“Are you sleeping in the same bed?”
Dang, her mom was smart. Annabella had thought for sure the murder thing would get her all excited again and have her going off on the dangers of the city.
“That’s none of your business,” Annabella said a little primly.
“Then you’re living with him.” A long silence. “Annabella, it’s not like you to fall so hard so fast. I’m worried. I don’t want you to get hurt or jeopardize everything you’ve accomplished with your dance.”
“He’s a good guy, Mom. I’m crazy about him, and I bet you will be, too.”
A pang of worry in her heart told Annabella that the question of her future with Custo did bother her. The fact that he aged like a human person was weirdly comforting, but they still had to figure out how they could share their lives, especially with his slightly abnormal appearance. They’d have to make up a halfway plausible “condition” to explain the dark lines on his body. That he ate a Shadow wolf wasn’t going to cut it.
Another silence, a little longer. Then a huge sigh. “Bring him to dinner Sunday.”
Her mom was her best friend; she couldn’t keep Custo from her for long. “I have performances. What about Tuesday?”
“Tuesday’s fine. I’ll call your brother so that he can give your Custo a hard time, too.”
Annabella smiled. It would be fun to watch Custo squirm. And more fun to make it up to him later.
A rustle behind her. Annabella turned to see Zoe crouching by one of her boxes. The tape hissed as Zoe pulled it off.
“Uh…Mom, I’ve got to go to rehearsal. See you Tuesday. Love you.” Annabella disconnected the call. To Zoe she said, “That’s not your stuff.”
Zoe looked up, the black fringe of her bangs hanging in her eyes. Still no makeup. She looked like a grumpy kid without it.
“I don’t have any stuff,” Zoe said. “I need clothes. I won’t leave Abby here alone, and I’m not about to ask Adam or Talia for a damn thing. That leaves you.”
Abigail wasn’t making as much progress as Dr. Lin would have liked, but she was holding stable. Zoe must have been worried out of her mind. In a strange place with no friends and a heck of a lot of scary monsters, no wonder she was in a foul mood.
Zoe rummaged through the box. A flash of pointe-shoe pink made Annabella’s heart leap. Bingo! Now if she could find Custo, she might make rehearsal on time after all.
“Clothes are in those boxes,” Annabella said, snapping up her shoes. “And my makeup in is the bathroom. Help yourself.”
“I don’t know why you’re so happy,” Zoe called after her. “It’ll never work out for the two of you.”
Annabella looked back, feeling sorry for her. No one could know the future with any certainty, not Abigail and certainly not Zoe. The girl just had the uncanny ability that other unhappy people have to sense and tweak the deepest fears of others.
It’ll never work out?
Ha! “The hell it won’t.”
“You’re looking better,” Adam said, turning away from his computer monitor. “Less ugly, but still…disturbing.”
Custo grinned as he dropped into a chair opposite Adam, glancing over his friend’s blackened eyes and the swollen bridge of his nose. “You still look like shit.”
“Yeah. Talia’s mad at me for getting hurt. Almost put her back into labor when she heard about it.”
“She knows you fight wraiths for a living, right?”
Adam chuckled. “She doesn’t want me doing it without her. I’m hoping with you and The Order around she won’t have to do much of it at all, but she’s still angry.”
Which reminded Custo…“About Talia and the babies…what are you going to do with Gillian?” Custo asked. “You can’t exactly let her walk.”
“Why not?”
“She knows too much about Segue, about Talia. And the wraiths were keen on getting a hold of the babies, probably to harness whatever gifts they have. The woman needs to face the consequences of her actions.” Custo had half a mind to go down to her cell and strangle her himself.
All humor dropped from Adam’s face. “The wraiths aren’t getting near my children. And for the audacity of threatening my family, I will hunt each one down and kill it. I have the manpower, if that term reasonably extends to The Order, to launch a full-scale offensive now.” Adam leaned forward, his eyes narrowing. “As for the good doctor, I leave her to the tender mercies of the wraiths. Without her connection to Segue, all she’s good for to them is food.”
“So you’re letting her walk,” Custo repeated. Gillian would be running scared for the rest of her short life. Inevitably, the wraiths would catch up. “Does Talia know?”
“Yep. I can’t keep anything from her. She wanted to gift wrap Gillian for the wraiths with a shiny red satin bow. Her words.” Adam smiled slightly. “Impending motherhood has, shall we say, intensified her temper.”
“Sounds like it.” Talia had always been such a quiet, studious thing. Except when she screamed, that is.
Adam put his elbows on the desk, his expression clearing. “Luca and his Order wouldn’t stay here, so I’ve put them up in the Annex building. Unless you have any objections, I’d like to give him the go-ahead to renovate the loft on the top floor. Neither Talia nor I want to live there, and it could be a usable space again.”
Custo shrugged. If anyone could excise the memory of his death from the loft, it was The Order. “That’s fine. It’s past time for that place to get a new paint job.” And windows. And elevator doors.
“You could have gotten all this from my head,” Adam said. “So what did you come to talk to me about?”
Custo heaved a sigh. The air became thick to breathe, but he forced it in and out of his lungs. It was past time for this, too. “I’m leaving Segue.”
The silence filled the room.
“I guess I knew that was coming,” Adam said, but he looked tired. Older.
Of course Adam knew. Custo was joining The Order. With his new abilities, the scope and strength of which he’d yet to fully explore, he was needed now more than ever. Plus he had a lot to learn.
“Are you going to become as unreasonable as the rest of them?” Adam asked.
Custo smiled, playing along. “No, you cannot have access to their…our…arsenal. The weapons have supernatural properties, and it would be inviting trouble to permit humankind to use them.”
“You let Shadowman have the hammer,” Adam pointed out.
“And I will have to take responsibility for whatever chaos he creates with it.” But if Shadowman could use the tool to retrieve Kathleen, the exception was worth it. Custo didn’t have to read Adam’s mind to know that he would second that opinion.
Adam shook his head. “Unreasonable.”
Since Segue and The Order would be working together a lot, Custo figured he’d be hearing that same complaint from Adam often.
Adam lifted his eyes just as there was a soft rap at the door.
Custo turned to see Annabella. She had her enormous dance bag over a shoulder, her dark hair pulled severely back into a tight ponytail. Her eyes were fairy-tale big and bright.
“Rehearsal starts in an hour,” she said with a token “sorry” wince.
Custo knew the expression was fake. She wasn’t sorry. She wanted to go right now. The light was shining in her eyes; she wanted to dance.
“You coming back here tonight?” Adam asked.
Annabella darted a look to Custo. He guessed that meant, No. We’ll find a place in the city.
A nice hotel, with all the luxuries. After the last couple of days they more than deserved it. Later he’d have to scout out some place for them to live. A comfortable, but secure apartment not too far from The Order’s new headquarters and her ballet company. When Luca had mentioned living discreetly among humankind, Custo didn’t think he meant living with a human woman. But then, Custo had never lived by anyone’s rules before. He wasn’t about to start now.