“I just came to get my friend.” Everyone in the room who’d been pretending to ignore us finally stopped pretending. Being the center of attention was unnerving. It felt very much like being prey.
Gina swung forward and lunged for Jorgen. “Do I still smell like a consort to you now, asshole?”
Even though the bouncer was still blocking the way, I tried to haul her up the first stair. Gina fought to concentrate on Lucas, or on one Lucas out of the many I bet she saw. “I hate you,” she said, pointing her finger at Jorgen. “And you,” she said to Lucas, moving her finger down the line, “and you and you—” Gina took control of herself and took a step up of her own accord, using this small leverage to wave her hand like a fervent preacher and include the entire crowd. “You’re all assholes! All of you men!”
I grabbed for her and pressed her to me. The room filled with a pregnant pause. Had anyone at County made a code for what to do when your co-worker was going to get you killed?
Booming laughter began nearby. I opened eyes I hadn’t realized I’d closed, and saw Lucas grinning from ear to ear. “She does have a point,” he said, looking out at the crowd of gawkers himself. “Half of you are dogs.”
“And those that aren’t are bitches!” someone else yelled from the back of the room.
There were snickers all around, and I could feel the tension in the room defuse. Lucas closed the gap between us. “Need some help?”
“Yes. Please.” Anything to get out of here faster.
Muscles rippled up and down his arms as he picked up Gina and pulled her up into a fireman’s cradle, like he was off to carry her over a threshold. Her chin lay on her chest, and if she was going to throw up, I prayed for her to wait until we’d gotten outside and nearer to my car.
“I’m parked nearby—” I led the way out. Lucas followed, and luckily Jorgen stayed behind.
“What was all that about?” He hefted Gina’s weight easily—not that she wasn’t thin, but he had no problem carrying her.
“A lover’s spat. Nothing personal, I swear.”
“I know.”
I stopped, and he almost ran into me. “You do?”
“Sure we do. The second I found out you were caring for my uncle I asked around. She may fraternize—but she’s damn good at what she does.” He looked down at the woman he carried. “She couldn’t fall in love with one of us if she didn’t love us all a little bit, I suppose.”
I started walking again, quickly in the cold. “And what did your background check tell you about me?”
“Like Jorgen said. You’re the one the vampires employ.”
“That’s not true,” I said as we reached my Chevy. Gina was snoring. I unlocked the passenger door, and Lucas set her gently inside. “There’s just the one. She needs my help, but only for a little bit more.”
“You are compelled?” he asked me as I rounded my car.
“No. She just needs my help.”
“And you are good at helping people.”
“Like a fucking Girl Scout.”
He gave me a wolfish grin over my car’s hood. “What an interesting image.”
I snorted, unlocked my door, and sank inside. I leaned over Gina to buckle her seat belt and reached to close her door. He held it open.
“Where are you taking her?”
“Someplace where she can sleep it off.”
“Take good care of her.” He stood and made to close Gina’s door.
“Lucas—” There was nothing about him that gave the vibe he’d sent attackers after me earlier. If he had, wouldn’t he have let the patrons of the bar off their leash, so to speak? He ducked down to peer inside. The winter air was misting off his skin, and beneath his tattoos moved muscles that could have torn my car’s door off. “I was attacked this afternoon. By two were-women.”
His eyes narrowed, making his red-brown eyes look like angry embers. “When? Where?”
“The Woodbridge Mall. At five P.M., or thereabout. One of them wore a fur-lined parka, the other didn’t. That’s all I know.”
“Viktor,” Lucas growled. Anger washed across his entire body. I could almost see it flow over him, the water of humanity parting to let the wolf show through. His hand clenched around my car door, and I realized that between that and the dent I’d probably just hit my deductible. “How did you survive?”
“I hit one. With silver. She might still have a scar. And then a friend of mine showed up—a vampire friend.” Calling Dren a friend was stretching things, but I was smart enough to know that if this was a were-ploy, it would be better to seem like I had protection. “Are you sure it was Viktor?”
“His pack and mine have a long history. He can’t get to me, and now he can’t get to Winter, but you’d be easy—”
“Nothing personal, but I don’t even know you. Why would he attack me?” I interrupted.
“You know me well enough. He’ll do anything to stir up resentment before the full moon.”
“If I’d died, I’d be a little more than resentful,” I said.
He snorted and shook his head. “We need to put guards on you, Edie.”
“No way.”
“My pack owes you. For my uncle’s life, such as it is.”
“I—I don’t trust you,” I blurted out. His anger seemed real, and I wanted to trust him, but I also wanted to trust everyone, and that instinct wasn’t wise. “I want to, but I can’t.”
His eyes measured me, I could almost feel him weighing my resolve. He released my car door and took a step back. “I’ll find out who they were, Edie. As soon as I can. I’ll let you know.”
“Thank you.” I nodded and put my keys into the ignition, waiting for the engine to catch and turn over before reaching for the door.
Lucas stood there watching me, with his wild-wolf eyes. “Take care of yourself, Edie.”
“I will. Promise.”
He closed my passenger door, and let me go.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
Gina groaned a few times during transit, and I felt for her. I didn’t get drunk often, but I knew how she’d feel in the morning, physically at least. Emotionally—I blew air through half-parted lips. Dating a were-bear—almost becoming one? And I thought I had the market cornered on bad ideas.
I followed Asher’s quick directions and reached a neighborhood I hadn’t been to before.
It was genteel. Not new money, but comfortably old—the houses were sprawling two-story brick affairs with dormered attics, surrounded by full tall trees. This was the land of the normal, storybook almost—strange, considering I knew Asher was anything but. I pulled into the driveway and left the engine running for Gina.
Asher met me at the door, looking like the Asher I knew best. Olive skin, dark hair, dark brown eyes. He took one look at me, and then past me to Gina, still slumped over in my passenger seat. “You want to put her in a spare room, or a spare bathroom?”
“Someplace with a lot of tile.”
He followed me out to my car, and we retrieved her. Gina kept murmuring things that sounded sad, while Asher helped me help her down his entry hall. We made it up the stairs together, and I arranged her inside a clawfoot tub while Asher went to get extra towels. I sat on the toilet beside her, petting her hair, and Asher returned to lean against the wall.
“Do I want to know what happened?”
“Girl meets were-bear, girl falls for were-bear, were-bear says if you love me you’ll let me bite you, girl says good-bye.” I wished I had an IV start kit and a banana bag—IV fluids with vitamins and minerals—right about then. We could’ve set her impending hangover straight in no time.
Asher’s eyebrows rose high up his forehead. “I meant at your house.”
I looked down at Gina. Chances were she wouldn’t remember any of this, so I told him. About Gideon, and Veronica. He let out a low whistle.