Lover Revealed (61 page)

When he looked back she was gloriously naked, the toga thing in a pool at her feet.

John felt his eyes bug out. Holy…
shit
.

"Do you approve, your grace?"

Jesus, Mary, and Joseph… Even if he'd had a voice box, he still would have been speechless.

"Your grace?"

As John started to nod, he thought, man, wait until he told Blaylock and Qhuinn about this.

Chapter Forty-five

The following evening, Marissa emerged from the basement rooms of

Safe Place

and tried to pretend that her world hadn't crashed and burned.

"Mastimon wants to talk to you," a little voice said.

Marissa turned around and saw the young with the leg cast. Forcing a smile, she crouched down and got eye to eye with the stuffed tiger. "Does he?"

"Yes. He says that you are not to be sad, because he is here to protect us. And he wants to hug you."

Marissa took the ratty toy and cradled it tight to her neck. "He is both fierce and kind."

"True. And you should keep him with you for now." The young's expression was all business. "I have to help
mahmen
prepare First Meal."

"I'll be careful of him."

With a solemn nod the young was off, pegging her half-pint crutches into the floor.

As Marissa held on to the tiger, she thought about what it had been like to pack up her few things and leave the Pit the night before. Butch had tried to talk her out of going, but the decision he'd made was in his eyes, so the words he'd spoken had made no difference.

The reality was, her love had not cured his death wish or his risk-taking personality. And as painful as the separation was, if she stayed with him, it would be worse: nothing but night after night of waiting for the call to come that he was dead. Or even more tragic, that he had turned into something evil.

Plus, the more she thought about it, the more she didn't trust him to keep safe. Not after his suicide attempt in the clinic. And the regression he'd volunteered for. And the transition he'd put himself through. And now the battling—the consuming of
lessers
. Yes, the outcomes had been positive so far, but the trend wasn't good: All she had to go on was a consistent pattern of self-abuse that she knew damn well sooner or later he was going to get seriously damaged by.

She loved him too much to watch him kill himself.

As tears came to her eyes, she wiped them away and stared into space. After a while, some kind of flickering thought, like an echo, flashed through the back of her mind. But whatever it was faded quickly.

Forcing herself to stand up, she was momentarily lost. She literally couldn't remember what she was doing or why she was in the hall. In the end, she headed for her office because there was always something waiting for her to do there.

One thing about being a former cop was you never lost your idiot radar.

Butch paused in the alley next to ZeroSum. Down the way, loitering at the club's emergency exit, was that half-pint, Euro-trash, flash-in-the-pan blond kid who'd made such a stink at the waitress last week. Next to him was one of his steakheads and the pair were lighting cigarettes.

Although why they were smoking it up out here in the cold didn't make a lot of sense.

Butch hung back and watched. Which of course gave him time to think. Which sucked, as usual. Man, anytime things got quiet, all he could see was Marissa getting into Fritz's Mercedes and that S600 disappearing through the gates.

With a curse, Butch rubbed the center of his chest and hoped like hell he found a
lesser
. He needed to fight something to take the edge off this perma—ache. Like
now
.

From off Trade Street, a car turned into the alley and came forward at a fast clip. As it flew past and stopped short at the club's side door, the black Infiniti was spinning enough chrome to qualify as a frickin' disco ball. And what do you know, Little Blond Dickhead sauntered over like this was an arranged meet-and-greet.

As the kid and the driver gum-flapped and palm-slapped, Butch couldn't tell exactly what was doing, but he was damn sure they weren't comparing cookie recipes.

When the Infiniti reversed it out, Butch stepped from the shadows, figuring there was one way of knowing if his hunch was correct: Assume and see what came back at him. "Tell me you aren't going to deal that shit inside? The Reverend hates freelancers."

The little blond guy wheeled around, all righteous pissed. "Who the fuck are—" His words dried up. "Wait, I've seen you before… except…"

"Yeah, I got my chassis overhauled. I run better now. Lot better. So what are you—" Butch froze as he felt his instincts fire up.

Lessen
. Close by. Shit.

"Boys," he said calmly. "You need to take off now. And you can't reenter through that door."

Dickhead's attitude came back online. "Who do you think you are?"

"Trust me on this and get your groove on.
Now
."

"Fuck you, we can stand out here all night if we—" The punk froze, then blanched as a sweet smell rode down to them on a breeze. "Oh, my God…"

Hmmm, so Little Blond Dickhead was a pre-trans, not human. "Yeah, like I said. Get gone, kid."

The pair took off, but they weren't fast enough: A trio of
lessers
appeared at the open end of the alley, blocking their way.

Great. Just terrific.

Butch activated his newest wristwatch, sending out a beacon and coordinates. Within moments, V and Rhage materialized by his side.

"Use the strategy we agreed on," Butch muttered. "I'll sweep up."

The two nodded their heads as the
lessers
closed in.

Rehvenge stood up from his desk and pulled on his sable coat. "Gotta bounce, Xhex.
Princeps
Council meeting. I'm dematerializing, so I don't need the car, and I hope to be back in an hour. But before I go, what's the status of that newest OD?"

"Off to the Saint Francis ER. He's probably going to live."

"And that rogue dealer?"

Xhex opened his door for him, like she was encouraging him to leave. "Still haven't found him."

Rehv cursed, reached for his cane, and headed over to her. "I am
not
happy about this sitch."

"No kidding," she muttered. "And here I thought you were down with it."

He pegged her with a hard stare. "Don't fuck around with me."

"I'm not, boss," she snapped back. "We're doing everything we can. Do you think I
like
calling nine-one-one for these fools?"

He took a deep breath and tried to chill his temper. Man, it had been a bad week at the club. Both of them were on short fuses, and the rest of the staff at ZeroSum were about to hang themselves in the bathroom from the tension.

"Sorry," he said. "I'm wound."

She ran a hand over her man's haircut. "Yeah… me, too."

"What's doing on your end?"

He didn't expect her to answer. But she did. "You hear about the human? O'Neal?"

"Yeah. One of us. Who'd've thought, huh." Rehv had yet to see the guy up close and personal, but Vishous had called with a heads-up on the miracle that had gone down.

Rehv honestly wished the cop well. He liked that big-mouthed man—er, male. But he was also very aware that his feeding days with Marissa had come to an end and so had any hope of mating her. The shit stung, it really did, even though linking up with her would have been a really bad idea.

"Is it true?" Xhex asked. "About him and Marissa?"

"Yeah, he's not a free agent."

The oddest expression filtered through Xhex's features… sadness? Yeah, looked like it.

He frowned. "I didn't know you were that into him."

Instantly, she was back to herself, eyes sharp, face showing nothing but hard-ass. "Just because I liked banging him doesn't mean I wanted him as a mate."

"Fine, sure. Whatever."

Her upper lip peeled off her fangs. "Do I look like the type who needs a male?"

"Nope, and thank God. The idea of you going soft violates the natural world order. Besides, you're the only one I can feed from, so I need you unattached." He passed by her. "I'll see you in two hours, tops."

"Rehvenge." When he glanced back, she said, "I need you to stay single, too."

Their stares locked. God, they were quite a pair, weren't they. Two liars living among Normals… two snakes in the grass.

"Don't worry," he murmured. "I'm never taking a
shellan
. Marissa was… a flavor I wanted to taste. Never would have worked out long term."

After Xhex nodded, as if they'd resealed their deal, Rehv left.

As he walked through the VIP section, he stuck to the shadows. He didn't like to be seen with his cane, and if he had to use it, he wanted people to think it was a vanity thing, so he tried not to rely on it too much. Which was a little dangerous considering his lack of balance.

He got to the side door, worked some mind magic with the alarm system, then popped the bar release. He stepped out, thinking he—

Holy Christ
! There was a frickin' melee in the alley.
Lessers
. Brothers. Two civilians crouched and quivering in the middle. And big bad Butch O'Neal.

As the door clicked shut behind Rehv, he widened his stance and wondered why the hell the security cameras hadn't—oh,
mhis
. They were surrounded by
mhis
. Nice touch.

Standing on the sideline, he watched the fight, listening to the dull thuds of bodies hitting bodies, hearing the grunts and the shifting of metal, smelling the sweat and the blood of his race mixing with the baby powder sweetness of the slayers.

Damn, he wanted to play, too. And he couldn't see why he shouldn't.

When a
lesser
stumbled his way, he caught the bastard, slammed it up against the bricks, and smiled while looking into a pair of pale eyes. It had been so long since Rehv had killed something and the flip side of him missed the experience. Craved it. Man, the snuffing out of life was something the bad in him yearned for.

And he was going to feed his beast. Right here. Right now.

In spite of the dopamine in his system, Rehv's
symphath
abilities came at his beckoning, riding the crest of his aggression, suffusing his vision with the color red. Baring his fangs in a smile, he gave in to his sinister half with the ecstatic pleasure of an addict long deprived.

With invisible hands, he tunneled into the
lesser's
brain, rooted around, and triggered all kinds of fun memories. It was like popping lids off soda bottles, and what bubbled out debilitated his prey, scrambling the
lesser
so badly it was rendered defenseless. God, such ugliness inside the bastard's head—this particular slayer had had a real sadistic streak, and as every single one of his nasty deeds and dirty abuses clouded his mind's eye, he started to scream, clapping his hands to his ears and falling to the ground.

Rehv brought up his cane and whipped off its outer casing, revealing a lethal length of steel, the blade red as his two-dimensional sight, But when he got ready to stab, Butch grabbed his arm.