Unawakened (13 page)

“The rules applying to you also apply to him. She’s off limits. Neither one of you
or
any of your associates will touch her, and you will conduct business as professionals. It might be best if you two pretend you don’t know her. If you want a dog to perform tricks for you, visit a pet shop or hire a dae with a fur coat.” Rob leaned against the bar, relaxing as though the two men weren’t a threat. “Should she be hired, I will inform you at my leisure.”

Neither Kenneth nor Jacob bothered with any pleasantries, excusing themselves with silent, terse nods. When they were gone, Rob laughed, pointing at the empty flutes of champagne.

“What’s so funny?” I demanded, pushing my glass away warily.

“Aphrodisiac, Miss Daegberht. Tasteless, odorless, and it has a reasonably slow onset. He’s not the only one who plays the game. I wonder how close of a relationship those two have.” Rob checked his watch. “I guess they’ll find out in a couple of hours.”

I slapped my hands over my mouth, my eyes widening as I stared at the four glasses on the bar. “You didn’t! How did you do it? I didn’t see you drug any of them.”

“They both looked for residue in the glasses. They wouldn’t believe for an instant I’d risk drugging you, so they picked their glasses first, and I took the last, which is a good way of preventing casual poisonings.”

“You didn’t put any aphrodisiac in the glasses,” I muttered.

Rob grinned at me and finished off his champagne. “I didn’t put anything in the glasses, but I
did
put it in the champagne before I poured it. I thought you wouldn’t mind an energetic evening with me, knowing you’d be ensuring Kenneth and his dae had just as energetic of an evening together. It should kick in right before bed time, and from my understanding, they have no one else living with them right now.”

I slumped over the bar, torn between screaming my head off at him for making such a ludicrous plan or laughing until I cried at the thought of Kenneth at the mercy of a drug.

Laughter won. “Payback’s a bitch.” I drank down the rest of my champagne and eyed the rest of the bottle. “Just how much did you put in the bottle?”

Rob picked up the champagne, went to the sink, and poured the rest down the drain. “Enough neither one of us are having any more of it. I also have a counter for it in case you’d rather not experience the marvels of medication. I assure you it doesn’t have any addictive compounds. I wanted to warn you, but I didn’t want to accidentally reveal my hand. I took the risk assuming you’d forgive me—eventually.”

“How considerate,” I murmured. “However, I pass on the counter. Why waste your efforts? Where—and how—did you get the stuff?”

Rob turned to face one of the security cameras and waved at it. “One of the nice ladies on my security team came up with the idea after I informed them of the drug you’d been dosed with and what it did. She thought it’d be an appropriate payback with no consequences to us for our participation.”

I giggled and waved for the camera, too. “I like her. When do I meet her?”

“Not tonight,” he assured me, leaning towards me for a kiss. “We’re going to be occupied.”

I had no complaints with that at all.

Chapter Nine

While Rob had mentioned wanting to take me to his apartment, I hadn’t expected it to be on the penthouse floor of the same building. I appreciated the short trip, as the champagne had gone straight to my head, leaving me with a pleasant buzz.

Alcohol had never been a drug of choice for me, but it took the edge off, dulling the aftereffects of meeting with Kenneth and his dae. In a way, I was tempted to ask for another glass to finish drowning my anxiety, but I resisted the urge.

Colby had an entire room to itself, and before I could do more than laugh, my roommate claimed the television remote and nested on one of the pillows. The bag of apples Rob took out of the fridge would keep Colby quiet for hours; I grinned at both of the dae.

“If only everyone was so easy to please,” Rob murmured, closing the bedroom door. “If we hear a peep out of Colby tonight, I’ll be astonished.”

He led me to the main room, and I stared out the wall to wall window. The lights of the city below woke the memories of dangling from the faulty rappelling gear during our escape from the Ivory Tower. We were so far above everything, and the height chilled me almost as much as the realization I had somehow stepped out of my safe, comfortable little world into a whole new one filled with rules I didn’t understand.

Rob joined me, wrapping his arm around my waist to pull me to his side. “What’s bothering you?”

Sometimes, living with a dae capable of sensing my emotions really annoyed me. I sighed and pointed at Baltimore. “It’s just so different.”

“Small steps, Alexa. It is different from what you’re used to, isn’t it? Does my wealth bother you?”

There was no point in denying it. I nodded, tensing in anticipation of ruining the harmony I had somehow forged with the elite dae.

“Believe it or not, I worked almost as hard as you to get here. Sure, I’ve had to go about it in a different way than you, but it doesn’t change the fact wealth isn’t the end of the journey. If anything, I have a hell of a lot farther to fall if I make a mistake. I try not to make them, but I do.”

“Harder, if you’ve been working remotely. From a different world remotely,” I pointed out.

“That’s not what’s really bothering you, is it?”

Sometimes, living with a dae capable of sensing my emotions
really
annoyed me. Wrinkling my nose, I turned and prodded his ribs. “It bothers me I might not have come this far without you around making a pest of yourself.”

“I believe you would have. All my being here has done is speed things up a little. You’re smart. You’re resourceful. You’re both wonderfully and frustratingly stubborn. I don’t mind you stepping on me here and there to get to where you want to go. Maybe I want to see how far you’ll go. Wallowing in your insecurities isn’t like you.”

I scowled because he was right, but it didn’t ease my worries.

Would I, because of him, cease standing on my own? Would I care?

Maybe Lily had had the right idea living as a kept woman under Kenneth’s heel. Maybe she hadn’t looked over Baltimore from a penthouse suite near the Ivory Tower, but how much had Kenneth provided for her behind the scenes?

Enough the woman had been ready to kill me over it.

“You know, Alexa, there’s one thing that sets those of the lower castes apart from those in the higher castes. Maybe I haven’t been around here as much as I should have over the years, but the higher I go, the more I have to rely on others to do my work for me. Independence is an illusion. The only choice you really get to make is how you bind yourself. In the end, we’re all tied to the train tracks, even those who think they’re on the very top of the world looking down at everyone else. All you’ve done is change which tracks you’re tied to.”

I don’t know which frightened me more: that Rob was right, or that I still wanted something more.

It was a good thing Rob had had the foresight to acquire enough counter for the aphrodisiac for both of us; he underestimated the drug’s potency. Every time I looked at him, I burst into helpless fits of laughter, which earned me more than a few scowls.

True to his prediction, I had enjoyed it, but there was only so much I could handle before exhaustion warred with my desire for more.

Our reaction to the drug made me wonder how Kenneth and his dae were handling their evening.

I wanted them both to suffer all night long.

“I’m not a very nice person,” I confessed between laughs, gasping in deep breaths of air.

“I’ve added this to the list of things never to do to myself ever again. Why didn’t you stop me?” Rob groaned, rolling onto his stomach next to me. “You’re supposed to hate everything about any sort of drug.”

I laughed and trailed my finger along the length of his spine. “You said it lacked addictive properties. You did not say it would turn us into sex-crazed fiends. Even if you had, I don’t think I would have declined such a nice way to spend my evening.”

After a lifetime of not being able to touch someone, I enjoyed every moment with Rob. I had every intention of enjoying him whenever I could in case he became another of my allergy triggers.

The thought of losing what I had with the dae sent a shiver through me. Determined not to allow myself to ruin my mood, I held him close and enjoyed the warmth of his body.

Rob chuckled. “While we were busy entertaining Mr. Smith, I had someone go to your apartment and get our laptops, your schoolwork, and other important odds and ends. I figured I’d save us the trip tomorrow. You’re still planning on applying to work with the police?”

While I didn’t like the idea of someone going through my apartment without me there, I did appreciate not having to make the trip—or leaving my illegal laptop where someone might find it and get too close of a look at it.

“Yes. I can’t think of any other way to get the information on those women. The public databases haven’t been updated, and they probably won’t be. The government might provide a list of the deceased to help smooth the transition, but I doubt it. It’s pretty obvious those who have vanished aren’t coming back.”

“Eaten by their dae or taken over,” Rob confirmed.

“Hell, Rob, I still worry I’m on some mass hallucinogen sometimes. Vampires taste like
candy
,” I wailed.

“I should start running a protection racket for the vampires. If they pay me, I’ll make sure you don’t steal their blood,” Rob teased.

“Bite me,” I hissed.

Growling at me, Rob struck fast and hard, nipping my neck before I could fend him off. A laugh burst out of me. “So tempting,” he murmured, his lips brushing my skin.

“I surrender. No more, Rob. No more. We’ll die.” I giggled, wiggled free of his grip on me, and stole his bathrobe. “I hope Kenneth is so raw tomorrow he can’t walk. His stupid dae, too.”

“Ouch, Alexa. That’s harsh.”

“Deserved.”

“Deserved, but harsh.”

“Are you sure we couldn’t have just poisoned them?”

“You’re really out for his blood, aren’t you? I
could
have poisoned them, but then it’d be very obvious. He’ll likely suspect I did something to the champagne, but he has no way to prove it, especially when he saw me pouring a glass for you.”

I sighed and held my hands up in surrender. “You said you had someone bring my laptop? I may as well fill out the basic application so I can get this show on the road. If I’m going to ruin his life, I want to get a head start. After, to bed.” I paused, narrowing my eyes as I watched Rob. “To sleep, and I don’t mean like that.”

“I’ll be making a few plans of my own while you do that, then.” Rob slid out of bed, headed to his closet, and pulled out another bathrobe. “You’re not the only one who is going to be playing this game, Miss Daegberht. If you’re going to be our eyes on the ground, I want to be ready to act, too.”

“Are you sure we can’t just drag him into a dark alley and get rid of him?”

“Patience. We ruin him first, then we drag him into a dark alley and get rid of him when no one cares he’s gone. Let’s not invite more trouble than we need. He’ll be gone soon enough. We need to bide our time and be careful. There’s no point in winning if we’re executed along with him.”

Rob was right.

I grumbled curses and wondered why everything had to be so difficult. “I just want him out of my life.”

“You and me both, Alexa. You and me both.”