Page 15 of Midnight Serenade
I’d let the girlfriend stay. My staff told me she’d broken up with him over one of our SAT phones the moment he’d been kicked off the chopper with his luggage. I’d thought it was fitting. Then again, my sense of justice was a little more razor sharp than others.
“Day three tomorrow. It’s anat-seaday. Any plans, Grace?”
Grace was frowning at her pot roast and potatoes as though they had personally snubbed her, moving them around her plate without really eating anything. She glanced up at Rafe’s question. “Hmm?” Her eyes focused. “Oh, well, I thought I’d check out the spa.” She shrugged. “I now have all this onboard credit. I may as well use it up.”
“I’d love to join you, if that would be okay,” I said.
Rafe stared at me. “Boss. You’re killing me! I wanna go to the spa!”
I gave him a look. “It’s unbecoming for a full-grown man towhine.”
Micaela snorted into her drink.
Rafe gave her a wounded look. “He works me like a dog.”
She shook her head. “I don’t feel sorry for you. You get time off, just like the rest of us, and you make seven figures a year.”
Rafe grumbled aboutno respectunder his breath and then sighed. “Fine. I’ll take your to-do list for tomorrow and add it to themountainalready on mine.”
Grace, who I guessed might be uncomfortable with someone having to work overtime for something relating to her, was instead staring at the ocean through the window of the restaurant.
“Grace?”
“Hmm?”
“Is it okay if I tag along to your spa day?” I asked again.
She nodded. “Oh, sure. That sounds good.” She tried to smile, but it was clear something was on her mind.
“Is something bothering you?” Micaela asked. “You seem preoccupied.”
Grace sighed, her finger swirling around the rim of her glass, a faraway look in her eyes. “My whole life I always thought I was under a curse. People have always reacted to me like they did today. It’s made me afraid to leave my house.” She looked at the table, her eyes filling with tears. She swallowed. “I thought that finding answers would be freeing. Instead, I feel trapped. I don’twantto be a siren. I don’twantto have this effect on people. To see reason leave their eyes. To have them pawing at me.”
I handed her a fresh linen napkin for her tears and scooted closer to her, moving Kazi over a bit. “I think you’re under some misconceptions about being a siren.” I put an arm around her.
Her chuckle was watery. “Well, I will admit I know next to nothing. Lay it on me.”
“First, as Micaela told you earlier, these men have a choice. Yes, you draw people. Perhaps more than the average person. But that does not mean you take their free will away. Theychoose.”
I really wanted to get this point across to her, because it was important. My lure as a vampire made others want to be closer to me. A leprechaun’s lure did the same thing. But we didn’t force people. And everyone that we came into contact with on a daily basis chose how to react to us; just like they chose how to react to the rest of the population.
“How did you even hear us? You were dealing with that table.”
I winked. “Vampire hearing.”
“Ah. So that’s real. I’m going to need details on vampirism for my books. I want to make them feel authentic.”
“I will answer any questions you have,” I promised her.
“Even the embarrassing questions?”
I raised an eyebrow. “Do youhaveembarrassing questions?”
She bit her lip. “I actually have quite a few.”
I nodded. “Then, yes. Even the embarrassing questions. Back to being a siren. Your singing voice has the ability to calm storms. Storms in nature. And the storms in people. That’s why everyone was so mesmerized by you in the Starlight Lounge. Your song calmed the storms within them, whatever that storm was.”
“So...” she fidgeted with her glass. “There are somegoodthings about sirens.”
