Drink Deep - Chloe Neill [8]
“Juliet,” I called out, before she’d gotten too far. “Have you ever jumped?”
“Jumped?” she asked with a frown. “Like in the air?”
“Like off a building.”
“I have.” Understanding dawned in her eyes. “Why, Sentinel—did you make your first landing tonight?”
“I did, yeah.”
“Congratulations,” she said. “Just be careful that you don’t go too far or fall too fast.”
Words to live by.
Frank had co-opted Malik’s office—the office that had once belonged to Ethan. Malik had barely had two weeks in the room before Frank arrived and announced he needed the space to evaluate the House.
Malik—tall, cocoa-skinned and green-eyed—was deliberative. He picked his battles carefully, so he’d deferred and moved back into his old office down the hall.
It wasn’t large; the room was nearly filled by Malik’s desk, shelves of books and personal mementos. But the small size didn’t keep us from meeting there regularly. Bound together by our grief, we were more likely to be crammed into the office in our spare time than anywhere else in the House.
Tonight, Malik and Luc sat on opposite sides of a chess set atop Malik’s desk, and Lindsey sat cross-legged on the floor a few feet away, magazine in hand.
Malik’s wife, Aaliyah—petite, gorgeous, and as humble as they came—joined us on occasion, but she was absent tonight. Aaliyah was a writer who spent more time in their apartment than out of it. I could completely understand the urge to hunker down and avoid vampire drama.
Luc, now House Second and former captain of the Cadogan guards, was blond, tousle-haired, and laid back. He’d been born and raised in the wild west, and I assumed he’d been made a vampire at the barrel of a gun. Luc had pined for Lindsey, my House BFF and a fellow guard who’d apparently stolen some time away from the Ops Room tonight.
Their relationship had been stop and go for a long time, albeit more “stop” than “go.” She’d been afraid a relationship would lead to a breakup, and a breakup would destroy their friendship. Despite her initial commitment-phobia, craving comfort after Ethan’s death, she’d finally agreed to give Luc a chance.
I’d spent the first week after his death in a haze in my room, Mallory at my side. When I’d finally emerged and Mal had gone home again, Lindsey showed up at my door in a total tizzy. She’d gone to Luc in her grief, and consolation had turned to affection—a supportive embrace to a passionate kiss that totally rocked her socks (or so she said). That kiss hadn’t erased her doubts, but she’d belayed her fears enough to give him a chance.
Luc, of course, felt completely vindicated.
“Sentinel,” Luc said, fingers hovering over one of the black knights, apparently debating his options. “I smell those burgers, and you’d better have brought enough for everyone.”
Decision made, he plucked up the knight, set it down heavily in its new position, then raised his arms in the air triumphantly. “And so we advance!” he said, winging up his eyebrows at Malik. “You got a response to that?”
“I’m sure I’ll figure something out,” Malik said, his gaze now fixed on the board, scanning left to right as he calculated odds and evaluated his options. The chess game had become a weekly ritual, a way—or so I’d guessed—for Malik and Luc to exert some minimal control over their lives while the GP’s talking head sat a few yards down the hallway, deciding their fate.
I put the bags of food onto the desk, pulled out bacon-laced burgers for me and Lindsey, and took a seat beside her on the floor.
“So,” I said, folding down the burger’s paper wrapping. “Blood rationing?”
Luc and Malik growled simultaneously.
“The man is a stone-cold idiot,” Luc said, taking an impressive bite of his triple-layer burger.
“Unfortunately,” Malik said, moving his chess piece and sitting back in his chair, “he is an idiot with the full authority of the GP.”
“Which means we have to wait until he royally screws the pooch before we can act,” Luc said, hunched over the board again. “All due respect, Liege, the guy is a douche.