I look at the barman with a stern glare and he rolls his eyes, hands splayed out on the counter. “Room three upstairs is open. You can have it half-off if you can be gone before daybreak.”
I smile wide. “Shouldn’t be a problem, Kep.”
Sephania whispers, “Unless I plan to trap you in there all day.”
I pout. “I’ve heard of worse tortures.” Stepping aside, I sweep my arm out in a bow, toward the stairs around the side of the bar. “Lead the way, Mistress.”
She takes a step past me, smirking and trailing her fingertips across my neck, making me so damned excited I’m about to burst out of my slacks. I hurry after her—
And nearly run into her back when she stops short at the base of the stairs. Her body goes rigid. The tension coming off her shoulders strikes me in the chest.
I snarl and bare my fangs reflexively, sensing danger, curling my arm protectively around Sephania’s middle. “Seph, what is it?”
She nods her chin toward one of the men sitting on the circular table we first passed, lounging with two others, speaking in hushed voices.
The man is unknown to me, an ugly specimen with a bulbous red nose, balding temples, and a sweaty pate. His lips move in a harshly and I can tell he’s saying nothing nice or quaint to his friends.
Sephania gulps and takes an unsteady step toward the stairs, trying to ignore this man. “Just someone I recognize is all. No need to make a scene—”
My hand circles tightly around Sephania’s wrist, catching her off-guard and making her gasp.
“Who. Is. He?”
My words brook no argument. Sephania looks from her clasped wrist to my face and sees the deadly expression there. “A flesh auctioneer,” she says. “Name is Pukren. I watched him sell off countless young girls and boys to my old master, and to people much more disgusting than Lukain. At least Lukain meant to train the whelps. The other buyers, well . . .”
My nostrils flare. I have a feeling she isn’t telling me the whole story, which only brightens my anger. I glance over my shoulder at the disgusting man named Pukren, who looks frail enough to snap in two. He hasn’t noticed us looking at him—none of them have, lost as we are in the shadowy dim light.
Instinctively, I take a step toward the table—
Sephania puts a hand out and stops me. “Garro. What are you planning?”
I look at her, eyes roving up and down. My words come out clipped, not my usual jovial tone. “I’m suddenly hungry for more than one thing, little honey badger.”
She catches the meaning in my shimmering red eyes.
A feasting and then a fucking?
Almost imperceptibly, she nods. Sephania won’t try to stop me. Not when Master Skar, Vallan, and I have corrupted her so completely during our time together.
Her hand releases me. “You know,” she mutters as we both face the table. “There’s a very good chance he was responsible for sellingmefrom the Diplomats to the Grimsons. As a liaison between Dimmon and Lukain.”
My blood boils, the ache becoming intolerable.
It’s exactly as I thought. She hadn’t told me everything. Now that she has, it’s impossible to keep my fury down.
When I say nothing, my fractured mind melding into a single curtain of red, Sephania hugs me tightly from behind. Into my ear, she whispers, “What say we take a seat back at the bar for a little while, my cub. See where the night takes us?”
Chapter 10
Sephania
We continue drinking for another hour, acting nonchalant. I can tell it’s difficult for Garroway, which exhilarates me for some reason. He wants to glance over his shoulder every few minutes to make sure Pukren is still there, carousing with his friends, but I force him to face forward so our cover isn’t given away.
For Garroway, gone is the notion of smoking redcloud in the den through that ominous closed door. His shoulders are high, bristling, and I know I’ve ignited something deep, resentful, and dangerous inside him.
Deep in my heart, I know I should be trying to talk Garro out of whatever he has planned. If he has any plan at all, it can’t be a good one. There’s murder in his eyes, and I seem to be a willing accomplice.
By the same token, I’ve beenmorethan a willing accomplice in recent months. I’ve been an accessory. Culiar, Peltos, Dimmon, Madame Kleora, Bregsitch—I had a hand in each of their deaths.
