Page 72 of Ballad of Nightmares

Was it him?she asked.

He stared at the phone briefly, biting the inside of his mouth.A call, yes. In a different part of the realm.

Why does he not answer all of them within his borders?

Sometimes it is too many, and his demons help.

Three dots strummed the bottom of the screen for a moment, and while he waited on her to respond, Luna jumped onto the table and began to purr and wind between his arms.

The door opened, Rolfe stepping inside, and by the look on his face, Sam knew he wouldn’t have much time for flirting today.

“Damien is on the line,” Rolfe said.

Sam nodded. “I’ll be up in a minute.”

Come over for dinner?Ana had asked.

Doubles, Sam said.I’ll call you later before I go in. Have a good day, baby.

You too.

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

FOR THREE NIGHTS, Sam barely slept.

Even with how exhausted he’d been with the people from the Spine, he hadn’t slept more than an hour or two.

The call with Damien had been brief. He’d only told him what he’d told Millie, and said he’d have more. And he wasn’t exaggerating.

Damien had brought two hundred more beings over the border for him the night after the prison, but this last night had been quiet, so Sam had ended up in his garden again.

He’d lied to Ana and said he had doubles at work the last two nights. He’d needed time to recover from the Spine souls, as well as time to think about her and how things had changed. He’d even gone alone uptown to the museum to try and clear his head, see if the art could give him some sort of guidance, but all it did was remind him of her.

That morning, he’d been so bent out of shape about not seeing her that he’d broken into her apartment and fucked her over morning coffee before lying and saying he had to go back to work.

He’d brought him and Rolfe breakfast back, though because Rolfe wasn’t up yet, he’d started the coffee and went out to the garden again to fertilize the roses.

A compost of bodies Rolfe had taken his own justice upon lie at the back of Sam’s grand garden grounds. He grabbed a wheelbarrow and a shovel before making off for it, Luna riding in the wheelbarrow like it was her personal chariot.

Rolfe woke and brought coffee out to the garden once he’d figured out what Sam was doing. Together, they spent the morning replanting and taking new cuttings, trimming the bushes, and fertilizing the plethora of plants.

“What’s wrong?” Rolfe asked him as they dumped the last pile of compost out and began to spread it. “Other than you’re being tired.”

“Why does something have to be wrong?” Sam asked, eager to avoid the question.

“Because you do physical labor when you can’t think straight,” Rolfe grunted.

Sam propped his hands on the stake of his rake, and Rolfe’s mouth quirked as he realized he’d gotten under Sam’s skin.

“We’ve been best friends five hundred years,” Rolfe said. “Think I don’t know when you’re brooding? I’d be more worried if you were painting.”

“I like painting,” Sam said.

“You paint when you’re sad,” Rolfe said, stopping his raking. “So talk.”

A heavy sigh left Sam as his gaze swept out to the far streets. “You didn’t make it to the prison the other night,” he said plainly.

“Had a few errands to run,” Rolfe said with a shrug. “She put on a good show?”