“You had sex with Holden?” Brigit squealed. “Gosh he’s pretty. But such a grumpuss.” She mocked Holden’s signature scowl, and I had to hold back a chuckle. I didn’t think Calliope would appreciate me laughing right then. She didn’t tend to have the best sense of humor when it came to things she considered to be of grave importance.
Come to think of it, the Oracle didn’t have a sense of humor about most things. I guess that was the price one paid for being able to see into the future.
“I’m glad you two are finding this so humorous,” Calliope said.
“I didn’t even laugh.”
“Secret, this is important.”
“I know this is a serious situation. Believe me, I’m well aware.”
“Are you? Because if you really were, I don’t see how you’d be taking a break to let a vampire stick his dick in you when you should be saving your friend.”
The words hit me more sharply than a slap in the face. When I didn’t reply to her verbal assault, Calliope got off the bed and started pacing the floor.
“I don’t know if you’ll be able to help her now,” Calliope said.
“If your brother thinks he’s tapped into some great secret by exposing my less-than-stellar judgment when it comes to having sex with the wrong men, then he’s sorely mistaken. I was getting into and out of shitloads of trouble before I started having sex with werewolves and vampires.”
“That isn’t the point.”
“It is the point, though, isn’t it? You’re saying Aubrey’s power lies in discovering and exploiting the desires of those he encounters and turning those desires against them, right?”
“Which he did.”
“No. Cal, I went to Holden’s apartment less than a week ago to have sex with him, and even though it didn’t happen, it could have. There was nothing there, no supernatural force motivating me to do it. And maybe I shouldn’t have had sex with him, and maybe I let my vagina do all the thinking yet again, but Aubrey can’t use this against me.”
“You shouldn’t be so sure.”
“If he tries to claim he’s exposed my greatest weakness by giving me an excuse to have sex, that’s like saying you’ve exposed a coffee lover’s greatest weakness by leading them into a Starbucks. It’s bullshit. With or without Aubrey’s sinister machinations, Holden and I would have eventually had sex. Sure, in retrospect I would have preferred we’d done it in a different time and place, when my other boyfriend wasn’t right outside the door…” a pang of guilt stabbed me in the guts, “…but it is what it is. And if Aubrey thinks that’s going to give him power over me, then—”
I stopped talking because my mouth had been moving faster than my brain, and we got to the conclusion at the same time. If Aubrey thought he was in the power seat because of this, he was about to find out he didn’t know me as well as he thought he did.
“If he thinks it gives him power, then what?” Calliope asked, apparently interested in the look I must have on my face from the moment of epiphany.
“Then maybe it gives me the upper hand.”
“Ohhhh,” Brigit said. “The sounds good. Doesn’t that sound good?” The latter question was directed at Calliope.
“It sounds like two foolish girls who have no idea how much trouble the fae can be.”
But she didn’t argue, and she didn’t shoot the idea down immediately.
“Admit it,” I pressed on. “If he thinks he’s already found my weakness, he’ll stop looking for another one. Once you find the fatal flaw in a Shakespearean tragic hero, you don’t go on hoping he’ll have more. Aubrey thinks he’s figured me out.”
“Don’t be so sure he hasn’t.”
“What’s a fatal flaw?” Brigit asked.
“In Shakespeare it’s the fault in a character that leads to their inevitable downfall,” Calliope said before I could answer. “Pride, jealousy…the most basic human emotions, all amplified until they take over the character’s whole life.”
“And what’s Secret’s fatal flaw?” She playfully jabbed me with her elbow. “Lust?”
“No.” Calliope looked down at me, and her face was frighteningly serious. “Secret’s fatal flaw is that the only thing keeping her good is her desire to be human.”
I stared at her, my pulse hammering while I digested the words.
“And last night…she let her humanity slip.”
Chapter Thirty-Three
I woke up absolutely sure I was going to vomit.
As a Tribunal leader, there had to be a way I could start keeping people out of my head. They were my underlings, weren’t they? Since when did underlings get to call the shots? The problem was, the way Holden had explained the connections to me, the more powerful the vampire, the stronger the connection. So, unfortunately, my being a Tribunal leader actually made the mental bonds I shared with Holden and Brigit stronger.
I’d have to ask Sig if there was a way to shut the mind-jacking down. Having weird dreams about my loved ones soaked in blood was bad enough. I didn’t need to have conversations with my condescending fairy godmother about my sex life.
As the whirlpool in my tummy began to settle and I was convinced I wouldn’t throw up immediately upon rising, I sat up. Still topless in real life. Holden was lying next to me in the bed—though how we’d come to be in the bed I couldn’t remember—and he watched me the way Brigit had in my dream.
“Do you always wake up like that?”
I tugged the blanket up to cover my boobs. “I usually fall asleep less naked.”
“No. I meant do you always wake up like you’re coming out of a nightmare?”
“Oh. That.”
“Yeah, that. I’ve seen agitated cephalopod thrash around less than you did waking up.”
“A what now?”
“An angry octopus.”
“Did you just compare me to a fish?”
“Technically, a moll—”
“No technically, professor.”
“Sorry.”
I pulled the blanket closer to me, stealing it away from him entirely. This had the unfortunate—or very fortunate, depending on how you looked at it—side effect of exposing his fully naked body to me. Even though he wasn’t in a state of arousal, his body was still incredible. I had to avert my eyes before I lost track of what was going on.
“Why is it you never sound sorry when you apologize to me?”
“Probably because I’m rarely actually sorry.”
My reply was cut short by a snarling outside the door and a confused human-sounding voice. Someone had tried to enter the foyer, and wolf-Desmond was apparently in the process of trying to dismember them.
I jumped off the bed and pulled my pants on without bothering to find my underwear. Likewise I tugged my shirt back on braless. I had a pretty small chest, so I wouldn’t look too floppy if I let the girls free for a minute or two. Once I’d saved some poor fae messenger’s life, then I could worry about undergarments.
I’d put my gun and sword on a small table next to the door when Desmond and Holden had decided to make me wait in here, and I was grateful now to have them within reach. Had they been out in the foyer, I’d have had to vault over an angry werewolf to get at my gun, and frankly that didn’t sound like too much fun first thing after waking up.
I didn’t want to shoot Desmond, but I knew how to wound without killing, and if it came down to it, I’d do what I needed. At least that’s what I told myself as I clicked off the safety and chambered a round. The gun might have been ready to shoot, but I wasn’t so sure I was. I opened the door and slipped into the foyer noiselessly, not announcing my presence until the door shut with a click behind me.
Desmond had backed a thin, tall man into a corner. The fae male was quivering like a leaf, and his fear would only egg the angry werewolf on.
“You’re getting him riled up,” I said. “Try to calm down.”
Desmond’s head whipped around, his typically violet-gray eyes more lupine than human now. I didn’t know how much of him was in there, or if any of the man remained. Once he shifted back he’d be himself again, but I couldn’t count on the inherent goodness of Desmond’s human half to help me out here. I had to treat him like a monster, not my boyfriend.
“E-e-easy for you to say,” the fae replied.
Wolf-Desmond was staring at my gun, which I had pointed at his shoulder. With a real monster I’d have pointed it at his head, but if he made a sudden movement to attack me or the man, and my immediate reaction was to shoot, I didn’t want to kill him just because I’d been trained to.
“What’s your name?” I asked, speaking to the fae but not taking my attention off Desmond. The wolf gave a low, angry growl. I didn’t need my internal wolf to translate for me. The meaning was clear. This food is mine, back the fuck off. His ears were folded tight against his head, and he was showing a lot of fang. Considering how much bigger in human form Desmond was than me—standing almost a foot over me—his wolf must have outweighed me by a hundred pounds.
“What’s your name?” I repeated.
“Zuzu,” he managed to spit out. “P-pl-please help me.”
I was skirting the edge of the room now, trying to get closer without Desmond realizing what I was doing. I was also trying to figure out how anyone, in any reality, could name their kid Zuzu.
“I’m going to help you, Zuzu.”
“Please.”
“I will, but I can’t just say here, wolfy wolfy, good doggy, ya know? He’s not that well trained.”
In response, the wolf snarled at me.
“I thought he was yours.”
“He is.” I glared defiantly at Desmond. “But sometimes he doesn’t recognize my authority.”
The wolf gave a sneer, curling one lip higher to expose more fang.
