“Well then,Alistair,” Hearing my name come out of his mouth was like acid being poured directly into my ears. It was wrong and twisted and sinister. Sure, he’d delivered it with a bit of a bite, but I felt like I needed a bath just hearing it from him. “You should know that my wife and I don’t endorse any of the horrible things that my siblings have decided to do with their lives.” He tilted his head. “We all have houses with dark corners.” Lafayette’s glare narrowed, his pupils looking more like the slits of a snake than human. I don’t know how, but in that moment, I realized suddenly that he absolutely knew about my mother. I couldn’t explain it, but I just knew. This man knew my past. “Don’t we?”
I tensed. He’d hit the nerve that I didn’t allow anyone to strike. Thankfully, Van stepped up. Whether or not it was because he knew this was leading nowhere good or he was just that good at reading me, I’d never know. “Alistair, you have that meeting in five.”
There was no meeting, but I was washed with a sense of relief that Van had saved me with a perfectly poised excuse. I erased whatever animosity from my face and plastered on the fake mask I’d grown accustomed to keeping whenever I was in the presence of people I didn’t want to be anywhere near.
“That’s right.” I said to Van before looking back at Veronica for the first time. “My apologies. Well, thanks again for coming to the show, and I hope you enjoy the future ones as much as you did tonight.”
“Oh for sure!” Veronica pipped up, any indication that her husband and I had had a very intense standoff long forgotten. “Thank you again for making the time. Your music is incredible and after the show tonight, it’s easy to see why your the hottest name being talked about in music. Congrats on everything and I’ll see you when you stop by The Gab!”
I thanked Veronica by giving her a quick hug that she hadn’t been expecting, the adorable sound of her little yelp as she hugged me back making me want to smile. But that was hard to do when her husband was still here.
After coming out of the embrace, I stuck out my hand to him, wanting to regain the power between us. I didn’t want him to think he’d gotten the best of me. He stared down at my outstretched hand before resting his eyes back on mine yet again.
“Thanks for stopping by, Mr. Rhodes.”
Smirking, Lafayette grabbed my hand and squeezed it just a little too tight before shaking it appropriately. “Mr. Rhodes is my father.” He gave me a wink. A fucking wink that made my very spine tingle with fear. “Lafayette is just fine.”
His mimicry of my words caused me to break the physical contact more abruptly than I would have under normal circumstances. I was rattled, but I tried to not let it show as Lafayette and Veronica took their leave, waving goodbye like the pair of Stepford robots they looked like. Once they reached a certain point, a security person with the crew began to direct them elsewhere down the hall, finally out of view.
“Are you okay?” Van asked me, stepping closer to me even as I kept staring into the void of where the Rhodes’ had just been.
“I’m fine.” I shook my head, closing my eyes so that I could cleanse the hold they were having on me. When I looked back up at Van, I smiled. His expression told me that he didn’t believe me in the slightest. “Thank you for jumping in. I appreciate the lie.”
“I was worried you were going to deck the asshole.” Van scoffed, chuckling. “I was just trying to avoid having to tackle the man.”
“There’s something wrong with him.” I admitted, feeling safe enough to say as such. “I don’t know what it is, but there’s something seriously wrong with Lafayette Rhodes.”
Chapter 19
Thanksto the early hour of the morning, I decided to focus on the fact that I could see my breath to deviate from the fact that I was up at this ungodly time.
I’d just finished my second Nashville show the night before, and now I was due in Pennsylvania for my first of three shows tomorrow night. Because of the hysteria with wrapping up our last show in Nashville and the whole weirdness with Lafayette and Veronica, I hadn’t managed to have my talk with Van about whatever it was he was so intent on sharing with me. He’d been great about it though, not even bothering to bring it up. I wanted to make a point of making the conversation finally happen, especially since we were about to have plenty of time to talk during our flight.
Van and I had ridden in the rideshare he’d ordered for us, after he’d shown up like a white knight in navy with two vanilla iced coffees for me. His own almond milk latte wafted in the air as we both got out of the car once arriving at our destination, taking the time to gather our things as we walked closer to the private airfield. Van walked by my side, carrying my two bags while I hoisted the carrier with Fawcett and Thiessen inside higher up on my shoulder to keep it from slipping. They bothmeowed in annoyance whenever the bag shifted, and this time was no exception.
“I really thought you were joking this morning when you said you’d be bringing your cats.” Van snickered, taking a small sip of his latte.
“I never kid when it comes to my girls.” I said easily, lightly patting the side of the cat carrier. “They go where I go.”
“No, I admire it.” He said as we kept making our way toward where the private plane was waiting for us. “I think it’s really great of you to bring them along for the ride.”
My mouth opened to respond, but stayed open once I saw a figure walk from in front of the plane, giving us a clear view of himself. I knew he had to be the pilot, based on what Priyanka had told me before, but what I hadn’t been expecting was the pilot to be an Orb.
He was fairly tall, taller than me for sure. He had flawless, medium brown skin that was honestly a marvel to behold. Not a single blemish or mishap was readable on his skin, and I was as envious as I was impressed. His ears were pointed and large, making him very obviously not human. Also on the list of things that definitely made him different from a human was the fact that he had slitted eyes the color of honey. The most human thing about him was the long dark brown hair that fell from his skull in slight waves. I had some serious hair envy all of the sudden.
The Orb flicked what looked like a cigarette down on the ground as we approached, snubbing it out on the concrete with the tip of his shiny loafers. He was dressed similarly to Van in the sense that he was wearing a beige suit that looked to be perfectly pressed. His navy tie was neatly tucked into his suit, contrasting Van’s suit wonderfully as we stopped in front of the pilot.
A weird sense of awkwardness fell into the air, and I looked at Van on instinct. His eyes were wide in shock, like he hadn’t been expecting for our pilot to be an Orb and he was caught off guard. I mean, I hadn’t exactly thought that our pilot would be an Orb either, but I certainly wasn’t that rattled by it. So why did it look like Van had seen a ghost all of the sudden?
“Ahh, you must be Alistair Finn.” The Orb said, wiping his hands over the side of his slacks before presenting me his hand. His fingers extended a little further than a human’s, and his nails ended in sharp points and were painted the same shade of blue as his tie. “Nice to meet you. I’m Xoah.”
Xoah’s smile was wide and showy, allowing us to see that he had enlarged incisors on both the top and bottom rows of teeth. I was pretty sure that Xoah was lycanthe, which I’d learned was the second most populated species of Orb in the world. The only thing I really knew about them was that a lot of people thought they were fairly similar to sangamar, the Orbs that were blind by nature unless they consumed human blood, but lycanthe didn’t need any of that. I was sure there was something concrete that set them apart, but I hadn’t heard of what it was specifically. To me, Xoah just seemed like a handsome Orb that was fairly confident.
Van, however, looked like he was trying to come up with an excuse to bolt. I didn’t understand why he was looking so ashen. He’d been pretty vocal about liking how much I supported Orbs and Orb related causes in the past, so I knew he wasn’t prejudice. I just couldn’t understand what I was witnessing from him.
“Hi, Xoah.” I finally said, shaking his hand firmly. His grip was way stronger than mine and honestly, it was obvious that Xoah was strong as fuck. When we pulled our hands apart, I stifled the urge to flick the feeling back into my hand. “I’m Alistair, and this is Van.”
“Van.” Xoah purred, letting his eyes saunter from me to the taller man to my right, who was still wearing a panicked look that didn’t seem like it was leaving anytime soon. “And Van is your—”
