He shook his head. Now she was sure that there were flickers of flame in those dark eyes, twin embers, burning bright. Outside the apartment building, the rain, which had been falling gently before, suddenly began to pour. Thunder rumbled off in the not-so-far distance.
“Meena,” he said. The embers were glowing a deep, steady red, exactly the way the dragon’s eyes had. “I don’t understand. What are you saying?”
“I’m saying,” she said, unable to hold back a sob, “that I’m going to go work for the Palatine.”
He stared down at her for a second or two.
Then he threw back his head and laughed.
When he looked at her again, the embers had turned to flames, flaring high.
“Oh, Meena,” he said. “You’re joking.”
“I’m not joking,” she said. She reached up and wiped her tears with her uninjured wrist. “The Palatine offered me a job. And I’ve decided that I’m taking it.”
His eyes were entirely red now. The brown was gone. The dragon was taking over.
“It’s not like I would ever do anything to help them go after you, Lucien.” She rushed to explain. “You know that. I’ll always try to do everything I can to help you. Because I love you, too. I always will. But I just can’t be with you. Not if it means my friends are going to get hurt. And this job…it means I can finally do what I think I’ve always been meant to do.”
“You don’t need a job,” he said with sudden savagery. He reached out and grabbed her by the waist, pulling her hard against him. Outside, lightning flared as thunder caused the building to shudder. The storm was directly overhead. “I told you that I’d take care of you.”
Meena lifted her chin to look him in the eye. Those fierce dragon eyes.
“But not without killing me,” she said quietly.
He looked down at her as the rain and wind outside lashed the balcony, his volatile gaze smoldering in its intensity. She thought it might consume her in its wrath and wipe her off the face of the planet entirely, the way his dragon fire had wiped out the Dracul that night.
And no one would know. No one would ever know what had become of Meena Harper.
He could do it. There was nothing to stop him.
Except her courage.
“You know,” she said, swallowing hard, “when you told me the story of St. George and the dragon that night we were in the museum, Lucien, there was one thing you left out.”
“What is that?”
He was keeping himself under control with an effort. She could feel his arms shaking almost as badly as her knees were as he tried valiantly not to drop his lips to her neck and do what he so badly wanted to.
“You never told me that you were the dragon,” she whispered. Thunder-or maybe it was his voice-rocked the walls of the apartment, so hard that Meena would have clapped her hands over her ears if she hadn’t already thrown them defensively over her face, certain the next thing she was going to see were his fangs coming at her throat.
“I’m the prince of darkness.” His voice was like a sonic boom in her ears. “What did you think that meant, Meena? Did you think that meant that…I…was…a…saint?”
And, just as she thought that it was going to be all over for her…
…he let her go.
She lowered her arms and stood there, shaking, just staring at him.
She had never seen such sadness in anyone’s eyes.
“No, Meena,” he said in his normal voice. “You’re the saint.”
What did this mean? Why had he let go of her?
“Go,” he said curtly, nodding toward the bedroom door.
She jumped.
“If you’re going to go,” he said, his voice rising, “go now. Before I change my mind. I think you know what will happen then.”
She turned and ran from the apartment, not stopping to lock the door behind her. She ignored the elevator, not willing to wait for it, and ran down all eleven flights of stairs, unable to believe he wasn’t coming after her-in bat or dragon or even man form.
She didn’t slow down. Like he’d said, he could still change his mind.
She tore through the lobby, not stopping to say good-bye to Pradip. She ran out into the rain, which immediately soaked her, flagging down the first available taxi that she saw. She fell into the backseat, gasping out the address to St. Clare’s to the driver.
She didn’t look back.
She didn’t dare.
Chapter Sixty-three
10:00 P.M., Friday, April 23
Shrine of St. Clare
154 Sullivan Street
New York, New York
It wasn’t until they were more than halfway there that Meena stopped shaking and began to believe that she’d done it.
She’d told him no.
And she was still alive.
She’d survived.
She didn’t know what was going to happen next.
But she did know that the horrible empty feeling in her chest was gone. She could think about him and still breathe. She was safe.
And what’s more, she had a plan. More than a plan…she had a purpose, for the first time in her life.
Maybe everything was going to be all right, just like Alaric had said. Maybe she didn’t need to sleep in a windowless room anymore.
By the time the taxi pulled up in front of the rectory, it had stopped raining. The sudden storm had disappeared. She paid the driver and got out of the car, running up the steps to the front door. For once, she didn’t look all around her, frightened that he might be waiting for her, watching, from the shadows.
Everything was dripping slightly, but Meena didn’t mind. It was as if the world had been baptized, washed new, just for her. It seemed like a lovely spring evening all of a sudden. Maybe she’d even corral Jon and Yalena into going out for a drink with her. Why not?
There was nothing to be afraid of anymore.
She pressed the buzzer.
Jon was the one who let her in, his clothes covered in drywall dust from all the work he’d been doing over at Adam and Leisha’s apartment.
“Hey, what took you so long?” he asked. “I thought you were just going to go see Leisha. Visiting hours ended a long time ago.”
Jack Bauer-sensing, as he always did, that Meena was home-leapt off the lap of Yalena, who’d been sitting on the couch in the living room watching TV, and raced toward her, barking happily.
“How’s my little man?” Meena knelt down to pet him, letting him lick her face. “Who’s been a good boy? Who saved the world today?”
“Well, he didn’t,” Jon said bluntly. “He took a dump in Sister Gertrude’s roses. She was not happy. I told her it was good fertilizer, but she was still none too pleased. Seriously, though. Where were you?”
“Did you take a dump in Sister Gertrude’s roses?” Meena asked her dog, picking him up and letting him lick her face some more. She ignored her brother’s question about where she’d been. “Who’s the worst boy? Who’s the worst boy in the whole world?”
Yalena, watching them over the back of the couch, giggled. Meena had been noticing lately that Yalena watched her brother, Jon. A lot. Meena wasn’t sure how aware Jon was of this, though.
But she did note that tonight Jon had rolled his thrift-shop T-shirt’s sleeves up very high. He usually did this, she’d learned from long experience, in order to show off his “guns,” of which he was inordinately proud, whenever there was an attractive female around he wanted to impress.
And he didn’t do it for just any girl.
It had to be Yalena he was trying to impress with his biceps. Who else could it have been around St. Clare’s? Every other female was a novice or nun.
Meena was pleased he’d transferred his affections from Taylor Mackenzie to someone a bit more attainable.
“Fine, don’t tell me where you’ve been,” Jon was saying to Meena in a voice about an octave deeper than the one he usually used. “Abraham is looking for you. He says there’s been some kind of, I don’t know, disturbance in Vienna. Whatever that means. And he needs to talk to you about it.” He looked at her strangely as she put Jack Bauer down, then removed her jacket and hung it on the coatrack. “Why would he need to talk to you about that?”