Page 110 of Black to Light

Nick winced, but didn’t answer me.

“Why?” I asked. “Why would you think that, Nick?”

“Yeah, why?” Black growled, staring between both of us.

“It might be a coincidence,” Nick muttered.

“Whatmight be a coincidence?” Black growled.

I gave my husband a faint warning look, and he bit his tongue. His eyes never lost that intense, frustrated look, and he didn’t look away from Nick’s face. Both things told me I wouldn’t have much time to talk to Nick before Black started pushing him a lot harder.

“Nick,” I said. “Have you seen Brick recently?”

There was a silence.

Then, after darting me a look that could have cut glass, Nick nodded. “Yes.”

“What. The. Fuck––” Black growled.

“Quentin,” I warned. I looked back at Nick. “Where? When?”

“Here. San Francisco,” Nick said. “On the wharf. Four nights ago.”

Everyone in the office fell silent. I saw Ace and Mika exchange looks, eyebrows rising. Everyone in Black’s company, at least of those of us who worked here, in San Francisco, knew about the truce with Brick. Brick promised not only Black, but Nick also, that he would stay away from all of us if we stayed away from him.

Both sides had explicitly agreed upon a sort of “truce of mutual non-interference” between seers and vampires. A big part of that truce had been Brick’s promise that he would stay away from Nick. That truce had been in place for almost two years, ever since we did that job in New York, and as far as I knew, it hadn’t been broken.

Not until now.

“What did he want?” I asked Nick. “Did he tell you?”

Nick let out a humorless laugh. He rubbed his face with a hand, leaning against a metal strut in the glass wall. “Not exactly,” he muttered. “No.”

“What did he say?” Mika asked.

She was leaned against the same bookshelf and cabinet as I was, her arms folded.

Nick looked at her, and a bloom of scarlet now showed in his eyes. I knew it wasn’t aimed at us, that the aggression there was very likely aimed at Brick, and the situation, and his overall worry about Jem.

I felt Mika tense, anyway.

“He said he wanted to say hi,” Nick said, angry sarcasm bleeding from his words. “He also said he was here, in San Francisco, on some kind of job.”

“What kind of job?” Black growled.

Nick swiveled his gaze to Black. “He didn’t say.”

“Did you follow him?” I asked, my voice still calm.

Nick shook his head, and rubbed his face again. “No.”

The silence grew a lot more tense.

“What the fuck else did he say?” Black blurted. “Are you seriously saying he walked up, said hi, I’m here for a job, what’s up, bro… then left?”

Nick exhaled. I knew it was all for show; Nick didn’t breathe anymore.

“Basically, yeah,” Nick growled back. “He managed to work in a few insults, and a few shitty comments about Jem. He stared at me a lot. He refused to answer my questions. He refused to acknowledge his even being there was a breach of the truce––”

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