Page 40 of Feeding Beauty (The Lost Girls #5)

Lost Girls Assemble

AURORA

S now drags me back to our apartments.

Panic, confusion, and fear swirl inside me, twisting tighter with every breath until I can’t tell where one begins and another ends.

I was right, they wanted Talon all along.

“We need to get Ariel,” Snow says, coding into the front door of our apartment building. The lock opens with a click and a gasp.

“What were you doing, out in a catsuit, in the dead of night?” I ask, taking a closer look at the tight-fitting, black matte outfit that has nothing to do with clubbing or the Poison Apple.

“Err, new workout routine?” she says, blinking those big blue eyes at me.

I cross my arms. “With daggers?”

A lopsided grin blooms on her face as she unlocks the door to her and Ariel’s apartment. “Okay yeah, maybe not the Zumba class everyone else is taking. Let’s just say, you aren’t the only one who’s been keeping secrets.”

Ariel is dead asleep until Snow crashes the door open and flings on the lights. “Wake up girl, our friend needs us,” Snow announces loudly.

“What the hell, Snow,” Ariel says groggily as she shields her eyes from the overhead attack of light.

“Talon has been taken,” she says.

“Wh-what?” Ariel asks, still waking up.

“Talon has been kidnapped by vampires. Keep up,” Snow claps. “We need to get Rap and figure what the hell is going on and save his big broody ass.”

Ariel throws back the sheets and transitions into her chair faster than I thought anyone capable. She rolls to the chest of drawers and pulls out a black band tee shirt.

“Aren’t vampires only hanging in the Midnight Realm?” Ariel asks.

With her back to us, she throws off the silk camisole and tugs on the shirt before going about changing her pants next.

“I’ve been seeing more and more crop over the last couple months. Not from Midnight, regular Boston people turned into suckheads.” Snow whips around to me. “Do you know who’s turning them? Who took Talon?”

I freeze, both Ariel and Snow watching me, waiting for an answer.

“Wh-why would you help me?”

Ariel’s brow furrows. “Because we’re friends.”

“Duh,” Snow adds.

“But—” My brain short circuits as I try to wrap my mind around this. “But I’m a Succubus. I accidentally hurt you guys, I—” My voice chokes from emotion tightening around my throat.

Snow steps closer, putting a hand on my arm. “Hey, so you’re a Succubus. Who the fuck cares?”

“You should. Everyone else will.”

“I mean, I don’t think you want to fuck either of us to death,” Ariel adds.

“Which I find slightly insulting,” Snow sniffs, then playfully squeezes my arm.

“We all got baggage,” Ariel says. “I mean, look at Catwoman here.”

“Hey,” Snow snaps at Ariel. Then looking down at her own attire, she smirks. “Okay, yeah, I have some very well-dressed issues going on myself.”

Snow turns back to me. “But we need to deal with yours first. Tell us everything.”

“Everything?” I say in a small voice.

The idea is terrifying. Legit, fall off a cliff into a pit of sharp rocks terrifying. But they already know I’m a runaway princess. They know I’m a Succubus, and I even accidently hurt them with my power. And they are still here, ready and willing to help me and help Talon.

By the time we push through the door of Poison Apple, Rap’s already there. A full pot of coffee steams on the counter. She has a mug in hand and an alert look in her eye. Between that and the thick eyeliner she sports, I can’t help but wonder if she was already awake.

Her eyes land on me. Keen. Calculating. “You said vampires took him?”

“Yes,” Snow answers before I can. “Organized. Not random.”

Rap’s jaw ticks. “I’ve been hearing chatter for weeks.

Bodies disappearing. People turned. The vampire count in Boston has been slow but steady over the last ten years or so, but the last month?

There’s been a notable uptick.” Her brows furrow.

“There’s also a rise in mage disappearances in the neighboring city.

My gut tells me that’s not a coincidence. ”

“A month ago? That’s when Talon and I started working here,” I say, my voice thin with panic. “When I became a Lost Girl.”

Rap’s eyes narrow. “Someone noticed you.”

“No.” I shake my head. “They noticed him. Mal wants Talon.”

“Mal? You mean Kai’s sister?” Ariel asks.

I nod. “Yes, she’s the one who cursed me.

Kai was right about all of it. She was engaged to my father who broke off the engagement and married my mother a couple weeks later.

She was exiled from the Midnight Kingdom by her father, but what no one knows is she came to Realm of Roses.

She broke into the castle and she...cursed me.

” It’s hard to force the words out. I’ve never told a single solitary person in my life.

Despite the acceptance I’ve received, my insides still quake as I lay it all out.

“She cursed me in my crib before she was run off. When I had my first…um…sexual experience I…uh… I...”

Ariel touches my arm and gives me an encouraging smile. “It’s okay. You can tell us.”

I look at the ceiling to blink back the stinging in my eyes.

“I found out I was a Succubus. After that I had to regularly feed, and my partners never survived. Talon would take care of the details. He would pick people who deserved to meet their fate.” My words are rushed as I try to explain.

“But I didn’t want to be that way anymore.

I came here and tried to get away from what I’ve done, from what I am.

And it’s been so hard.” The words cracks.

I scrub my hands over my face. “If I hadn’t come here, Talon wouldn’t have been forced to follow.

He’s been taking care of me while making sure no one else got hurt.

And because of me, he’s been taken by Mal for fae lords know what. ”

“That Dragon blood made noise.” Rap pours herself another coffee, black and violent. “Noise travels fast. Faster than we realized.”

“So where is she keeping him?” Snow demands. “I’ve been tracking the vampire movement for the last couple weeks, but it’s erratic. Hard to pin down.”

Ariel pulls out her phone. “What’s the pattern? Show me on the map.”

Snow begins dropping pins on Ariel’s phone.

Ariel analyzes it, chewing on her lip. “Disappearances, feeding dens, drain sites. It’s a web. But there’s a center.”

Rap taps her nail on the map. “If Mal has Talon in one of these old crypts, there’s likely power running to it.

These aren’t Midnight Fae. These are Boston people turned vampire.

They aren’t going to forego the luxury of electricity.

Let me make a call and we can find out which one is lit up. ” She steps away, already on the phone.

“I’m gonna go shake down Kai. He was an absolute ass to Aurora, but he wouldn’t be down with this. If he can help us find out where she is, he’ll do it. Even if I have to beat it out of him.”

“Love you, babe,” Ariel says. “But I’m not sure you’ve got what it takes to make Kai squeal.”

Snow shrugs. “Then I’ll get Cinder to step on his balls with her spiky platform boots until he submits.” With that, she’s out the door.

Rap stays on the phone in the corner, barking orders. Ariel keeps working at her map, fingers flying over her screen, piecing together routes and patterns.

And me?

I sink onto one of the barstools. For a moment, it’s just me and a cup of coffee going cold between my hands. The sun is creeping up, bleeding pale light over the Boston skyline. It’s nearly six AM.

My thoughts spiral back to that young vampire sneering at me. “You’re not as powerful or dangerous as she said.”

It was right before Talon went full Dragon, right before everything unraveled. We got swept away by the fight, by each other. But those words haven’t stopped bouncing around my head.

Mal told them I was dangerous. Powerful.

But surely, she didn’t mean I’d roll over and spread my legs in order to murder them. No, she was warning them about something else. She meant something else.

She knew. She knew my hunger, my power, could leave my body. That I could weaponize the curse she strapped to my soul. When my instincts lashed out and targeted Mal, she didn’t look surprised. Intrigued? Maybe. But not shocked.

Granted, it ended in absolute fucking disaster. But for the first time in my life, it felt like I had a grip on something real. Something mine. What if I could...

What I did to that vampire. That wasn’t an accident. My curse can stretch beyond touch, beyond my body. I can control it.

Even now, I feel the tether. Like a muscle flexing under my skin. Coiled, waiting. Fueled by fear, by rage, by hunger...and by my need for him. Talon.

I jump to my feet when Rap comes back. She shakes her head. “I put some feelers out but most of my contacts have their phones on Do Not Disturb and are asleep right now. We’ll have to wait.”

“We can’t wait,” I snap. “We need to go over to that cemetery and start searching the area. Mal had one of her vampires slice a scale off Talon. Whatever she wants from him, it can’t be good. She could be torturing him. Or worse.”

“You’re not wrong,” Rap says, pushing back from the counter. “But we don’t charge in blind. We plan. We arm up. We think this through.”

“There’s no time.” The words rip out of me—too loud, too sharp. “They have him now. They took him for a reason.”

Rap crosses her arms, gaze narrowing. “And running in half-cocked will get you killed. Then who’s going to save him? You’re no good to him dead.”

I jerk like she slapped me. “You think I don’t know that? You think I don’t know how dangerous this is? I don’t care. I can’t sit here and drink coffee while he’s—” My voice breaks. “I can’t do nothing.”

“You’re not doing nothing. You’re regrouping. You’re surviving long enough to fight smart,” Rap says, her tone steel-edged but not unkind. “He’d want that.”

“That’s easy for you to say,” I fire back. “You’re not the one who left him behind.”

“You didn’t leave him. They took him. That’s different.”

It doesn’t feel different.

Rap’s phone rings. She picks up, murmurs, listens. Her expression hardens as she hangs up.

“There’s only one crypt in this area pulling power right now,” she says, pointing at the map Ariel’s built on her phone. “An abandoned burial site in the old district, under St. Ignatius. City records show a power reroute a few weeks ago. It’s too quiet. Too clean. That’s your center.”

“We should wait for Snow,” Ariel says, trying to steady the room. “She’s getting Kai. He’ll talk to his sister. Maybe we can avoid bloodshed.”

I nod. “Okay. You’re right. I’m going to shower and change at my place. Be back in twenty.”

“Wait,” Rap says, stopping me with a hand on my arm. “Take the stairs around the corner. My place is unlocked. You can shower there. I don’t want you wandering off alone when you’re this…raw. Stay close. Take any clothes you need.”

She thinks she’s keeping me safe. Keeping me from doing something reckless.

She doesn’t know me well enough to understand I’ve already decided.

“Thanks,” I say softly, meaning it. Because this is the last kindness I can take from her before I walk into the dark alone.

I head outside and walk right past the entrance to Rap’s apartment.

I can’t risk them. Not for this.

Talon has always been the one to protect me. To drag me back from the edge when my hunger, my curse, my shame tried to devour me whole. He’s bled for me. Burned for me.

He’s not here to protect me now. That means it’s my turn to protect him.

My heart pounding. My hunger roaring. My feet carrying me toward the crypt. Toward Talon.

They’ll forgive me later.

If I survive to earn it.