Page 3 of The Dancer and the Dark
Chloe woke a little before noon and her knee was already hurting. She lay in bed, slowly going through gentle stretches to loosen the joint as her cat wound around her, yowling and trying to force her to the food bowl.
“Stop it, drama king.” She nudged the black shorthair away and sat up in the massive king-sized bed in her room. The windows were shaded, but she could see midday light pouring through them.
Chloe leaned against the headboard and closed her eyes, still moving her knee in gentle motions. She reached for the phone on her bedside table and tapped a few buttons to put on her morning playlist. Immediately Nina Simone poured through the speakers in her room.
She drank from the bottle of water on her bedside and mentally ran through her day. She was due at Ben and Tenzin’s place at one, work for about five hours, then back home for a light dinner before she headed to the theater for the show.
She was performing at Lincoln Center with the dance company she’d joined on a semiregular basis two years before. She wasn’t the star of the company, but she was a regular member for the season and she was loving it. The show at Lincoln Center would run for three more performances, and then they’d have a monthlong break.
While some of her fellow dancers were doing passion projects on their hiatus, Chloe was taking it easy and giving her body a rest.
She got out of bed, her knee barely a twinge, and walked to the luxurious bathroom Gavin had surprised her with the year before. She’d been out of the country with Ben and Tenzin, so he’d had her bathroom remodeled and it was glorious.
That was, it was glorious until she flipped on the lights and saw her reflection in the mirror.
Leaning forward, she blinked her puffy eyes. “Stop talking with your vampire boyfriend until three in the morning, Chloe.”
She kept her bonnet on as she warmed up the water to wash her face. Her skin felt dry, so she smoothed some lotion over her body, then rinsed her face, pressing the warm washcloth to her swollen eyes.
It wasn’t just the late nights—she was used to those—it was spring in New York and her allergies were going overtime. Gavin had put air purifiers all over the house, had the filters changed to HEPA certified, and made the penthouse as hypoallergenic as possible, but there was only so much a wind vampire could control.
Pollen happened.
Allergies only emphasized the fine lines that were growing around her eyes. She leaned closer, examining them.
“You’re turning thirty,” she told her exhausted reflection.
And by all human metrics, her skin looked amazing, even during allergy season. She’d never suffered much from acne or other teenage skin conditions. Her mother still looked like she was in her late forties or early fifties, though she was pushing seventy, and as much as she disliked the woman who’d given birth to her, Chloe had to admit she looked like her twin.
But Chloe wasn’t comparing herself to humans—she was comparing herself to immortal beings who didn’t age.
You’re turning thirty.
And she still looked far younger than Gavin, whose human life had been much harder than hers. He didn’t talk much about it, but people in the 1870s just aged differently than your average twenty-first-century American.
Her phone started buzzing at her while she had a mask on her face. She tapped the button and put it on speaker. “Hello, Audra.”
“Morning. Any changes in the schedule from yesterday?”
Audra was her personal security guard, and Chloe was grateful for her. While she’d struggled at first to understand who would want to harm a very nonthreatening human, she understood that to Gavin’s rivals, she was considered a weakness. He’d made it clear that leaving her unguarded was leaving himself open to manipulation.
Chloe was determined that no one would use her to get to Gavin, so Audra stayed.
She dunked a washcloth in the warm water. “Same schedule as last night. Gavin’s home tomorrow evening?”
“That’s the plan unless his meeting with MHC veers off track.”
Chloe smiled. She’d never met Gavin’s mentor, Marie-Hélène, but most of his employees who knew her spoke of the eccentric vampire from New Orleans with obvious affection. Gavin and Chloe kept making plans to go down to New Orleans so Chloe could meet the woman, but something always seemed to interrupt them.
“We really need to get down to New Orleans for a trip,” Chloe mused. “We keep saying that.”
“We do, and something always comes up,” Audra said. “Usually involving your employers.”
“I’m assuming you don’t mean Phillip.”
“Your dance director isn’t nearly as unpredictable as Ben and Tenzin.”
Chloe smiled and wiped the mask off her face, revealing glowing brown skin. She dotted on some serum and patted it in. “I know they’re problem children, but I love them anyway.”
