Sterling narrowed his gaze on the gangster. “No. And honestly, I take offense to that question.”
Another laugh left Jamie. He pointed at Sterling, his smile broadening. “That was a trick question. And you passed my test.”
Rolling her eyes, Elise left the two men to their own devices at her map. She swiped the vial from the cat, who had been trying to swat it off the counter during their conversation. “You might be the least insufferable one here right now, Hen.”
21
Layla dreamed of Elise again. Even when she woke up, she still felt her fingers, soft as ever, on her face, and her voice whispering a sweet goodbye into her ear. She wore an outfit that took to the night. Swathed in black garments, she looked more like one of Layla’s clan mates than the elite Saint heiress Layla had known her entire life. Still, Elise was a picture of true beauty without even trying. She had pulled her curls back into a golden hair clip, though a few tendrils hung by her sharp cheekbones and stuck in the gentle shine of her plump lips. It was a large turnaround from her usual dreams of the Saint heiress, where blood drenched her dying body like a veil. For once, Layla could touch her without causing her demise and hold her without having to say goodbye. The dream elevated her mood more than she cared to admit; the months of sleeping with only nightmares had been so long, Layla had forgotten what it felt like to dream peacefully.
She was eager to join the commotion in the living room early that morning if it meant she got to see Elise alive and well in the flesh. But when Layla left her bedroom and found only Jamie and Sterling arguing over guns, all earlier contentment was chased away with a quickness.
“Where is Elise?” she demanded, cutting right through their heated tiff.
Jamie pulled back first, though he maintained his scowl at Sterling. “She left to…complete a task.”
Layla’s heart rate picked up. Already, her mind filled with all the terrible things that could have been happening to Elise in that moment. If last night’s announcement on the radio about them all being wanted by the police was not enough to fear, then images of the beast that lurked beneath Harlem’s streets, waiting for a glimpse of darkness to strike, popped into her head next. “Why did no one tell me she was leaving?”
Sterling shoved a gun into his chest holster, grumbling, “I wasn’t aware you owned her.”
Rage consumed her. Snarling, Layla lunged for him, her hands going around his throat. Without his Saint guns and his Saint bullets, he might as well have been just another man taking up space under this roof. Layla had nothing preventing her from shutting him up permanently now, even if it cost her all the work she had done over the past few months to keep herself calm. Right as her fingers closed around his throat, Jamie’s arms plucked her from the air and hauled her back against his chest.
“Enough. Both of you. We’re supposed to be working together. Now is not the time for petty fights,” Jamie ordered.
Layla strained in his arms hard enough to make him pant with the effort of keeping her contained. Somehow he managed to maintain his hold on her, and he didn’t let her go until she went still, silently promising her commitment to his word.
The former Saint member lifted a brow. “She’s planning a blood mission, just so you know. If she’s willing to die for you, you should know how to stop her. I have never seen such an unbalanced relationship otherwise. She deserves so much better than you.”
Jamie ran his fingers through his hair, restyling the pieces that had been knocked free by Layla’s struggle. “Are you serious? I just calmed her down and you’re going to say that?” He turned a gentler look to Layla, who had begun to vibrate with anger. “She said goodbye to you this morning. So maybe if you really—”
She was out of the living room and back in her bedroom before he could even finish his sentence. Layla leaned over the bed, remembering just where she had seen Elise in her dream. She should have known her unconscious state had been too good to be true. It took all of three seconds for Layla to trace Elise’s scent and then find Karine’s mixed in with it. The older reaper’s essence was faint, but it was there. And that was enough for Layla to tear out of the room with the intention of starting a hunt.
“How dare you not tell me she had seen Karine. You don’t know how dangerous she is,” Layla seethed as she shoved her feet into her boots and failed miserably at every attempt to curb the thoughts ofElise walking into a reaper bloodbath just to prove herself to some mutinous ancient reaper who had been in their neighborhood for no longer than a few months. Layla gripped the edge of the kitchen counter so hard, her nails left divots in the granite. Her heart thudded in her chest at the image of Elise covered in her own blood and choking on death. She watched as Jamie and Sterling exchanged a look. The fact they held a knowledge of Elise that she was not privy to sent a sharp spike of jealousy through her spine. Whether it was the blood they shared between them or just Layla’s twisted desires causing this charge of emotions, she didn’t care. Her brows furrowed into a dangerous glare while her fangs emerged, digging into her lower lip until blood spilled over her chin in thin rivulets.
Jamie looked over Sterling’s shoulder, and his eyes widened. “What the hell is wrong with you?”
Sterling frowned, stopping abruptly when he saw Layla. He relaxed, his shoulders lowering as he placed another gun on his belt. “It’s a strange possessive reaction some reapers have after drinking from a human. Although usually it’s the human who experiences the urge to lay claim over the reaper. I wouldn’t be surprised if she tore through Harlem just to find Elise.”
She would. Layla knew just how volatile human blood made her, and Elise’s absence only increased her adrenaline. What she would give to be near the Saint heiress now—what she wouldkillto keep her around. “We can save a lot of lives if you just tell me where she is,” Layla muttered. She licked the blood from her lips and waited.
Sterling offered her a soft gaze full of pity. “I will not betray heron this,” he murmured. “For once you get to taste the sins of your own flesh.”
Though Elise had been gone from the apartment for a while, Layla still suffered the overwhelming sense of her. Beyond just her scent and her essence, Layla felt like she could still feel Elise in her—as if the blood between them had become something more tangible than just spilled promises and acts of vengeance. Her heart throbbed the farther Elise went from her, and all her thoughts came back to the Saint, no matter how hard she tried to direct them elsewhere.
Even as Jamie passed her by, Layla grabbed his arm, roughly holding him in place. He grunted and gave her a bewildered look. “What the hell?”
Layla looked up at him with as much malice as possible, urging every ounce of glowing anger she had into her eyes. “If she has a single hair out of place when I find her, it’s death for you.” She shot her glare at Sterling. “You too.”
Jamie pulled away from her the moment she released her grip. He brushed off his coat and rolled his eyes, blowing out hot air. “I’ll be damned. And I’d rather die than have a Saint get hurt on my watch. I know my boundaries. Have a little faith in her, Layla. She might surprise you.”
But with a Saint’s blood still cycling through her system and an Elise-shaped hole in her sinking chest, Layla knew faith would not keep her calm. Her crushing desire would end in no less blood than the Saint’s lone mission would. This hunt was Layla’s and Layla’s alone. Consequences be damned.
***
Layla had never been good at tracking those she did not care for. The act came easiest to her when there was a blood she desired to recognize and trace, but this time, she was going purely based on her own rage and urge to hunt and kill.
Karine knew many people and reapers in Harlem. It was no surprise to Layla when one of her blood patrons mentioned the various allies Karine had been through in an attempt to settle in Harlem. The absolute pride with which her patrons spoke of Karine with while reeking of her made Layla’s stomach turn. Along with the slight sheen of their eyes and the dreamlike state they seemed to function in that told Layla Karine’s venom still ran through their veins.
She followed the faint scent she had grown to associate with Karine through the apartment building her blood patron had mentioned just hours earlier at a blood house. The moment she stepped in front of the door that held the most of her essence, it swung open, revealing the older reaper inside a dimly lit sitting room.
