Barely past thirty, Nick’s mom was a tiny woman. Dressed in the black Sanctuary staff t-shirt and jeans, she had her long blond hair pulled back into a ponytail. Frowning, she glanced around the sparse Tuesday evening crowd. “Actually, he’s not here, sug.” She pulled her phone from her apron pocket to check for messages. “He hasn’t called either, which isn’t like him. What time did he say he’d be here?”
“Seven.”
Cherise screwed her face up. “It’s not like him to be late. Never mind a whole fifteen minutes. Especially not with you. Weird. And I know he’s not over at Michael’s tonight. Him and Mark are gearing up for another go at their zombie survival apocalypse stew, and Nick’s terrified they’ll make him taste it for them. He should have gotten off work two hours ago—Kyrian normally calls me if Nick’s ever held up for any reason. So I know he didn’t run my boy late.” She dialed the phone and held it up to her ear.
Kody didn’t say anything as she checked her own phone. There were no missed calls or messages from him.
Yeah, definitely not like her Cajun OCD Malachai who was maniacal about checking in with them.
“Hey, Boo. Where are you?” Cherise listened for a few minutes. “Yeah, well, Kody’s here at Sanctuary. Said you’re supposed to be meeting her?” She listened again before she finally sighed. “Okay. I’ll tell her, but you need to make sure you stay on top of your promises. I raised you better than that, Nick. You don’t keep a lady waiting. That’s all kinds of wrong and you know it. You tell someone you’re going to meet them, you’re there on time. You hear me … ? All right. Love you, Boo. See you later.”
Hanging up, she slid the phone in her pocket and offered Kody a sympathetic scowl. “I’m so sorry, Kody. Nick’s off with Madaug. Said he forgot all about it. I don’t know what’s gotten into that boy lately.”
Kody screwed her face up as she considered it herself. “He has been a little distracted the last couple of days.”
Cherise’s frown deepened. “Are you two crossed up?”
“No, ma’am.” They hadn’t even so much as passed an irritable snark at each other.
“Is he having trouble at school?”
No more than his normal run-ins with Stone and Mason. But everyone had trouble getting along with them. Even they got crossed up with themselves at times. “Not really.”
“Fighting with Caleb, then?”
Kody shook her head. No one fought with Caleb as he tended to disembowel whatever annoyed him.
“Well, I can’t figure it. But something’s been weird. I know my boy and he ain’t been the same since they questioned him about his friends.” She swallowed hard. “Maybe that’s it. Maybe their deaths hit him harder than I thought. I wonder if he needs to speak to someone about it?”
Yeah, that wouldn’t go over well. Nick wasn’t into sharing his more tender emotions with his closest friends, never mind a stranger. She’d never seen anyone more nimble at dodging questions … except Caleb and Acheron. Only they could make Nick look like an open book. “I don’t really think that’s it, either, Mrs. Gautier. Pretty sure Nick would run for a door if you tried.”
“I guess,” she whispered under her breath. “It’s like he’s somebody else. Some days, I swear I feel like there’s a stranger living in my little Nicky’s body. Like a pod-person took him over and is staring at me as if he’s never seen me before. I caught him the other day, at the door, with the weirdest look on his face … like he couldn’t remember where his room was. Must be a teen boy, puberty-thing. He even forgot the words to his prayers at Mass. I can’t remember the last time he did that.” She patted Kody on the back and smiled. “Oh well. Let’s not dwell on bad things. You sit right there and I’ll bring you some of Mama Lo’s famous bread pudding and an Oreo shake. That’ll put a smile on your face and a hug in your belly.”
Kody smiled at Cherise as she hurried off toward the kitchen.
And as she saw her disappearing through the door, a memory hit her hard. One that had been buried way deep inside her … or rather a memory someone had restricted from her so much that she’d all but forgotten it.
Yet now with a burning clarity, she saw this restaurant and bar, not as it was today, but centuries in the future. Very similar and yetverydifferent.
For one thing, Nicolette Peltier no longer owned it.
Her daughter Aimee did. Along with a Were-Hunter wolf named Fang Kattalakis who’d married Aimee after he and his brothers had moved their wolf pack to New Orleans.
At the same time Valerius Magnus had been assigned to town as a Dark-Hunter …
Dazed, Kody glanced around as her vision went in and out of the present and future. She saw the Were-Hunters who were currently in the crowded bar … The Howlers—the house band, only they were a bit older. The Peltier bear family who owned it now and who sat on the Omegrion Council that ruled over Werekind, only they had merged with other fey and preternatural creatures, to make a new family and home.
Dev, the huge muscled bouncer at the door would one day marry a Dark-Huntress named Sam—an Amazon warrior.
Max, the quiet dragon who lived in the attic upstairs, would be joined by his dragonswan and their children … His brothers would leave Morgen’s fey Circle where they currently resided behind the Veil and move in here, as well.
Somanychanges to come.
It staggered her mind. The former pirate, Rafael Santiago, would spend time here …
Simon and Kassim. Even the Dark-Hunter Kit would become friends with the quiet Were-Hunter tiger named Wren, and both would fight to save the Devereaux sisters from the demons out to slay them.
And not all that far in the future. It would all start when Julian and Grace reunited with Kyrian.
