Lehr focused on me again.“You blame me for what happened, but you’re the one who demanded open access to The Rain.I’ve given it to you.”
“You gave strays a chance to hurt her,” Blake said.
Someone tightened a strap around my chest.What was Blake doing?I didn’t need him to intervene.I hadn’t wanted him herebecauseof this.Lehr had already threatened to kill him.I didn’t want to create more friction between the two.I didn’t want Lehr to call out how often Blake found excuses to talk to me or how my presence affected him enough to remain human while under the influence of a wolfsbane spell.
“Jared has agreed to my terms,” I said, trying to pull Lehr’s attention back to me.“Vampires are booking rooms—”
“You’re standing opposite me.”
Lehr’s words and the way he stared at Blake raised chill bumps on my skin.My heart rate kicked up.Inexplicably, so did a feeling of hope.
What ifBlake ignored his alpha?
What ifhe stayed at my side?
What ifI held more power over him than the magical bond linking him to Lehr and the pack?
Could we makeuswork?
“Am I?”Blake asked.He exaggerated scanning to his left.Then he scanned to the right, where I stood and where our gazes met.For a short, breath-catching second, I forgot everything else—the worlds that separated us, the lines we had blurred, and the ones we hadn’t yet crossed.A thousand morewhat-ifsfilled the space between us until the moment shattered like a porcelain secret.
Feigned surprise replaced the heat in Blake’s eyes.
“Huh,” he said with a shrug.“It looks like you’re right.”
Slowly, casually, he crossed the strip of earth separating me from Lehr and the pack and took up position beside his alpha.When he faced me, his emotions were locked down tight.
I needed to leave.Immediately.Not for my own safety but for Blake’s.Lehr’s eyes were banded in gold, and the pack was stirring, responding to the killing energy radiating from the alpha.
Blake stood much too still and too confident.Too insubordinate.
I backed up a step but kept my shoulders straight and my chin lifted, wearing my own confidence.It didn’t matter that it was a costume.I’d initiated this confrontation, and I was ending it.This had everything to do with me and absolutely nothing to do with Blake.
“Arcuro lost the compound and his life,” I said.My next sentence would secure my role as Lehr’s antagonist.“Your position isn’t as secure as you think.”
Chapter Twenty-Five
Thefalloutfrommycovert exit from The Rain wasn’t what I’d expected when I returned.Instead of angry lectures, I was given cold silence.Garion wouldn’t look at me.Phedre and Thordis spoke in hushed whispers and looked at me too much.Other staff members ended their conversations abruptly If I walked by.The only person who really interacted with me was Sullens.We sat down in my living room for that meetup we’d planned to sort through emails.Even then, he spoke the bare minimum.
I stared at the three piles of paper on the coffee table between us.The largest one was for themaybesandneed more informationvampires and the eight werewolves brave or desperate enough to subvert Lehr’s demands.The pile fordefinitely yesanddefinitely noparanorms were the exact same number of printed pages: four.
I sighed.Why couldn’tsomethingbe easy for once?
“We’ll have to call their references,” I said.Most had given us two like I’d asked.A few gave us twice that number, and a handful of others had more than ten.
“I will start.”He grabbed the center stack.“Anything more?”
Our relationship had regressed to how it had been in the beginning.Him giving me only short, curt responses.Me, wondering what I could do to punch through his stern expression and belittling gaze.But one significant difference between then and now was that I was willing to set aside my resentment and try harder to connect with him.
I wasn’t wrong for leaving to confront Lehr.They weren’t wrong for wanting me to stay safe and sheltered, but this stalemate strategy of everyone pretending there wasn’t a big, fat elephant in the room wouldn’t get us anywhere.
“I threatened Lehr,” I said.
The way Sullens’s wide eyes shot my direction was almost comical.
“I told him I’d ban any name he sanctioned.”
“I’m sure that went well.”He straightened the stack of papers.
