“I didn’t think you had it in you.” Raleigh’s attention swings to me. “You shouldn’t waste your time with dinosaurs, little lady.”
“And what? Join your coven of rat-sucking leeches?” I snort. “I don’t think so.”
An audibleoooohpasses through the crowd, but Raleigh only smirks. “Oh, she’s got teeth, this one.”
“You have no idea,” Lucian says.
“Another Vittoria?” Raleigh asks. “You know I like my women with bite.”
“Elliot ismine,” he snarls the last word. “And therefore off limits.”
Raleigh holds his hands up in surrender. “Understood, grandpa. You like to rob the cradle.”
“I didn’t come here to be ridiculed. If that’s what this is going to be—” He’s about to turn away when Raleigh calls out.
“I’m sorry, Lucian. I didn’t mean anything by it. You know this.” He laughs again. “I like to think I’m funny.”
“Hilarious,” I mutter.
Raleigh clears his throat, switching gears. “Anywho, I invited you here for one reason. I know we haven’t really seen eye to eye and we think yourmethodsare a bit outdated?—”
“Out with it,” Lucian snaps.
“We want a truce,” he says simply. But that only makes Lucian blink. Whatever he had expected this meeting to be about, that clearly wasn’t it. “A formal one.”
Lucian raises a brow, a slight smile lighting his face. “I thought we had a mutual understanding.”
“We did—well,do—but as the Rogues’ leader, it’s up to me to protect my people. I’m not stupid. I know your numbers crush ours. We don’t want any trouble with you or VMR.”
I study Raleigh. He looks honest and open, but he’s smart and looks can lie.
If the Rogues and Lucian have had some kind of agreement to stay civil for years, and he wants to solidify the truce, why would Santiago claim the Rogues want Lucian out?
“And that truce has nothing to do with expanding into de Santis’s territory?” Lucian asks.
“Not unless you’re offering,” he replies. “But no, we don’t mind our little underground slice of heaven.”
I lean closer to Lucian. “I think he’s telling the truth.”
“You do?” he whispers back.
“If he wanted to kill us, he would’ve done it by now.” This entire thing smells like a power play. Lucian nods.
“There have been rumors,” Raleigh goes on as though he doesn’t hear us, “that you’ve been looking to snuff us out.”
Lucian glances at me briefly. “Who told you this?”
“Santiago,” I reply before Raleigh can.
“Exactly, yes,” he agrees. “I’d rather cut through the bullshit and lay all cards on the table. And if you’re not against us, that means Santiago is the one making moves.”
“He was hoping you two would take each other out,” I say.
“He did seem annoyed that we had this meeting scheduled,” Lucian says to Raleigh. “He didn’t expect us to talk,just to fight.”
“Fighting isn’t really our thing. We take in lost vampires, the ones abandoned by their masters who need help navigating through the change. Sure, we like to dabble in some…illicit things to survive, but the big bad mafia lifestyle—nah. No thanks.”
A vampire orphanage, of sorts. It’s kind of…sweet.
