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A loud noise erupted from inside the room, and Phillip kicked the door down after activating one of the unique contraptions he’d taken out of his pocket. The sizzle of magic faded away to nothing. When the sparkly cloud dispersed, Phillip was inside the large, richly decorated room wrestling a man nearly a foot taller than himself to the floor. With his knee on the back of the supposed Cassius’s neck, Phillip swept back his dark hair like he was at a photoshoot and not in the middle of a brawl, then effortlessly wrapped a luminous silver thread around the pinned stranger’s arms.

Pulling both ends of the thin string, the man beneath my partner cried out and grunted. “Been a minute since I got to see this pretty face of yours, Cash. How many markings do you have now? Twenty? Thirty? Fifty?” Phillip licked his lips, definitely the only person having any amount of fun in that room. “You’ve been a naughty boy, haven’t you?”

I, on the other hand, was just fucking confused.

A beam of vibrant purple luminosity, Cassius’s gaze lifted from the floor to find me in the doorway. The stranger’s irises were a color no human eye could replicate. It gave me the chills. White-blonde hair was styled fashionably around the captive man’s eyes, framing a face that could easily steal the hearts of anyone who came across his beauty. Even with dark markings displayed all over his body, which could easily be written off as tattoos, the stranger was painfully beautiful. Lucky for me, after being around nothing but gorgeous vampires bent on draining my life away, I knew the look of danger when I saw it.

Cassius was definitely bad news.

The visible markings all over Cassius’s face and body did, however, explain why Phillip evaded my question earlier in the club. Very likely, it wasn’t out of welcome we came to this room. And it was even less likely that Cassius expected us to come at all. Because Cassius was a Dark Fae.

“Oh, fuck me,” the pinned man groaned, voice tainted by a super posh English accent.

“I’ll pass, old friend.”

Phillip took a second to laugh at his own lame joke, and I took a minute to ponder how a man like Phil somehow became my drug of choice. Clearly, hormones were to blame. “Fancy seeing you here, out and about, when you promised never to return to this part of the world without my permission. I needn’t remind you what I warned would happen if you did,” Phillip remarked casually, but every word landed with the promise of violence.

So, the Dark Fae was on the run from the Organization, and probably for good reason. He’d killed people. With how many markings Cassius sported, he’d killed enough to earn himself a substantial number of runes. But I wasn’t terribly sure what the Fae punishment system looked like. A hundred lives for one rune? A thousand?

I’d have to ask Phil later.

Still, maybe there was more to this Dark Fae’s story than what presented on his face. Maybe I hadn’t been given the entire picture yet.

One could only hope.

“A Dark Fae?” I asked of my partner.

Phillip tightened his grip on the pinned man, who grunted and went rigid. “I told you. The Organization works with all types. He used to be an informant for the Organization.” Cassius scoffed before Phillip delivered a small knee twist to the back of his neck. “And now he’s my little underground spy. This bastard keeps tabs on a few Dark Fae for me with a little...incentive.”

Probably better off not asking what sort of incentive Phillip used. Something told me I’d regret it.

Cassius coughed as Phillip locked something around the Dark Fae’s wrist, and glowing veins appeared along Cassius’s forearms, beaming in short bursts like a strobe light. The light grew like vines and disappeared under the Dark Fae’s clothing, but seconds later appeared along his neck and face.

“You’re a fucking bastard. What did I do to deserve this bracelet? I don’t have any reason to lie to you.”

“Well, Cash, you failed to mention Eros was back on the prowl.”

Cassius seemed genuinely surprised to hear it. “Eros? Impossible.”

“Oh, but he is. Or at least he was when he attacked my partner and I. I trust you didn’t hear anything about it, then?”

“Not a damn word. He’s been a ghost for the last few decades. No one knew he was back,” Cassius responded quickly, evidently afraid of upsetting Phillip.

The Austrian hummed low in his throat before lifting the Dark Fae off the ground and nodding for me to come inside. “I’ll let it slide this time, but you’re going to have to give me something in return.”

Cassius was haphazardly thrown onto the in-room couch, and Phillip tossed another device into the air as I stalked forward. The door returned to its previous state of repair and the sensation of magic returned to the air. “You were the informant for the same mission where Rose’s son and daughter-in-law perished, yes?”

The Dark Fae eyed me shortly, obviously curious about who I was. His eyes swept down my body in silent intrigue, moving as if he’d figure it all out just from looking at me.

Gross.

“You know I was,” Cassius finally bit out, visibly irritated.

“You were the last person to see my parents alive?” I questioned, trying to keep my voice even. “How did they die?”

With a sigh, Cassius managed to get himself upright on the couch. He moved his torso awkwardly, evidently in pain from Phillip’s mistreatment. “Not the way the Organization claims it happened, but something tells me you already suspected that.”

His purple eyes bewitched me as I dropped to a crouch in front of the Dark Fae, face removed of all emotion. To be safe, I kept a dagger in one hand, ready to fight him off if Cassius got out of whatever weird string Phillip used on him. “Then what happened?” I demanded.