There was that pang of envy again.
“What happened next?”
“He carried me to his car and helped clean me off.”
“Oh, well, that’s kind of sweet.”
She scoffed, her eyes flashing with anger. “It would have been sweeter if he hadn’t have been acting like he was trying to cover up a crime scene. He acted like it was a mistake. One we could never make again. And you know what the most bullshit part is? He said we couldn’t be together because his“organization”wouldn’t allow it.That’sthe bullshit excuse he gave me. Can you believe that?”
My brows crinkled. “Organization? What, like a religion? Since when is he religious?”
“Exactly. He said it was more like a cult.”
I let out an exasperated huff. “What the fuck, Gabriel. Really? That’s the excuse he came up with?” This was troubling. I would expect this from a one-night stand with a random douche bag butGabriel?That didn’t sound like him at all.
“Something is going on with him, Jessica. He’s covering up a secret. It’s something…big. So then I called you to go to Siren’s, and he freaked out on me going on about how the devil works here and fallen angels are dangerous or whatever. He dropped me off, and there was a Tacoma Pack shifter outside who grabbed my butt. A fight almost broke out.”
Holy crap. Gabriel almost took on a member of the Tacoma Pack? “Please tell me he’s still alive.”
“Yeah, the owner of the club came out of nowhere. He broke up the fight. The bouncer escorted Gabe and the wolf off the premises.”
“You met Lucifer Morningstar? Just now?”
I don’t know why my stomach fluttered at that name. It should have made me cringe because what normal, well-adjusted man would call themselves that? It’s not like it could possibly be his legal name.
But I didn’t have to know the billionaire tycoon who was buying up downtown Seattle like one giant game of monopoly to know he wasn’t anything close to well-adjusted.
And that made me all the more curious.
“Yeah.” She gave a slow nod, a look of confusion settling on her face. “He was…odd. He acted like he knew Gabriel.”
For a long moment, we sat in silence, her processing all that had happened to her and me processing all she’d told me. Man, what a birthday. I would kill to have crazy things like that happen to me. I had to chase trouble, but Mel just seemed to attract it. And she wasn’t the sort to handle that kind of thing well. Her idea of a perfect birthday would have been to stay inside curled up watching TV with a plate of pancakes. And maybe her reclusive nature just made it easy for Gabe to be hiding something from her all this time because she was right. He was hiding something, something huge.
“Holy crap. That’s a lot to unpack, Mel.”
“Jess…” She paused and gave a tentative swallow as if tasting the words that she was about to say, unsure of them. “I don’t think Gabriel is human.”
Chapter Three
Jess
Isat up a little straighter. The idea of Gabriel being anything other than human was troubling because it was very possible he wasn’t. Supernaturals were all around us; they always had been. The “real world” had been in the dark until two years ago and was still adjusting to this new normal. It was scary because these supernatural creatures were friends, family, co-workers… Many of them were “still in the closet” so to speak. Which brought into question who was human and who wasn’t? Because not everyone supernatural had jackets and logos like the Tacoma Pack.
I’d known Gabriel for over seven years. Mel had known him since she was just a kid. The thought of him being something other than human had never even occurred to me. But there was a very real possibility that Gabe was no different from all the others that had been in hiding.
“Do you really think… Shit, do you think he’s a wolf?
Mel shook her head. “I don’t think so. A cat maybe, going by the way he cringes whenever wolves are mentioned. Whatever he is, he’s been lying to me this entire time.”
I tensed, drumming my nails against the veneer of our table. “I hate to side with Gabe here but say he is a sup. Is there ever really a good time to tell your childhood best friend that you’re not human? What if he’s something embarrassing like a chicken shifter? Then I really wouldn’t blame him for not coming clean.”
Her lips quivered. “We don’t keep anything from each other.”
“I don’t know. If I was secretly a chicken, I wouldn’t want that sort of thing getting out. It would also be hell on my dating life. There, I cracked the mystery of why he wouldn’t sleep with you.”
She flung me a barbed glare. “This isn’t helping.”
“I get that you’re worried about him and whatever secret he’s hiding. But hey, you lost your V card! And even if he’s a lying asshole, you lost it to the guy you’ve been in love with for a decade. How was it?”
