Seriously. Don’t let the tuxedos and stiff collars be deceiving, or end up at the business end of a gun or a stake.
Butterflies still spiraled in her belly, but Alice straightened her back and did her best to look the part of someone important. One glance at her trembling hands would immediately squelch that image, so thank God for a small clutch she clung to.
The small group hovered at the entrance as Kemp—maybe it was Conell?—spoke in low tones with a steely eyed man. Her guards tightened their formation around her, acting as a single unit, to the point she could have questioned her own value if she didn’t know better. Bast covered her hand with his own warm one, and Alice let loose a breath she didn’t realize she’d been holding.
“Easy,” he said softly.
She glanced up at him, needing someplace to focus, a question poised on her lips. But the tension stretched across his features made her forget what she was about to say. “Bast?”
A sense of dread filled her, because she recognized the expression of forced concentration. He was in pain again.
“Don’t worry.” His brow unfurrowed. “It’s not the same.”
“But something is wrong,” she replied quietly, knowing damn well the other men at her side could hear. It couldn’t be helped.
“Wrong isn’t the right word.” They began to move forward as a single unit, squeezing in pairs through the doorway. “I just have this feeling.”
“Heat?”
“No. Not like that. It’s...I don’t know how to explain it. Like I’m being pulled almost. Weird.” At his sides, his hands went into fists, knuckles cracking with the movement. “Kind of like static electricity, but it’s zipping around my inside. I swear I feel two heartbeats. If I hold still long enough, my heart is doing double-time.”
“It’s racing?”
“No.” He shook his head. “One right after the other.”
“Boss.” Drew edged closer to his side. “You know what that is, right? And even better, you know it’s not possible. At least, it shouldn’t be, unless there’s something you need to tell us.”
“What’s not possible?” Alice asked. “I don’t understand.”
“I did nothing wrong. Nothing. Not even in a drunken fit.” The confusion and outright anger on his face held Alice captivated. He looked like a man just given notice he’d been fired from a job of thirty years. Or maybe it was the expression of a teenager who’d been informed that in nine months, he’d be a father. To Alice he said, “There’s another vampire here.”
Well, obviously. “Okay?”
“I mean, one that’s connected to me.”
“I still don’t understand. How’s he connected to you?”
“That’s just it. I’m not sure how.”
“Start from the beginning.” His gaze kept darting from her face to something behind her, his entire manner as close to frantic as she’d ever seen on the normally stoic man.
His expression straightened. “I’ll explain it later. This isn’t the time.”
She weaved her fingers with his, trying to grab his attention. “Don’t shut me out now.”
He only shook his head. “It can’t be up for discussion this second, Alice. This...it’s wrong. I can’t say anything else about it now other than it’s wrong. It has to be.”
But what was the matter? She got that he didn’t want the others to know he’d been sick, but right now they seemed to know more than she did. Something about being vampire. Something he wasn’t allowed to tell her—or did he flat-out just not want to tell her?
Drew slanted a sympathetic glance her way, but when he turned to face forward, his expression straightening, she followed his example.
A very lean man, with salt and pepper hair and a hawklike nose, made his way toward them. A woman in a pretty black dress hovered a few steps to his right side. A glass of something sparkly was gripped between her elegant, unadorned fingers. Before he’d stopped moving, coming to rest right before Drew, he held out his hand. Without hesitation or the slightest clumsiness, the woman deposited the glass. Almost as if this practiced move had been done thousands of times before.