Page 49 of Little Wing
I could never forget the days, weeks, and even years that followed when people pounded on the door wherever I was staying. After the crime was committed, Luca spent longer periods away from me. Yet I did not find solitude as his scent was always traced back to me, leading vampires to believe I was sheltering their enemy.
“This happened while the treaties were being debated. My brother’s stupidity truly put things at risk, until months of debate deemed him a vile exception to what vampires could be. That violence against humans would be punishable by death, and the council that had signed the treaty vowed to destroy my brother. It has been so many years since that day, but any time someone pieces the information together about who I am, I fear they will hunt me for the satisfaction of ruining someone Luca created.”
The memory of young vampires destroying whatever semblance of security I felt remained fresh in my mind. Refraining from sinking back into that nightmare took more willpower than I often had, which was why Fairhaven was home to me. No one appeared to know me, or maybe they didn’t care. I had found family in Reina and Kait. I found home in Silas, too, but I could not think of him, not yet.
Hours since I found myself at Kait’s home, my dear friend finally got up from the loveseat and closed the distance between us, takinga seat beside me before she grabbed my hand. She didn’t have to say anything because just the feel of her warmth caused my voice to crack. When my gaze lowered to my lap, my shoulders sagged and rattled as tears began to stream down my face.
I felt another pair of hands settle on my knees as my tears blinded me. Reina was kneeling on the floor with her chin resting in my lap.
“I don’t want to die," I uttered. “I don’t want to die when it’s now that I truly feel alive, even more so than when my blood ran red.”
“You’re not going to die, Lotus,” Kait whispered against my hair. “You stay here as long as you need. No one is getting through these doors.”
Reina finally looked up, her green eyes glossed with tears. “Not unless they want to be beaten with a bat.”
The laugh I choked back turned into more tears that were wiped away by my friends. While the weight I carried crumbled with each comforting stroke, I feared that whatever fronts I had weaved over the last century were a mere thread’s pull away from unraveling.
I could already feel my grip loosening.
Days had passed and there was still no sign of Lotus. She wasn’t responding to my messages, and I hadn’t seen her at her apartment, work, or even The Royal Nomad. But I knew in my heart that what those awful headlines declared was not the truth. It couldn’t have been. Right? Perhaps this unknowing was the seed of doubt that stirred each time I tried to reach her with no response. I even tried all the numbers I could think of to get in touch with her.
At the very least, I just needed to know that she was okay. Even though that brutish asshole who attacked her was detained at the police station, I didn’t know how long it would be before someone else would find her and attempt to hurt her. Next time, she might not be as lucky, and the thought alone stirred the madness inside me. It killed me not knowing where she was.
I scrolled through all the messages I sent before typing yet another text, asking her to at least let me know that she was safe.
After waiting for any sign of the message being acknowledged, I shoved the phone back in my pocket and looked back at my monitor where a budget spreadsheet remained untouched.
“Woah, excuse you?”
I turned my head, realizing it was Quinn all the way from the front desk. Vampiric hearing was great, but not so damn clear that it sounded like she was in the room with me.
“I said, where the fuck is she?!”
“You’ll need to lower your voice if you expect me to respond,” she said again. Her voice rose to match the volume of the other party.
I was on high alert. The other voice penetrating the thick walls was low in pitch and rigid. Each word held a sharpness that immediately forced me out of my office and down the hall.
It wasn’t the first time that we encountered a disgruntled guest, and Quinn was more than capable of getting them to settle down, but it wasn’t the raised voices that bothered me the most. No, it was the familiar scent that alerted me. It was Lotus’s scent that taunted me. But she wasn’t here, so that meant that—Fuck. I moved down the hall, continuing to listen in on the conversation that bounced back and forth between the man’s questions and Quinn’s short responses.
“I’ve followed her scent to this shithole three fucking times. I demand you send her out.” He sounded increasingly frustrated, but Quinn wasn’t letting up. She had nearly a century of experience in wearing people down. She wasn’t about to back down easily. While she continued to test his patience, I had the opportunity to get a look at him.
Quinn was standing behind the front desk with her arms crossed but otherwise looked unbothered while the man just feet away from her was demanding answers he wouldn’t get from anyone at Little Wing. From what I could see from afar, he had shaggy black hair and features that were strikingly similar to Lotus. He was dressed in an army green jacket with the sleeves rolled up and black jeans that had holes in the knees.
“Don’t play dumb. You know who I’m talking about.”
“Nope, don’t know who or what you’re talking about.” Quinn faked a yawn before her eyes darted to the hall. At least she knew I was there if she needed me to step in.
“My sister,” the man hissed before he slammed his fist down on the desk, shaking it. “Where is Lotus Everett?!”
That question was like a punch to the gut, but I had to stop skulking around and step down the few stairs leading to the front desk.
“I’d appreciate if you didn’t terrorize my employees,” I declared. It was then that I got a good look at his face. I could see the same ruby eyes I fell in love with, but these were full of a burning rage that I needed to snuff out.
“Finally, someone who can tell me—” When the dark-haired man fully turned to look at me, I watched him stiffen. His eyes settled on me and his nose wrinkled like he just smelled something that sickened him. I knew he could smell Lotus on me. “Who the fuck are you?” he demanded.
“You’ve come into my place of business. It’s me who should be asking you that question.” I stepped down the final step and approached him. We were similar in height and that only had me roll my shoulders to adjust my posture.
Even though I knew his name, I needed to hear him say it. What small sliver of uncertainty I had needed to be squandered before I contemplated beating the shit out of him for everything he did to the woman I cared about. Lotus kept a lot of her history a secret, but I could recognize the fragments of the pain that she shared. They all came back to her brother who turned her, abused her, and left her with a target on her back. Now he barged into Little Wing demanding information about Lotus's whereabouts like he deserved it. He might have been her maker, but she wasn’t his property. If there was one pieceof information that I committed to memory, it was that Luca was the one person Lotus feared. I wasn’t going to hand her over to a man who appeared to long for destruction. Hell, no. Even if I couldn’t get in touch with Lotus, I wasn’t going to stop protecting her.
