Page 46 of No Man's Land

“You look like you need a drink,” he said, and moved to a cabinet near the room’s inner door. “Whisky?”

Protest formed on Josef’s lips—it wasn’t even midday—but he found himself too weary to argue. More than weary, mentally exhausted, and when Alex approached and offered him a glass, he took it without comment and sat down.

Alex wasn’t drinking, but he took the chair opposite Josef’s and leaned forward, elbows on knees, fingers steepled. He looked anxious. “How are you?” he said. “Were you hurt?”

“A few scratches, that’s all.” He hesitated, then added, “It didn’t bite me.”

Alex nodded. “I know. If it had…”

He didn’t finish the thought, but Josef remembered the gun on the laundry hamper in Alex’s bathroom. It hadn’t occurred to him before that Graves may have been armed during his inspection of Josef’s body.

He swallowed a mouthful of whisky, the fiery burn settling warmth in the pit of his belly, instantly relaxing.

“Who are we waiting for?” he said.

Alex looked up. “What do you mean?”

He really was handsome, with those fine aristocratic features and silky dark hair flopping over his forehead. Josef remembered the weight of it running through his fingers. He said, “You look like you’re waiting for the other shoe to drop.”

Alex surprised him with a snort of laughter. “Very observant.”

“Journalist, remember?”

Across the space between them, their eyes met, and Josef felt the same electric jolt of recognition, of connection, that he remembered from their first encounter in Pops. It made his stomach fizz.

Alex smiled, rather a sweet smile for his serious face. “Have you ever heard the expression, ‘Curiosity killed the cat’?”

“Frequently. And I say it’s a good job cats have nine lives.”

Alex’s smile broadened, warming his dark eyes. Then it fell away abruptly. “I’m afraid things are about to get a little…sticky.”

“They were very sticky out on the street.” He took another sip of whisky, washing away the taste of his terror. “How did you know? Did you hear me shouting?”

“Not exactly.” Alex tapped his fingers against his lips. Soft lips, Josef remembered. Clever fingers. “The alarm was raised by the watch.”

“Coppers?”

“Hunters. We keep watch on all avenues of approach. For security reasons.”

“Ah. ‘Security’ reasons.”

Alex shook his head. “You can’t seriously still think this has anything to do with the Intelligence Corps.”

“You can’t seriously think I believe your fairytales.”

“Why not?” Alex snapped. “Did you fail to notice the ghoul trying to eat your face? Or the fact that I decapitated it with an original Crusader sword? Does that seem, even remotely, like the work of the bloody government?”

Josef set his jaw. “I don’t dispute that something was about to eat my face, but—”

The click of an opening door had Alex jumping to his feet and standing to attention. Subadar Dutta appeared at the inner door. His cool gaze travelled over Josef and landed on Alex. Then he nodded and stepped back into the room beyond. Shoulders braced, Alex headed for the door, pausing at the last moment to give Josef a serious look before he disappeared inside, and the door closed behind him.

Josef was alone.

After a moment, he rose and ambled over to the bookshelf next to the fireplace. A small blaze flickered in the grate, pleasant on a cold November day, but the books were nothing extraordinary. Encyclopaedias, atlases, a couple of Bibles. Reference books. Nothing to hint at the secret purpose of this place.

Hunters of supernatural creatures.

Ridiculous. Every fibre of Josef’s rational mind rejected the notion. And yet the horror of the attack, of that ruined face and those awful teeth, was sharp in his mind… His chest tightened at the visceral memory, and he had to push it aside vigorously.

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