poured her a glass of red wine. I even poured one for myself. I didn’t want to let that dickwad Landon Crane spoil anything for me. I’d force myself to love wine to spite the horrible thing he’d done to me. Seemed fair.
I’d confessed to Miranda what I’d done to Jamal, expecting her to shoot me. Instead, she grabbed my hand and said she knew it wasn’t my fault. After all, I had saved him. He was released from the hospital and having lots of long talks with his mom about what they once thought to be true about this world. She’d said to him, “Life has the endless ability to surprise us. In this case, dark, scary creatures that we never thought could exist. But that also means there are endless possibilities for the expression of love, hope, and good in the world.” I informed her that I was an orphan and demanded she adopt me right away.
When I asked if Jamal was terrified of me, she explained he thought I was a superhero. He knew I was manipulated by the bad guys. I absolutely did not tear up when she told me that.
So I told Miranda about the blood bond, that I could only drink blood from Grim now and had quit humans for good. Didn’t even need a patch. She knew he was different, she just didn’t know how. Miranda was only aware she had been around a lot of supernatural beings lately. Thank god she was the coolest, toughest chick I knew and didn’t melt into an incoherent puddle of fear. I wanted to be her when I grew up.
Miranda’s hand wrapped around the giant balloon glass, as I passed it to her and said, “There was no way I was going to live in that penthouse with his majesty.”
Though he rarely spent any time up there, which was why it was a great makeshift prison for me in the first place, it was still his. It smelled of him, his taste was everywhere and inescapable. I may be on a short leash, but I intended to take every inch.
“So I demanded my own digs. It’s still in the same hotel, but don’t you love it?” I asked Miranda. We were standing in one of Sinopolis’s greatest suites, complete with two bedrooms, a kitchen, and an infinity pool that butted up to the glass and overlooked the sparkling lights of the Strip. Of course, heavy duty blackout curtains were installed to keep me from ending up a pile of ash.
“I mean,” she said, eyeing the piles of clothes everywhere, “it’s impressive you trashed it so hard in what, six hours?”
“I got a hold of his majesty’s credit card and have done a lot of online shopping.” I examined the mini mountains I’d made. “And I’m still trying to figure out my new look. Jane had a certain kind of style, but now I’m Vivien. And Vivien totally has a look. I just haven’t figured it out yet.”
Miranda eyed my mess with the barely restrained censure only a mother could manage. “And a maid will be by to pick up all of this?”
“Exactly.” I nodded, clinking my glass against hers. Jamal was sleeping over at a friend’s house, leaving us a blissful girl’s night. And now that I had memories, I could count the number of these occasions on one hand.
She shrugged and sighed, seeming to give up the itch to lecture me to pick up after myself, and sipped from her glass. “So are you going to tell me what Grim is yet? Or Timothy or those other two ya-hoos who fought off those vamps with me?”
I took a longer slug from the glass. Still wished it was a beer. True to Grim’s word, I was bound to not reveal the identity of the gods. Oh, believe me, I tried. Immediately, many times, with Miranda in fact, but I barely got a puff of air out every time I tried. My throat would squeeze the words down before they could really get up at all.
“You know I can’t,” I said. “Why do you ask?”
Miranda pinched the stem of the wine glass and rolled it between her fingers. “Grim offered me a position with his security team, here at Sinopolis.”
I froze. “Are you going to take it?”
“It’s chief of security. The job comes with housing, five times the pay I was receiving at Castlegate, and the benefits are out of this world. He even promised that the owner of Castlegate wouldn’t put up a fight, as he would personally see to compensating for my transfer.”
The idea I could flounce down and bother Miranda any time I wanted made my heart soar. I was planning on doing that anyway, seeing as the hotels connected by a windowless corridor, but it would be so much more satisfying to do it on Grim’s dime.
“But I don’t know what kind of man Grim is.”
He’s not a man at all.
I shrugged. “From what I can tell, he treats his staff very well and as far as I know he doesn’t do any shady shit, if that’s what you’re asking.”
“Then I can tell him I’ll take the job in the morning.”
I squeed and raced around the bar to squeeze Miranda in a near bone-breaking hug. Then we lounged on the couch and chatted about how Jamal was doing, picked over the clothes, some of which I forced her to take with her because she had a banging body and actual, defined arm muscles. Sooner than I liked, Miranda headed home, full of cocktails, in a cab. Somehow, out of all of this I’d come out with a friend. That was more than I’d had in my previous life. And it sure as hell wasn’t nothing.
My phone buzzed. It was a text.
