Twice Cursed (33 page)

The welcoming feel of coming home
after a hard day seemed to dissipate along with her hunger. She
stood speechless, chiding herself that she should have seen this
coming a mile away. Sean wasn’t exactly happy with her involvement
in this case on any level, and now that the stakes were high, he
voiced his disapproval at every turn—but for him to exclude her
altogether? She took the plate from his hand and put it down on the
table without as much as a sniff.

His back was still to her as she stood
waiting for an explanation, but as neither wolf elaborated, she
crossed her arms in front of her chest and issued a loud, rough
sigh. “When did I get vetoed out of this investigation? I thought
we were handling this as a team, and the plan was to leave around
midnight when the council would be in full swing.”

Sean turned around, the resolute set
of his jaw evidence that he was primed and ready for a litany of
questions. “You haven’t been vetoed out of anything. It’s just
better this way.”

The phone rang, but Lily barely gave
the handset on the kitchen desk a cursory glance, letting the
answering machine grab it while she tried to keep a handle on her
rising frustration. A telltale click followed by an empty dial tone
told her whoever it was had hung up.

“
Why? I don’t understand.
What happened? What’s changed?”

Sean didn’t answer. Not knowing what
to say and not wanting to overreact, she sat at the table and
absently watched Jack busy himself with his own plate. The boy’s
appetite hadn’t let up at all, and she stared as he stacked three
slices one on top of the other and took a bite. The clock above the
sink read seven-thirty. It had been only a matter of hours since
she had left Sean and Jack outside Bellevue to go and look for
Ryan. One by one, she replayed the day’s events, looking for
anything that might have led to this change in plan.
Nothing.

She had done everything Sean
asked—from sifting through the residual psychic images retained by
the badlands Were, to requesting the latest case pathology.
According to the coroner’s report, bite marks on the victim’s hands
and forearms, as well as tissue scrapings from under his
fingernails, pointed to the attack being a random hit. The
unfortunate Were had obviously fought for his life.

Inconclusive lab results couldn’t
provide a positive DNA identification on the attacker—no surprise
there, since the perpetrator was a vampire, and what little blood
remained in the victim had degraded to such an extent, it didn’t
lend itself to anything decisive, either. In fact, the only
definite thing the human lab had provided was the time of
death.

A dozen reasons played through her
mind why Sean would intentionally discount her, but she dismissed
each one.

Sean took his own plate and sat down
across from her. “You’re not eating,” he said, folding his own
slice in half and talking a bite.

“
I’m not
hungry.”

As he chewed, the weight of his eyes
watched her tear little bits from her paper napkin and curl them
between her fingers. Lily still didn’t say a word, instead
collected her shreds and piled them in front of her on the table,
even as she collected her thoughts.

“
Sausage pizza is one of
your favorites. Are you really not hungry, or just boycotting to
try and punish me?” he asked, taking another napkin from the
decorative holder at the center of the table and wiping his
mouth.

Childish as it was, she pushed her
dish even further aside. “Like I said, I’m not hungry, and if I
wanted to punish you, I’m sure I could think of a better way to do
it than starving myself.”

Jack hoisted himself onto the counter,
munching away, an open bottle of beer between him and the pizza
box. “Ha! I’d take a piece of that bet,” he said between
chews.

Sean crumpled his napkin and threw it
down next to his plate. “This is ridiculous. I heard your stomach
growling when you came in. You’re not the sulking type, Lily, so
why now? No one is questioning how valuable you are in a tense
situation, but this is different, and Jack and I already discussed
it.”

Shoving the tiny pieces of
paper away, Lily leaned forward, her forearms pressed into the edge
of the table. “Oh, you discussed it? Didn’t anyone think it
necessary to
discuss
it with me? Like I said, Ryan is coming here in an hour or so
to talk. What am I supposed to do with him while we wait for you
two to get back from playing summit meeting with the
vampires?”

She cringed inwardly at the
possibilities. Close proximity with Ryan at this point was not a
good idea, but letting Sean in on why she didn’t want to be left
alone with him was even worse.

After all her sermonizing, Ryan was
finally willing to talk with Sean, and now they were leaving it to
her to explain why neither Were was around to meet with
him.

Gee, thanks
guys.

It’s not that Ryan wouldn’t
understand, at the end of the day he was still a homicide
detective, and this was still his case. Hell, if he knew where Sean
and Jack were headed, he might even insist on going with them. Just
the same, there was no way she was sitting home alone minding the
castle.

“
I know it’s an
inconvenience, but you’ll have to call him and reschedule.” Sean
shrugged apologetically. “If you want, tell the detective I’ll meet
with him after I meet with the vampire council.” Clearly trying to
soothe whatever feathers he’d ruffled, he reached across the table
and brushed her forearm with his knuckles. “I am sorry,
Lily.”

She squashed the urge to shove his
hand away. “No, you’re not…but I am. Sorry for a lot of
reasons.”

“
Uh oh…” Jack uttered,
scooting further down the counter away from them.

Sean pushed himself up from the table,
and stood with his hands on his hips as if weighing his next move.
With a rough breath, he walked to the fridge and grabbed a beer
from the open six-pack on the top shelf. “You’re being ridiculous,
even for you. For once can’t you just do what I ask, without
turning the request into a grand inquisition? You’re not coming. I
won’t allow it.”

He leaned against the counter and
twisted the cap off the bottle, tossing it into the sink. The
metallic plink as it hit the stainless steel like an audible
exclamation point.

Since when did they use words with
that connotation between them? “Allow?” she questioned.

Silent, Sean tilted the bottle to his
lips and swallowed a good mouthful before dragging the side of his
hand across his mouth and chin. “I don’t have time to debate this,
so you can save your daggers for later. This is Were business, and
bringing you along will only arouse things best left in
peace.”

Lily’s eyebrows creased. “You’re just
chock-full of surprising semantics tonight, aren’t you? Arouse?
That’s an odd choice of words, even for this situation. What could
I possibly do, or possibly have, that would provoke the vampire
council?”

Sean looked at her, not an ounce of
humor in his face. “Not everyone appreciates a passionate
disposition the way I do, and it’s no secret that mouth of yours
could provoke a saint to profanity, but that’s not what I mean.
You’re a smart girl, think about it for a minute.”

Lily beat back on her rising
impatience and considered him. Sean wasn’t usually cryptic,
especially not with her. Although sanctioned, this meeting
certainly wasn’t classified, so why was he being so bullheaded
about her going? What was so worrying, he couldn’t come right out
and say?

She blinked a couple of times, and
then lifted her eyes to his, her body frozen in place. No wonder he
thought she was slow on the uptake tonight. This wasn’t just a
meeting. It was a possible death sentence. Jack and Sean were
walking into the belly of the beast, and the vampires would tear
them to pieces if they so much as blinked the wrong way.

Or just because they felt
like it...

Shivering mentally, her eyes moved
from one man to the other. How could she be so stupid? So wrapped
up that she couldn’t read between the lines? They were both
prepared to die, and she would be left to carry the news back to
the compound. A cold reality crept over her shoulder and wrapped
its icy fingers around her heart, and she swallowed hard against
the unfamiliar nudge of fear tightening her throat.

Hands shaking, she curled her fingers
into her palms and got up from the table, moving around to where
Sean stood. Facing him, she tried to conceal the depth of her
realizations.

“
I understand what you’re
trying to say. I’m human, which in itself is enough of a
distraction, not to mention I have Were blood and carry your mark.
The combination probably makes me some sort of delicacy.” She
paused, watching Sean nod in agreement while surprise drifted
across his face that she didn’t press the issue and took the
obvious hook.

He put the beer bottle down on the
counter, his eyes still serious, but relieved. “I’m glad you
realize that. You would be in tremendous danger, not to mention an
unwitting liability. Jack and I alone would be no match for the
conclave of vampires we expect to face in the council’s lair,
should anything untoward happen.”

Leave it to Sean to make her safety a
priority, and downplay the risk to himself and Jack. He was right,
of course. When it came to things like this, he was always
right.

Suddenly, the last of the internal
walls she’d built against fear and loss crumbled, and a surge of
bottled up panic and dread rushed passed. She steeled herself,
closing her eyes against the horrible probabilities floating across
her mind. Terry ‘s voice echoed in the midst of it all, reminding
her, this is what life was all about—to feel love as well as pain,
or run the risk of feeling nothing at all.

If that was the case, then it was
party time.

Now more than ever, she refused to be
left waiting. Better to face real demons up front, than face the
ones she conjured in her head. Whether she wanted the title or not,
she was Sean’s alpha female, and better to fight beside him, than
be left behind to be his widow before she ever got the chance to be
his bride.

Determined, she opened her eyes.
“You’re right,” she said, knowing she had to meet them halfway, or
Sean would never agree to listen. “I get it.”

Sean didn’t say a word, just raised an
eyebrow as if waiting for the other shoe to drop.

“
Can you repeat that,
please? I don’t think I quite caught what you said,” Jack added,
his snort unconvinced.

Lily bit her tongue. “Okay, okay, I’ll
say it again. You’re right, and yes, the words taste like vinegar
in my mouth.”

“
Halleluiah! Can I get an
Amen?” Jack mocked, his hands high and spread wide. Sean lifted
Lily’s fingers to his lips, but she gently pulled her hand
back.

“
You’re both forgetting one
important thing,” she said, pausing for effect, waiting for both
men to focus on what she had to say. “I’m the one who can prove a
vampire is responsible for all the lime-lighted bloodshed, and I’m
not just talking about the Were in the morgue this afternoon. I’m
talking about all the attacks.”

“
Oh, God,” Jack moaned, his
sixth slice of pizza halfway to his mouth. “Just when you think
you’re out, they suck you back in—listen, you two can ping-pong
this back and forth all you want, but I’m done.” He tossed what was
left of his half-eaten slice into the open pizza box, and slid off
the counter. “Call me when you’re ready to roll. I’ll be in my
room.” He spoke directly to Sean, purposely ignoring Lily, before
pitching his crumpled napkin into the trash and then walking
out.

Even with Jack’s impatience weighing
on him, Lily knew Sean couldn’t ignore the truth of what she said,
but that didn’t mean he had to like it. The big wolf folded his
arms in front of his chest.

“
You’ve got it all wrong,
Lily. You think you have proof, but you honestly don’t—at least
nothing concrete, and you don’t seem to grasp the ramifications. I
have demanded a meeting with the Vampire Council of New York City,
one of the largest in the country I might add, with nothing more
than a post-mortem psychic assessment and an allegation of guilt.
Nothing in this bodes well for anyone, no matter how you look at
it.”

Lily opened her mouth to speak, but
Sean unfolded his arms and raised a hand for her to just listen. “I
know what you’re going to say, and Jack is as much a witness to
what happened in Washington Square Park, as you. He’s a full Were
and a skilled hunter. He can phase on the fly if
necessary.

“
Vampires are cruel and
devoid of emotional attachments by nature, instead they create a
semblance of courtesy and decorum through their laws and the
treaties made with the supes they refer to as
daylighters
. They do not take kindly
to unfounded accusations, so unless you want to break into the
morgue and throw what’s left of that badlands Were at their feet,
it’s best you let us handle it. ”

He let his arm fall to his side, and
he drew in a breath. “Whatever the collateral damage, we stand a
better chance of walking out of there alive without you to worry
about.”