Hard Bitten - Chloe Neill [30]
“You know that for sure?”
I caught the tiny thread of hope in her voice and tugged. “I know that for sure. It’s Catcher, Mallory. Crazy stubborn? Sure. Gruff? Absolutely. But also totally in love with you.”
She sniffed. “Keep going.”
“Remember what you told me about Ethan? That I deserved someone who wanted me from the beginning? Well, Catcher Bell is your somebody. He would snap anyone who came at you in half, and that’s been obvious since the second he met you. There’s not a doubt in my mind that he’s all in, and there’s nothing you can’t tell him. Well,” I added with a smile, “unless you become a vamp. That would probably be a deal breaker.”
Mal made a half laugh, half cry and wiped her face again.
“I assume you’re not making secret plans to become a vampire?”
“Not right at this moment.”
“Good. I think one vamp in the family is plenty enough.”
“Concur on that one. It’s just . . .” She paused, then started again. “There are very few decisions in my life that I regret. Not grabbing that vintage Chanel we saw at that consignment store on Division. Not watching Buffy until the third season. Minor stuff, but you know what I mean.” She shook her head. “But this. Being ID’d as a sorcerer, agreeing to go along with this stuff, taking part in things—I don’t know. Maybe I should have just ignored the whole thing. Kept on with the ad gig and ignored the vampires and the sorcery and Ethan touching my hair. I mean, who does that? Who touches someone’s hair and pronounces they have magic?”
“Darth Sullivan.”
“Darth goddamned Sullivan.” She chuckled a little, then put her head on my shoulder. “Did you ever wish you could just walk away? Rewind your life back to the day before you became supernaturally inclined and catch an Amtrak out of town?”
I smiled a little, thinking of what Ethan had said. “The thought has occurred to me.”
“All right,” she said, putting her palms flat on the table and blowing out a breath. “It’s time for a pep talk. Ready, set, go.”
That was my cue to call adult swim at the pity pool and kick her out—and then offer up a little motivational magic of my own.
“Mallory Carmichael, you’re a sorceress. You may not like it, but it’s a fact. You have a gift, and you are not going to sit around a Goodwin’s drinking fifty-nine-cent coffee because you’ve got concerns about your assignments. You’re a sorceress—but you’re not a robot. If you have concerns about your job, talk to someone about it. If you think something you’re doing flunks the smell test, then stop doing it. Break the chain of command if that’s what it takes. You have a conscience, and you know how to use it.”
We sat quietly there for a moment, until her decisive nod.
“That’s what I needed.”
“That’s why you love me.”
“Well, that and we wear the same shoe size.” She swiveled in her seat and pulled up a knee. Her foot, now propped on the seat, was snug inside a pair of lime green, limited-edition Pumas . . . one of the pair I’d left at Mal’s house when I’d moved into Cadogan.
“Are those—”
“What they are is so comfy.”
“Mallory Delancey Carmichael.”
“Hey, Street Fest is this weekend,” she suddenly said. “Maybe we could head down and nosh some meat on a stick.”
Street Fest was Chicago’s annual end-of-summer food bash. Restaurants and caterers put up their white vinyl tents in Grant Park to hawk their wares and celebrate the end of August’s roasting heat and steamy humidity. Normally, I was a pretty big fan. Sampling Chicago’s finest grub while listening to live music wasn’t exactly a bad way to spend an evening.
On the other hand, “Are you trying to distract me with roast beast?”
She batted her eyelashes.
“Seriously, Mallory. Those shoes are limited edition. Do you remember how long I tried to find them? We staked out the Web for, like, three weeks.”
“Epistemological crisis here, Mer. Seriously. One cannot tread lightly in cheap knockoff sneaks when one is enmeshed in a crisis.”
I sighed, knowing I’d been beaten.
As it turned out, she didn’t have two hours in her. She needed