Page 39 of I Regret Nothing
-+
his Brody I was supposed to steal keys from hadn’t made an appearance in the mess hall until after I left Faust’s office. He was glaring right at me too, like he blamed me for Venus ending up in medical. Okay, I was getting offended at all these witches, blaming me for shit and wanting to kill me. I owned stealing that Grimoire, and I’d do it again. Venus didn’t disable the cameras at the museum. I saw her face clear as day. She wasn’t wearing a mask. She’d be in here even if I didn’t bite her. And I didn’t lay a finger on her. She got her ass beat because she asked a fox to kill me. Why was I getting blamed for everything that went wrong with the witches?
It wasn’t like I had this comprehensive plan to stop offending witches either. I was sizing Brody up for weaknesses to steal his keys. We’d hopefully be long gone before he realized someone stole them instead of losing them. He’d know I stole his keys, but good luck coming for me. I didn’t know where we’d end up after we broke out. I didn’t just need to hide from the authorities. The Aether Circle wanted me dead, and they would get personally butt hurt I broke out of here. It wasn’t like I could stay in Silverhold either, even with Faust looking after me. He wouldn’t be everywhere at once.
Brody was going to be an easy mark. I just had to make sure no one saw me. Brody was one of the evil warlocks. There were plenty of nice witches and warlocks if you didn’t know that since they all wanted to kill me. Brody was not one of them. I could tell just by looking at those beady eyes of his.
He was shifty, but not in the paranoid way that would make stealing from him hard. He was one of those warlocks that thought his magic made him way too powerful to be a target. I hated those kinds of people. Honestly, I probably would have stolen from him just to prove a point in here if Dakarys and Rajack hadn’t picked him for his keys. I would have done it just to mess with him, like stolen his phone so I could have one in here or his computer mouse to piss him off. I could be a passive-aggressive little kleptomaniac.
He even had douche bag hair. His hair belonged on some frat boy named Chad in 1998. I was glad they picked him. It would have been easier to steal from Faust, but I just couldn’t do that. I didn’t steal from people just because it was easy. Faust was honest with me when I asked if he was a serial killer, and he gave me an answer I could accept. There was a fine line between a serial killer and a paid assassin, and Faust had a code, so he didn’t cross it. I would have said no and told them to pick another target if they wanted me to steal from Faust.
Brody kept glaring at me from across the mess hall and beating his shock baton against the palm of his hand. I avoided meeting his eyes, even if I wanted to wink at him. I could use this. I already knew if Dakarys and Rajack started a riot, he’d make a beeline for me to give me a few shocks. I could use that opportunity to lift his keys. I’d take a few shocks for the team if it meant getting out of here.
I was starting to like Faust, but he was doing that overprotective thing wolves liked to do. It was entirely possible Faust would get to me before Brody did and ruin our entire riot so I couldn’t get those keys. I liked that he looked out for me when it came to witchy killers, but not so much when it came to breaking out of prison.
I knew Dakarys and Rajack wanted out of here just as much as I did, but for different reasons. We couldn’t put our plan in place without Astrid’s help, and she was still dealing with Venus and her shit. The shit still hadn’t been dealt with, and things looked tense at the witch table.
This seriously did not bode well for me. I had enough witches that wanted me dead without all of them in Silverhold siding with Venus. And it looked like several of them did, or the witches would have taken her out by now. Astrid and Wren wouldn’t even be seen with us to give us an update. It was that tense over there.
It was this entire stalemate where I had three men offering to kill Venus for me, and we couldn’t do a damned thing because witches were just so sensitive when you bit one of them. I could have used my magic and snapped her neck. Did they even think of that? I bit her instead of killing her because I had principles. Prison changed me. I’d already thought up several ways to kill her.
“Have any witches snuck into the mailroom with an update?”
Dakarys sighed.
“They haven’t even brought us a new list. Wren was supposed to be stopping whispers of taking over the mailroom, but it sounds like it’s spread. Astrid is doing her best with what she has. She and Wren are good at this. They’ll put down the mini witch revolt and take care of Venus.”
I liked Astrid, but I hardly knew her. Things looked pretty fucking dire at the witch table. I had this feeling showing weakness in prison was a bad idea, and now every single gang in Silverhold knew the witches were having problems. Perhaps they should focus less on killing me and taking over the mailroom and concentrating more on which gangs watched this go down and would swoop in for some revenge. I’d pissed off the witches. Surely, the witches pissed someone here off. I tended to do it more than other people, but pissing off people was a part of life, and none of these people would be in Silverhold if they didn’t have the same habits as mine.
I really hoped this didn’t reach blood feud level in Silverhold because I was pretty sure the Aether Circle had already declared one.
Astrid needed to handle her witches because if things got to blood feud level against me, then she was in danger too. So were Dakarys and Rajack.
Chapter 33
Rajack
I
hated this. I hated watching the witches tear themselves apart because of Venus. Out of all the gangs in Silverhold, we had the best working relationship with them, and that was mostly because Astrid ran a tight ship. We were friendly with all of them. Some of them must have just looked at us as people who could get them shit instead of respecting what we pulled off with our black market because they were willing to listen to Venus about taking the mailroom over.
What they didn’t know was that they could have it if they would just lay off Rei long enough for us to escape. We weren’t going to leave Astrid high and dry, and we didn’t intend to pay her for the potion we needed with things she couldn’t get again. We would let her in on the big secret of running the black market out of the mailroom and let her take over.
There was this entire, long debate about taking her with us because we just really liked her, but it was too risky to break out with four of us. We felt rotten about leaving her behind, but we could set her up with a profitable business. Dakarys and I had a nice fund waiting for us when we got out to make sure we stayed hidden.
It was the Vampire’s day to bring us their list of dirty books and sex toys. People needed what they needed to get through prison, and we didn’t judge. Marcel always brought the list, and as far as Vampires went, he was the most tolerable out of everyone in Silverhold. He didn’t always look at everyone like he wanted to eat them or fuck them. Or fuck them while eating them.
The only irritating thing about Marcel is that he didn’t respect personal space. He got way too close to me and slipped me his list where the cameras wouldn’t see it. He liked to sniff when he was close too, which was just creepy. Vampires did that a lot. They sniffed people way more than shifters did. Shifters could pull it off. It was how they got to know you, and they could sense your mood. It helped show them how to react around you. Vampires did it because you smelled like food to them.
I pressed my hand against Marcus’s forehead and pushed him away from me.
“What did I tell you about that, Marcus?”
He ran his tongue across his fangs.
“I’ve just never sampled a gargoyle before, and you smell good. I’d make it feel good.”
“You’re getting pushy again, Marcus. Do you want what’s on this list? Dakarys and I have already said we’re off-limits for feeding, even if none of you have had a gargoyle or a sphinx before. We’re proud, powerful supernatural creatures. We aren’t finger sandwiches where you can try when you want.”
