Unawakened (39 page)

“It was very nice listening to her while she kept my octopus company in the kitchen. His name is Oliver, by the way. You’d have known that several days ago if you came within talking distance, since I was incapable of communicating above a hoarse whisper.”

“Seriously? It’s still in the sink? You haven’t eaten the damned thing yet?”

Oliver clanged his ladle against the faucet.

“If you get sprayed with ink again, you’re cleaning it up. I
just
finished removing the black spots from you tormenting him. Get my octopus a proper house. Oliver is a he, thank you very much.”

“You like the octopus more than you like me.”

“Unlike you, Oliver isn’t a coward, Coward. He’s also house broken.”

At the rate Oliver was banging his ladle against the faucet, he’d break the house, but I wasn’t going to argue the semantics with Sullivan.

“Aren’t you going to ask me how Rob is doing?”

I narrowed my eyes, huffed, and turned my back to the vampire. “No. He’s fine, because if he weren’t fine, you would have told me. If you have failed to tell me, I will be feeding you piece by piece to Oliver, who I do like far better than you at this point. I behaved, sleeping on the couch so Rob wouldn’t catch my cold. None of you seemed all that concerned. I could have had pneumonia for all you knew, since you wouldn’t get close enough to actually find out.”

“Ouch. No need to be vindictive.”

“Oliver isn’t afraid of me and my germs.”

“While you were sick, you weren’t
that
sick. Despite appearances, we were actually watching to make certain you didn’t have pneumonia. Anyway, Rob would have told us if you were in any serious trouble.”

“Was it truly necessary to hug the wall when you were coming and going? A bit much, don’t you think? I thought dae could take a beating better than plain, ordinary, powerless, unawakened little humans like me.”

“You’re not going to let us live this down, are you?”

“Not a chance in hell, bat boy.”

“It wasn’t that bad, Alexa. We don’t know how your human illnesses will affect us.”

“As if something like a little cold can kill you when a gun can’t.” I crossed my arms over my chest, lifted my chin, and huffed. “Surely
someone
has had a cold in the city since the Dawn of Dae. I can’t possibly be the only unawakened in Baltimore.”

“You’re not,” Sullivan conceded with a sigh.

“It’s cold season. Deal with it. No wonder you’re still a virgin. Where’s Netzach, anyway? I bet I could talk him into eating you. Then you won’t have to worry about catching a cold.”

“I’ll bribe you with a bottle of my special whiskey if you promise you won’t feed me to Netzach.”

“I’ll consider it.”

“Netzach and Sandalphon are running interference and making certain no one realizes we’re the reason Kenneth Smith has been missing for almost a week.”

“I see. The slime bag hasn’t made a miraculous recovery. That’s good.”

“Very few would make a recovery after being shot in the face with a tactical nuke.”

I choked on my own spit. “That was a
nuke
?”

“I thought the radioactive warning label would have been sufficient to inform you about the nature of the projectile.”

“How the hell would I have known? I’ve never seen the symbol before in my life!” My voice went up in pitch, and I coughed and swallowed to regain control of myself. “I guess that’s why the ship sank.”

“Nuclear projectiles detonated in close proximity to ship hulls tend to make a mess of them. You punched a thirty-foot hole through the keel. The ship didn’t stand a chance.”

My face burned from my embarrassment and horror. I couldn’t believe I had actually shot something as dangerous as a nuke in close quarters. “Oops.”

“At least it’s a low radiation yield. Even if you were exposed, you shouldn’t start glowing in the dark.”

A pair of hands slid along my shoulders, and warm breath teased the side of my neck. “That’s a pity. I can think of a few things we could try if you start glowing in the dark.”

I sucked in a breath and held it, afraid I was somehow hallucinating Rob’s voice in my ear and the fact I wasn’t itching from the contact of another’s skin pressed to mine.

Sullivan chuckled. “Decided to come out of your hole, have you?”

Rob yawned, resting his chin on my shoulder. “I figured if you were going to be so noisy, I’d at least come in here and enjoy the company. I don’t mean yours, Sullivan.”

“What did I do?”

I lifted my hands so I could tangle my fingers in Rob’s hair, sighing my relief his presence in our bedroom hadn’t been a lie. I closed my eyes and fought the burn of tears. The tension in my muscles eased. “Hello, Rob.”

“Hello, Alexa. Miss me?”

Torn between relief and annoyance over the fact Sullivan was still around, I snorted before replying, “Who’d miss you?”

Rob laughed.

“Why is there an octopus in the sink?”

I stretched on the couch and yawned, rolling over and covering my head with my blanket. I could have kicked Marlene and Analise out of the bedroom, but both of the women had collapsed in an exhausted stupor.

I was grateful for their help taking care of Rob while I contaminated the living room with my germs. I let them sleep on the bed, and Rob and I shared the couch.

I was too warm and sated to want to move, let alone worry about the problem of Oliver’s residence in our sink.

“Alexa? There’s a live octopus in the sink. Why is there an octopus in the sink?”

Apparently Rob didn’t handle creatures living in the sink very well. After a moment of consideration, I filed away the tidbit of knowledge for a later time. “His name is Oliver. Shh. I’m sleepy, Rob. Leave Oliver alone.”

“How am I supposed to cook dinner if there’s an octopus in the sink? Why is Oliver in the sink?”

“He doesn’t like the bucket.”

“Bucket? What bucket?”

“The one Sullivan brought him back here in. If he bangs on the faucet with his ladle, he’s hungry or wants something. Oh, don’t be surprised if you wake up with him attached to your head. He gets lonely.”
 

I had only shrieked the first two or three times I had woken up with Oliver’s tentacles wrapped around my head.

“He gets out of the sink and wraps himself around your head? Isn’t Colby enough of a handful for you?” Rob sighed. “Oliver does not belong in the sink. What have you been feeding him?”

“There’s fish for him in the fridge.” The conversation woke me enough I couldn’t fall back to sleep, and I already missed Rob’s warmth on the couch. “If you’re hungry, Minangi brought a pot of soup over. It’s in the fridge, too.”

“Why do we have an octopus, anyway?”

“I’m pretty sure Oliver’s the only reason I didn’t drown.”

I sat up in time to watch Rob dip his hands into the sink, grab Oliver, and hold him up. Oliver flailed his tentacles before wrapping them around both of Rob’s hands. The octopus shifted colors to a vibrant blue, a match for Rob’s eyes.

“You have earned your rent for at least a year. And a new house—one that isn’t my sink. Good job, Oliver.”

Oliver squirmed free of Rob’s grip and splashed into the sink, snatching his ladle before banging it against the faucet.

“
Not food
!” Colby wailed from its bedroom.

I flopped onto the couch, pulled the blanket back over my head, and wondered if I’d ever return to having a normal life.

Probably not.

A week after I killed Kenneth Smith, Sullivan, Analise, and Marlene got the hint I didn’t appreciate having one of them in our home at all times. I delivered the hint in the form of incoherent snarls and poorly aimed kicks, concluding my childish tantrum with a loud slam of the door when I finally managed to herd them out.

“Don’t come back until you’re ready to do something productive,” I snarled, not caring if the dae heard me.

Rob lounged on the couch, his arms stretched along the back with his usual smirk in place. “I was wondering when you’d snap. I’m grateful you didn’t grab Oliver from his tank and throw him at Sullivan again.”

I glanced in the direction of the octopus’s tank, a ten-foot wide monstrosity with an entire coral reef for Oliver’s enjoyment. I couldn’t spot the cephalopod anywhere in the clear waters. “In case you weren’t aware, I have laid exclusive claim to you. That does not mean you get to have two girlfriends and a boyfriend in the wings.”

Snorting his laughter, Rob shook his head. “They’re just worried. Their happy bubble of security was popped, and they don’t like it. They really dislike the fact you, my beautiful unawakened, got the revenge they all wanted. They’ll get over it.”

“I thought you were dead,” I hissed.

He grimaced. “I know. They told me you weren’t exactly being reasonable about the whole thing. Really, Miss Daegberht. You
could
have used a regular bullet on the likes of Mr. Smith. Externalized bonded are not so different from unawakened humans. Shooting him in the head would have worked. It’s the internalized dae you have to worry about, especially the strong ones.”

“He hurt you.”

Rob smiled, sliding his hand along the couch to pat the cushion beside him. “Come sit. Now that the interlopers have been evicted, we can talk about what happened without you having to sacrifice your pride and dignity in the process. Marlene’s been rather quiet about everything that happened after we left Minangi’s restaurant.”

“They’ve haven’t told you anything?”

“After you snarled at Sullivan—”

“Munkar.”

Rob arched a brow. “He told you his name?”

“No, Analise was talking to Minangi, and she told him I had gone to him—to Munkar—for help. I don’t think Analise likes Sullivan very much.”

“Sullivan—yes, Munkar—makes a lot of people uncomfortable. It’s his nature. I wouldn’t worry about it. I wouldn’t, however, wish for anything within his domain. Munkar’s wishes have a tendency to backfire in spectacular ways. The dae who grant wishes, including Munkar, must keep their word, but they’ll often leave things up to interpretation.”

“Smith kept wishing to know who could give me to him.” A shudder ran through me, and I crossed the living room to sink onto the couch beside Rob. He circled his arm around me and tucked me close to his side.

“He’s not going to bother either one of us again thanks to you. In the next few days, things will get back to normal. You’ll go back to work with the police, you’ll return to college, and instead of dealing with Smith’s operations, you’ll have more time to spend with me.” Rob chuckled, drawing circles on my upper arm with his fingertips. “You’ll be interested to learn Jacob vanished during a shift with the police. He’s been charged with desertion.”

“I haven’t shown up for work, either,” I whimpered.

“You’re not going to be charged with desertion, darling. The police appreciated you not spreading your germs around the general population. Analise has been taking care of all the necessities. If anything, that sergeant fellow seemed relieved you intended to continue your work with them since I’ve been found.”

“Until they find out I was involved in Kenneth Smith’s death.”

“Involved?”

“I didn’t kill him, a nuke did.”

“A nuke you fired, young lady. How the hell did you get hold of that, anyway?”

I swallowed and bit my lip.

“What did you do?”

“Why do you always assume I’ve done something?” I barely resisted the urge to wrinkle my nose. While it was healing, touching it still hurt and the bruises hadn’t quite faded.

“You’re alive,” he replied in a rueful tone. “Just tell me how you got it.”

“I offered Sullivan a vial of my blood to help me find you—or get revenge for your death.”

Rob remained silent for a long moment before sighing. “You used a weapon I had given him. Of course. I should have known. I’ll go with you when it’s time to pay up, just to make sure nothing goes amiss.”

“It’s not the first time we’ve made a deal. He’s fair.”

With his cheek twitching, Rob leveled a narrow-eyed stare in my direction. “Stop that. That’s not fair, giving him your blood when you won’t give any to me.”

“Next time I get a paper cut I’ll let you steal a lick, you shameless dae.”