Page 82 of Surface Scratch
He felt his stomach churn as he watched her tip four bottles upside down into a tumbler. It was going to be a long night.
He couldn’t help but smile to himself. Ophelia looked calm. In her element. When he watched her behind the bar of the club, she looked confident but always two seconds from winging a bottle at someone. Here?
She almost looked happy.
She placed a short glass full of way too much alcohol in front of him. “You have to shoot it,” she said as she poured the remains of the tumbler into a glass in front of her.
“Your dad is going to be so mad if he sees you drinking that,” Tariq told her.
“What’s he gonna do? Ground me? I shot five people in the face in the last two weeks.” She shrugged, then reached across the island and clinked her glass against Caleb’s. “Bottoms up, Pinky.”
Caleb pinched his nose as he poured the drink into his mouth, grimacing as the burning liquid made its way down his throat. If hell had a taste, that was it. He shook his head, feeling kind of like a wet dog as he did. He opened his eyes and jerked back when he saw Luka and Matteo standing on either side of Ophelia, both of them grinning at him.
Matteo held out a mini bottle of water.
“Um, thanks,” Caleb said as he took the bottle. Then he remembered what Ophelia and Marcus had taught him while he’d been off his feet recovering from his frostbitten toes. He touched his hand to his chin and motioned out. “Thank you.”
Matteo’s eyes lit up and he looked at Luka. They locked eyes for a moment over Ophelia’s head before Luka nodded.
“What are they doing?” Caleb asked Tariq.
“Probably deciding if they should squeeze you like an orange for learning one thing in ASL,” Vincent said from behind him.
Caleb jumped again.God dammit, they’re all going to give me a heart attack.He glanced at Vincent, stepping to the side to make room for him at the island. “They don’t, um, need to sign for that?” Caleb asked. Vincent shook his head. “Is that a vampire thing?”
“A twin thing. Creepy, isn’t it?” Vincent grinned. “I gotta hand it to you, buttercup, you’re a bit of a firebrand, aren’t you?”
Blood rushed to his cheeks, though whether it was from embarrassment or the alcohol, he couldn’t tell. He didn’t say anything in response and instead took a drink of water.
“I did some asking around for you,” Vincent continued, reaching for one of the unlabeled bottles in front of Ophelia. She slapped his hand away. “No bodies missing a left hand have turned up in a hundred-mile radius, so I think it’s safe to assume your brother got the hell out of dodge.”
“He’s not back up in Chicago, either,” Ophelia said as she poured another drink that looked like a mixture of blood and whiskey.
Luka signed something to Caleb, but he didn’t understand any of it.
“The Society up in Chicago knows what happened down here, but they don’t seem like they’re going to send reinforcements at the moment,” Vincent translated.
“He’s not back with them?” Caleb asked.
Vincent shook his head. “Not according to my sources up there,” he said. “I’m not surprised, though. He killed one of them. If they ever figure out it, he’s going to be a target for them as well. Killing another member is very frowned upon.”
“Oh.” He stared down at the water bottle in his hands, focusing on the warmth in his gut. He’d spent the week trying not to think about Nick at all. Every time he did, it wasn’t Nick’s scream that disturbed him. It was the look in his eyes, his face so hardened and devoid of anything that resembled his brother.
And the way it had felt when Nick held his head still so Henderson could rip out his tooth…
He ran his tongue over the gap subconsciously, thankful that the hole had finally smoothed over with a clot and his mouth no longer tasted of blood and steel dental pliers. It still ached a bit, but it didn’t hurt as bad as the knowledge did. A part of him hoped that Nick would come to his senses wherever he was out there. He could come to realize that not all vampires were bad, right?
“I leave him alone with you for five minutes and now he’s distraught,” Marcus said, his arms wrapping around Caleb’s waist from behind and pulling him close.
This time he didn’t jump. He smiled as Marcus kissed the top of his head. The intoxicating smell of tobacco and sugar cookies swirled around him, pushing away the dark thoughts. He could worry about it another time. For now, he just wanted to be present with Marcus. He’d already spent too much time plagued by memories he couldn’t do anything to fix.
Just having Marcus near kept his feet on the ground and his mind out of the past.
“I didn’t do anything,” Vincent said.
“Let’s keep it that way,” Marcus said, a playful edge to his voice. “Ngabo wants to talk to you about a new supplier in the south. That way we won’t have another disaster if the hunters up north mess with the supply chain again.”
“Thank fuck,” Vincent mumbled.
