Okay. So probably not going to learn much from Dani.
I study the people around me, but I don’t see anyone who stands out, which means either The Witch isn’t there or, more likely, I’m not actually good at reading people. She could be anyone—the older woman down the bar with ribbons woven through a pile of graying braids, the bartender handing off yet another viciously pink cocktail as his mouth smiles and his dead eyes don’t. Even Dani, although I have a hard time imagining a criminal as cold and calculating as The Witch doingthatwith her tongue to a piece of meat while making eyes at a pig-shifting medical examiner.
She smacks her lips after a particularly aggressive tongue swipe and then thrusts what’s left of the meat-on-a-stick into my hand. “Hold this,” she says. “I gotta hit the bathroom.” Tossing her blond mane, she turns and squeezes her way through the crowd to a bathroom that I can only assume is as brown and sad as the rest of this place.
I do not “hold this,” but rather set it down on top of my abandoned cocktail. Then I head over to where Grayson stands, his eyes dancing as he watches me walk up.
“I didn’t expect you to be here tonight,” I say.
“Well, Wayne did say beer was a good way to make weight, right?” he says, waggling the bottle in his hands. “Plus, I didn’t like the idea of you out hunting on your own.”
“I can handle it.”
“Last night you took down a middle-aged mom of three and got peed on. I’m staying.”
“Touché.” The people beside us move a little, leaving me enough space to lean back against the bar next to him. “I don’t know if you saw Dani torturing that meat lollipop to death, but she was doing it for your benefit.”
“Was she? Kind of felt like a threat.”
“I think it was more of a come-on.”
“In that case, it was a terrifying one.” He lifts his bottle to his lips and shudders as he takes a sip.
“It has to be flattering to have an attractive woman suck meat in your general direction.”
He bends his head to speak directly into my ear. “She’s not exactly my type.”
Warmth washes over me that has nothing to do with the close-packed bar. I’d like nothing better than to revel in what I’m almost positive is Grayson flirting with me, but I can’t. The Witch is out there, and we have no idea who she is or what she’s planning. I can’t be distracted by a pig shifter, no matter how sexy he is or how his breath is tickling my earlobe even now.
I pull back a little. “Sir, you’re used to looking at dead women. I don’t know that I trust your judgment when it comes to how pretty a woman is.”
“Hey, I’ve dated some very attractive women, I’ll have you know. In fact, you know one—Cressida Caine? She’s your boss, right?”
I almost wish I still had my Pig’s Tail so I could do a spit-take with it. That’s how shocking this revelation is. Cressidadated someone? Like, an actual human(ish) man? She doesn’t feel very…warm. “You dated Cressida?”
“Yeah.” He settles back against the bar, his face growing distant. “We dated for a while, actually. Almost a year. I think we both thought…” He picks at the label on his beer. “Well, I think we both thought we’d found The One.”
Oh.
So he hadn’t just dated Cressida.
He’d been in love with Cressida. Thought about marrying Cressida.
“What happened?” I ask even though I know I have no right to know.
“She was obsessed with catching The Witch. It was all she could focus on, and it just ate up her energy. She just didn’t have anything left to give to a relationship, and eventually I got tired of being the only one putting in the work.” He gnaws on his lip for a moment, then shakes his head like he’s dismissing the memories. “Okay, enough about old relationships—if you were going to use a meat lollipop to get a man’s attention here, who would it be?” he asks, looking around at the various pig show participants packed into the small bar.
This feels like a trick question.
I turn so I’m facing him and look up into those blue, blue eyes. “One thing I’ve learned this week is that I will never put a pork lollipop in my mouth again.”
Grayson makes a strangled sound and then takes another sip of beer to cover it up. “Noted,” he says, coughing a little. But his eyes sparkle in the wash of fluorescent lighting and he moves ever so slightly closer to me.
I’m surprised at how comfortable it feels just to stand next to him. If I let myself, I might even be able to forget about what’s coming tomorrow.
“You’re going to catch her, you know,” he says after a moment of silence.
“I sure hope so. Because the alternative…” I look away, not wanting to think too hard about everything that’s at risk.
