Page 119 of The Rogue's Curse

At that, she smiled faintly. “I understand. They’ve got it coming.”

He kissed her forehead and said, “I’ll be outside if anything goes wrong.”

They took several cars along different routes to reach Le Cirque, the empty club near the stadium downtown. Its landscaping was overgrown, the cracked parking lot empty months after the Auberon raid shut it down.

Misha stayed quiet as Paris drove, though the scent rolling off him was strange and smoky. When they were a few blocks away, Paris nudged him and asked, “How close do you need to be?”

“The closer the better,” Misha said.

“Can I stay a few blocks away?”

“Sure,” Misha said.

He found a parking spot two blocks away, near the building where he’d acted as lookout in their previous raid. After pointing out the direction of the club, he settled back to watch Misha work. The other man drew a bloodstone from his pocket. When he held it up, a spark ignited inside, filling the car with the distasteful scent of Lilah’s blood.

A sick feeling roiled in his belly, and Paris felt a sharp ache sweep up his left arm. Sweat dripped from Misha’s brow, and his right arm trembled violently as he held up the glowing bloodstone.He was no magician, but he felt it. Something was terribly wrong. He grabbed Misha’s left hand and squeezed it tight. “I’m here,” he said. “I don’t know what’s happening, but I’m here.”

What the hell was he thinking, as if his touch was magic? He was just—

Misha relaxed, and that roiling tension eased. His eyes opened, and Paris was startled by the sight of swirling streaks of black in his pretty eyes. That eerie black swelled and contracted, as if it was fighting to break through. “Lilah is there. Shea isn’t,” he said, his voice weak.

Paris immediately hit his watch. “Nikko, you can move in. No Shea.”

“I’m on it,” Nikko said.

“You can go in,” Misha said. “I’ll be fine.”

He shook his head. “We’re catching runners. We get to wait for once.”

Misha closed his eyes and leaned his head back. Paris fumbled around in the bag and handed him the small glass vial, which he downed. The sharp smell of it was unpleasant, but it was a relief to know that the magic wouldn’t burn him out.

“Misha, be honest with me. Are you going to be okay?” Paris asked. “I can feel that you’re unsettled.”

“I’ll be fine,” he said. “I’ll certainly be glad when Shoshanna breaks the curse, but I can get us through the mission. You’ll get the kill on Shea if it kills me.”

“Don’t say that,” Paris said sharply. “Jesus, don’t say that.”

“We’re going in,” Nikko said.

Paris sat up straight, watching from down the block as Nikko’s car rumbled around the corner. It stopped in front of Le Cirque, and he got out before offering his hand to Danielle. He watched instinctively for red dots, fearing that Lilah would take quick revenge and blow his head off before he got in the door. They were banking on Lilah wanting to torture Nikko for thwarting all her villainy, but there was no telling what she might do.

But no shot came. Holding Danielle’s hand tightly, Nikko sauntered across the cracked parking lot to the front door of Le Cirque, where a brawny bearded man stepped out of the door.

Kieran.

“Welcome back, Mr. Durand,” Kieran said. “And so kind of you to bring a guest. Come in. She’s waiting.”

24

DANIELLE

Agreeing to join the fight with her sister’s boyfriend was one thing when it was a theoretical plan and she was still flying high on her first belly full of human blood. It was another entirely when they walked hand-in-hand up to Le Cirque, the garish backdrop for so many of her nightmares.

Kieran O’Brien stepped out of the door, and his eyes scraped over her appreciatively. Did he know? Or would Misha’s stinky little potion trick him?

“Welcome, Olivia,” he said in that rough brogue. “So nice of you to join us for a civilized party. It’ll be just like old times.”

Fear and fury churned her belly into a lava pit. The last time she’d been here was practically a hole in her memory. She only remembered seeing Olivia, limp and pale with blood oozing from her torn throat, and a vague sense that things were very bad.

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