Page 30 of A Token of Blood and Betrayal (Kennedy Rain #4)

I enclosed the dossier within multiple pillowcases.

I didn’t know how to respond to Deagan’s observation.

He made me sound like I was a savior, like I knew what I was doing and was nobly pursuing some kind of justice.

In truth, I was fumbling my way through the paranormal world. I was making mistakes, making bargains.

I took the hopefully innocuous pillow-stored dossier to the kitchen. Thordis had returned. She lounged on the couch, confident enough this time to prop her feet back up on the coffee table, pink toenails on display. She swiped through a phone, not looking up when I walked past.

“Your tools.” Deagan swept his hand toward the table. I half expected to see a quill and ink. Fortunately, he’d gathered an envelope, plain white paper, and a ballpoint pen. “Wine?”

Red liquid poured from the bottle to the glass, Deagan gently swirling to aerate it.

Pretty ineffectual, and I didn’t like the way the wine seemed to cling to the glass a little too long before settling.

While I believed it was wine, it still made my stomach churn.

Arcuro had consumed blood from glasses. I might never drink a red again.

“No, thanks.” I set the dossier on the table and picked up the pen. “What do I need to write?”

Deagan proceeded to give me a page worth of explanations, threats, and little digs, all of which were slightly vague and nonsensical if you didn’t already know what he was talking about.

I didn’t try to keep up with his train of thought.

Instead, I ignored his suggestions and kept the message succinct.

Satine,

Not all the plates burned.

Leave me and mine alone. Don’t, and Samuel learns everything.

Kennedy Rain

“How do I get it to her?” I asked, interrupting Deagan’s ongoing monologue. He peered down at the letter.

“I suppose that works.”

I gave him a little smile, folded the paper, then placed it in the envelope.

Deagan took the letter. “I know an individual who will deliver it immediately.”

I lifted the pillow-cased journal. “Any chance you have notes on fey?”

“Probably. I’ve been alive a long time. It’s a big book. I wrote things down so I wouldn’t have to remember.”

Not helpful. I’d have to find time to look more closely. “I need to run. I have a couple of things to do before I go home.”

Thordis bounced to her feet. “Good. I was beginning to get bored.”

“You can go back to the hotel.”

“Nope,” she said. “Can’t leave you unprotected.”

“I have Deagan.”

She crossed her toned arms. “Sun’s still up.”

“She does have a point,” Deagan said. “For the next three hours or so.”

I pressed my lips together. I’d been planning on Deagan “protecting” me from the trunk.

Thordis was the more logical choice, but…

“I’ll be interacting with humans. You don’t always act…

normal.” Politely put. “It’ll be boring and mundane, and you’ll go crazy just sitting there.

That will attract attention I don’t want. ”

“No problem,” she said. Her posture, the lift of her chin, her crossed arms—damn, I wish I had her muscle definition—said I had no chance of changing her mind.

“Fine. Get your shoes. You’ll have to leave your weapons in the car.”

She laughed dismissively. “That wouldn’t be very protector-y.”

“It will be fine. We’ll be around humans, not paranorms.”

“I’ll borrow a pillowcase.”

“They don’t allow pillowcases.” I had no idea if that was true, but it would draw attention.

“That’s dumb,” Thordis said. “It’s more difficult than you would think to smother someone with an empty pillowcase.”

I chose not to respond to that.

It might have been cruel, but I relished the way Thordis visibly wilted from inactivity.

I’d warned her the errands would be boring.

Twenty minutes wasn’t even a long time to wait at a bank.

The service was so quick and efficient I considered writing a review.

I’d honestly thought obtaining a cashier’s check would be difficult considering the not-so-high amount sitting in my account.

Thordis didn’t appreciate how smooth the whole process went.

Even the power company had its act together, and the woman who took the check was remarkably pleasant considering how long it had been since I paid.

Yet within thirty seconds of her asking us to sit, Thordis was squirming in her chair, tapping her foot on the ground, drumming her fingers on the wooden armrest. Multiple times, I found myself excusing her restlessness with a tight smile and "She struggles in social situations.”

We left after the clerk assured us The Rain’s electricity would be restored within the hour. I’d actually accomplished something. Sure, I’d screwed up by not paying the bill in the first place, but I gave myself credit for adulting.

With the sun dipping toward the horizon, I merged onto the highway. It split a few miles later, and instead of going south toward The Rain, I headed east. It might be a bad decision, but I’d decided to drop by Carrie’s. “I have one more stop to make.”

“Hmm,” Thordis mused. “What happened to get in, get out, go home?”

“I’m kinda going home. I promised my roommate I’d drop by. My rent is paid through the summer, so technically I still live there.”

Her next hmm didn’t sound surprised or concerned. She’d probably suspected I didn’t plan to go straight back to The Rain.

“Carrie is my roommate. John is a friend who lives in the apartment across from us. They’re normal college students.

Smart, social, fun. They mean a lot to me.

They don’t know about the paranormal world, and they think…

” I couldn’t believe I was going to say this.

“Blake told them The Rain is an exclusive sex resort. So just—”

A laugh exploded from the Valkyrie. She slapped a hand on the dash, her grin stretching across her face.

“Blake is now, officially, my favorite werewolf,” she said.

“He was already toward the top of my list with that build and those eyes and his smile. A sex resort.” She laughed again.

“He and I can make that claim true. In every building. Multiple times and in every position. Goddess, I’d even leave the Null again to have his magic pound—”

“Enough daydreaming, Thordis.” I gave myself huge props for so casually interrupting. I couldn’t be mad or jealous. I had no right to Blake. In fact, it would be great if they hooked up. I could add it to my reasons-not-to-sleep-with-Blake list.

“Just try to be human-ish,” I said. “Please.”

“No problem.” She grinned. “I can pull it off. I have pink nail polish.”

Fifteen minutes later, I parked in the first empty spot I could find, then took the sidewalk to my building.

Even though I had a Valkyrie at my side, my gaze flicked from one sunset-stretched shadow to another, hoping a fey wouldn’t step into my path.

But the only paranorm I saw was Eli, the earth elemental my parents had asked to watch out for me.

I ground my teeth. If I’d known he was here because of them, I’d have been extremely annoyed.

I probably would have insisted they call him off.

I’d definitely demand they tell me why they thought I needed protection, which was likely the reason they hadn’t told me anything. They’d been keeping secrets.

Eli met us at the stairs to my apartment. He dipped his head in a respectful hello to me. Then he gave Thordis a more curt nod. “Valkyrie.”

Thordis put a finger to her lips. “Shhh. I’m a secret.”

Eli didn’t react to her theatrics.

“It’s good to see you again,” I said. “Have there been any problems? Any visitors I should know about?”

“Jared’s vampires come by regularly,” he said. “Sometimes they check in with me. Sometimes they stay and walk the perimeter. Lehr sends a wolf most days.”

“Lehr sends them?” My voice sounded flat.

I couldn’t help it. I’d treated Lehr with respect most of my life.

That respect ended when he’d hunted down the unsanctioned.

It had turned into hatred when he forced me to kill Shelli.

Now I could barely stand the sound of his name. “Is anyone here tonight?”

Eli shook his head. “The wolf left at sunset.”

“To avoid crossing paths with a vampire, I bet,” Thordis said.

“Let me know if anyone…” I faded off. Something had changed in Eli’s expression. He was studying Thordis, a wrinkle between his eyes. That wrinkle smoothed out a second later, like he’d just figured something out.

“Thordis,” he said.

A chill prickled the hair at the back of my neck. I hadn’t introduced him to Thordis yet, and the way he’d said her name… It sounded like he recognized her.

My gaze shifted to Thordis and locked in place there. Her entire face had hardened into something sharp and lethal. She became a Valkyrie. A warrior. A weapon.

“Thordis?” I tried pulling her attention away from Eli. I might as well have not existed.

“I have no quarrel with you,” Eli said. “And no reason to speak to your kind.”

She held a knife in her right hand. It hadn’t been there a moment ago.

I risked a step toward Eli, cutting slightly to the left so I was more in her field of vision. “You were going to do your best to act human, remember?”

Eli placed his hand on my shoulder, eased me out of the way. “Put away your weapon. You know where to find me if I’m not true to my word.”

Thordis’s nostrils flared. The atmosphere felt too still, too closed in, too quiet. If Eli blinked wrong, violence would erupt at the foot of my apartment stairs.

What the hell was going on here? She hadn’t acted this way with Deagan.

A number of rapid heartbeats passed. Then the world released its breath, and Thordis’s knife disappeared. She looked at me. “We’re meeting your friends, right?”

Note to self: Reread Phedre’s and Thordis’s employment applications. And maybe check Deagan’s dossier too.