Page 41 of Grim’s Delight (The New Protectorate Syndicate #1)

TWENTY-ONE

It was the longest three hours of his life. He made damn sure it was the longest three hours of his mens’ lives, too.

They’d been celebrating the end of the war for too long.

That was the only reasonable explanation he could come up with for how Dahlia managed to waltz out of the house completely unchallenged.

His girl was a lot of things, but trained in stealth techniques and exfiltration she was not.

For her to have so easily escaped spoke of a dire lack of discipline among his men.

His wrath rippled outward through the ranks, promising retribution against everyone who failed one of the most basic and important jobs in their organization.

If Dahlia could walk right out, there was every chance someone could walk right in, and they had way too much to lose to allow a breach like that.

Tracking her down was easy enough. She had no cash on her, so all they had to do was wait her out before her payment ID pinged somewhere in the city.

He couldn’t sit still, though, so he’d gone out with the search parties, hitting all the nearest transit hubs in the hope that someone would find her as soon as possible. Every man knew exactly how important it was for their health that she be returned unharmed.

Of course, it was Luis who got to her first.

Felix and Milo got to the house a few moments before his cousin did. He swaggered into the foyer like he expected trumpets and a herald to announce his victory. Dahlia walked stiffly beside him, looking considerably worse for wear.

The relief of seeing her whole and healthy, if disheveled and a little dirty, was a punch to the gut.

“Milo, you owe me fifty bucks,” Luis crowed, clapping his hands together with delight. “She jumped out of the window and onto the pergola!”

Milo, who was somehow more upset than Felix at the breach in their security, scowled at his jubilant older brother.

He then leveled that look at Dahlia. If he thought it would intimidate her, he was sadly mistaken.

That look had made hardened soldiers shrink in their boots, but Dahlia was made of stronger stuff.

She glared back at him, arms crossing in front of her chest, and tapped her foot.

Cutting right to the heart of Felix’s second in command with deadly precision, she sniffed, “Your security could use some work. The window wasn’t even locked.”

Luis found that hilarious, but the man in charge of said security markedly less so. Milo sucked in a deep, calming breath. In his usual tightly controlled voice, he said, “I’m glad you made it home safely.”

Still not looking at Felix, she scoffed. “Barely. Your brother drives like a maniac. Do they not have speed restrictions on the grid here?”

Luis rolled his eyes. Like they were best buddies all of a sudden, he wagged a finger in Dahlia’s face and explained, “Vampires built this city, sugar. No way any of us were going to let some m-grid tell our cars how fast they should go.”

“Then what is the point of having one in the first place?”

“Well, everyone else?—”

Felix’s voice cut through the air in one clean, vicious stroke. “All of you — out.”

There was no argument, though Luis did give Dahlia a sympathetic pat on the shoulder before sauntering away. From over her shoulder, he raised his eyebrows at Felix and went bzzt bzzt while miming pressing a button with his thumb . When Felix scowled, he shrugged and walked out of the foyer.

After gesturing sharply for the men to follow him, Milo went in another direction. It would be his job to see everyone who’d fucked up punished appropriately and retrained.

That left Felix and Dahlia alone.

She eyed him warily, clearly bracing herself for his wrath. “Look, Felix, I know you’re?—”

He didn’t let her finish. In two long strides he had her face between his hands and their lips crushed together in a hungry, devouring kiss.

The tension that had seized his muscles the moment he discovered she was missing finally dissipated, leaving all of his nerve endings buzzing with a sudden influx of energy.

He kissed her again and again and again, until his lips were sore and the urgency gradually bled out of him. “A window?” he growled, tangling his claws into her hair. “You could’ve broken your fucking neck.”

“Honestly, getting over the dock’s gate was more dangerous,” she muttered.

“Do you have any idea what could’ve happened to you out there?

Alastair could’ve snatched you out of that train station as easily as we did.

” His heart squeezed at just the thought.

Getting Dahlia back would’ve been much harder than keeping her under his roof.

A siege on the Bowan house really would start a war.

He’d do it, though. In a heartbeat.

“Yeah, well, your annoying cousin got there first.”

“Most people find him charming.”

Dahlia pinched his side. “When have I ever been most people?”

“You’re right. Most people wouldn’t have jumped out of a third story window.” Pulling back to really look at her face, he snapped, “What the fuck, Dahlia?”

“You tell me I’m a prisoner and I’m going to try to escape, Felix. What is so hard to understand about that?”

Speaking through gritted teeth, he demanded, “Tell me you didn’t hurt yourself.”

She made a face. “Jumping from the window or over the gate?”

“Dahlia.”

“I’m fine,” she sighed. “A little bruised. Some scrapes here and there. Definitely tired and hungry. But fine.”

His pulse jumped at the mention of her hunger. Even pissed at her, the instinct to provide for her melded with the erotic pleasure of her bite to make him crave it.

Clasping the back of her neck, he steered her around and up the stairs.

He marched them through the labyrinthine hallways until they reached their wing.

“You need to drink more than other vampires,” he grated.

“You need more care now, Dahlia. And to run so close to sunrise— Are you trying to give me a heart attack?”

“I know it can be hard to process, but not everything is about you,” she shot back.

“Then what is it about, hm?”

Felix pushed the door to their suite open and nudged her inside. Instinct compelled him to get her somewhere safe and dark as the sun rose outside. Though the light was blocked by their vampire-safe windows, which cost a fortune, age-old instinct wasn’t so easily swayed.

He frog-marched her into their bedroom and deposited her on the edge of the bed before he went around the room. Agitation made his movements jerky and quick as he secured the heavy drapes over the windows.

Her eyes tracked him as he worked. He could feel her gaze like soft hands raking their nails down his back.

Felix gripped the heavy velvet curtains tightly, unable to release them. He couldn’t turn to look at her. Some small, weak part of him was afraid of what he’d find there.

He wasn’t an insecure man, but doubt could sink its teeth into anyone.

It whispered possibilities to him, each one more gutting than the last: that she might be telling the truth when she said she didn’t want to be with him; that she didn’t feel the same visceral connection he did; that she really, truly couldn’t see herself making a life with him.

Staring at the drapery until his eyes burned, he croaked, “Tell me. Tell me why you ran. The real reason.”

Dahlia didn’t answer right away. Just when he was beginning to think she never would, she murmured, “I’m scared, Felix.”

He whirled around. Something sharp pierced him — not a blade, but a deadly sort of feeling. “Scared of me?”

Dahlia sat on their bed, framed by the four-poster’s curtains. Her toes barely brushed the floor and her fingers were curled into the blankets on either side of her thighs. She looked small. Breakable.

“No,” she answered, gaze on the floor. “I’m not scared of you, Felix. I should be. A sane person would’ve run screaming from you years ago. I pretended like I tried but I think we both know I didn’t. Not really. I always liked you more than was healthy.”

Dahlia shifted to one side. Patting the spot next to her, she said, “C’mere.”

Eyeing her warily, like this sudden shift in attitude was some con to get him to let her go, Felix crossed the room to sink down on the mattress. Their thighs and shoulders pressed together.

Looking up at him with those big blue eyes, she asked, “If I tell you what I need to be happy, will you help me get it?”

Felix tilted his head toward her. A muscle ticced on his jaw. “As long as it isn’t letting you go, yes. Anything.”

“Yeah, I think we established that.” She bumped his shoulder with her own, a sardonic smile tilting the corners of her mouth. But whatever lightness buoyed her was brief. It was there and gone in a moment as she leaned her weight into his side.

In a hushed voice, she admitted, “I’m scared, Felix. Of all of this. Of me. Of being this— this new thing with instincts and urges I don’t even understand. And I’m afraid that everything I’ve cared about or worked for is being taken from me now that I’m whatever this is.”

She spread her arms in front of her, gesturing to some unseen expanse.

“In a couple days, I’ve lost my identity, my home, and all the things I’d imagined for my future.

It’s more than the fact that I drink blood now.

It’s the fact that I can’t even imagine what my life will look like a few weeks from now — which is really scary for someone who built their entire adult life around hard goals. ”

He wanted to argue. Gods, he wanted argue.

She hadn’t lost anything. She’d gained a new life, a new family, a whole new strata of influence and power. But Felix managed to curb his natural inclination to push. This wasn’t an argument or a challenge he could win. It just was.

Instead, he rasped, “How do I fix it? Tell me what you need.”

How do I make you happy?