When Atticus brought his sister, Adriana, up to stay with him for a while, Zia was pleased to discover that she, too, was lovely. Even though Adriana was unhappy about her temporary relocation from San Francisco, they got along instantly.
Gone were the lonely days in Zia’s little cottage. With her shift to nocturnal life, her world overflowed with connections, laughter, kisses, and bonds that drew her into a brand new family.
There was a part of her that boggled at the sudden change in her life, too. Sometimes she lay awake, her back tucked against Harlan’s naked chest, and wondered if she would wake up from the blissful dream she had been snared in.
Surely this couldn’t bereal.This kind of happiness, this connection,Harlan,couldn’t want her as much as she wanted him. Doubt was a shadow in the back of her mind. It was thin and weightless, but still held the power to tie her tongue into knots whenever she tried to work up the courage to bring up bonding.
But every day that shadow lessened. Doubt crept back. Her confidence grew.
Really, the only problem was that whileshegot more comfortable, her vampire seemed to get more and more tense.
He lavished her with attention, of course, and he insisted on spoiling her every chance he got, but as the weeks passed, she could tell something was wrong.
When she wasn’t on the estate, he insisted on an escort of guards. A couple turned into a few, then more and more. Her home got an upgrade in wards, at his insistence, as well as a new security system and a full-time rotation of guards. It didn’t matter that she rarely slept there anymore. On the subject of her security, Harlan was utterly immovable.
Several times she caught him muttering angrily into a phone, or speaking quietly with Atticus, who wore a hard, grim expression.
Considering his past, she was surprised that when she asked him about it, he told her the truth: the Amauri family was in upheaval, and he worried that the chaos would reach them, too. Zia was skeptical that anyone would be foolish enough to bring Syndicate drama into the EVP, but she didn’t want to dismiss his feelings. He would know better than her, certainly, so she did her best to adjust. Temporarily, at least.
It helped that Adriana, a beautiful vampire with wavy auburn hair and an infectious, dimpled smile, was there to commiserate with her.
“It sucks,” she agreed one night. They were sitting on the manor’s living room floor, both clad in festive sweaters and matching fuzzy socks. A board game lay between them, and two steaming mugs of apple cider sat beside one another in front of the crackling fireplace. Adriana couldn’t drink more than a sip of hers, but she said she liked the smell of food, so Zia gamely made her a cup.
“They aren’t always like this, are they?” Zia pressed, eyeing her tiny plastic figure’s place on the colorful board. She had never been very good at games and couldn’t rightly tell if she was winning or not. “I feel like things have escalated since I’ve been with him.”
“Yeah, you’re not imagining it.” Adriana tucked her fangs against her lower lip as she plucked a card from the deck at the edge of the board. Her nose wrinkled as she read it, scrunching her freckles. “They’re bad on a normal day, but when they’reworried?It’s a whole new level.” She glanced up to meet Zia’s eyes and shrugged. “And you’re Harlan’s anchor. It’s different.”
“Why?”
“You’reliterallyhis lifeblood, Zia,” she answered, moving her figurine back three squares. “He loves me like a daughter, but instinct tells him that his very life, his whole existence, depends upon your safety and happiness. So yeah, he’s gonna be pretty feral about danger. Particularly Julius.”
Zia took a nervous gulp of her cider. Licking her lips, she whispered, “Do you think there’s really a threat?”
Adriana shrugged again. She was pretty, with long limbs and an hourglass figure, but there was something almost withdrawn about her. It was not quite shy and not quite stand-offish. Instead, it was as if she hoped to fade into the background whenever an eye landed on her.
But perhaps Zia had it wrong. Maybe Adriana was just an introvert. She was, after all, someone who spent most of her life sitting quietly in front of a canvas, restoring damaged paintings with tremendous skill and technical know-how. It was entirely possible that she was justquiet.
She didn’t think so, though.
Adriana’s answer came slowly as she toyed with her figurine. She looked up through her lashes when she said, “I… think that Julius would do anything to get Harlan back into the fold, and without Dora there to keep him in check, he reallycould.”She swallowed. “But I also think that he’s fickle. He was interested in me for about half a second before he apparently forgot all about me, so… With everything going on, he might not even spare a thought for Harlan.”
Another shrug. This one came with the distinct impression of a woman intentionally shucking off worries she could do little to fix. “If we get lucky, someone else will deal with him before Atty and Harlan have to.”
Zia shook her head and set her mug aside. Her stomach was too knotted with anxiety to accept anymore cider. “I guess I just can’t imagine it. That whole world seems totally unreal to me.”
She watched Adriana’s expression tighten as she lifted her nearly untouched cider in a half-hearted toast. “Here’s hoping it stays that way.”
ChapterSixteen
November gave way to December.The ground became too frozen for Zia to work in the garden, so she gave her roses her warmest wishes as they quietly settled into their winter dormancy. Instead of going outside, she started spending her nights in the manor, writing her paper.
Gradually, her things migrated into Harlan’s home, too. Her plants came first, since she had begun to spend weeks at a time in the manor. Her wardrobe moved over in fits and starts. This was helped greatly by the fact that Harlan enjoyed hiding gifts for her in the closet — mainly fine wool sweaters, satin nightgowns, and an assortment of expensive coats. What she didn’t have tended to justappearone day, sneakily eliminating any need to run back to her cottage for even a simple errand.
It was a foregone conclusion that she would move in permanently, though Harlan restrained himself from demanding it more than once a week. It had become something of a game between them — the push and pull versus the inevitably of her choice.
Mostly, though, she knew that having her under his roof eased some of the stress she saw mounting every day. It was no hardship to spend most of her time in the manor, anyway. While she still danced with the topic of moving in completely — and silently wrestled with how to broachbonding,of all things, when she still felt like she was in a dream she might wake up from at any moment — it was easy for her to make the adjustment.
Harlan was worried enough. She didn’t need to add to his load by pretending like shewantedto stay in her cottage. At the very least, his water pressure waswaybetter than hers.
