Page 13 of Lessons with the Mothman (Monster Smash Agency)

CHAPTER 13

Elias

I scowled down at my phone, staring at the three text messages below as if they were a code I might solve.

Professor Stanton is attending the interview tomorrow.

You don't have to come.

If you don't want to, that is.

The first felt like a warning. The second, a dismissal. The third, a retraction of said dismissal.

I didn't particularly like any of the three messages, or their potential meanings.

"What's got you so scowly?"

I lifted my head to glare at the disruption and blinked when I found Natalie sitting across from me at my bar.

"What are you doing here?" I asked, glancing around the room.

Her eyebrows rose. "You are so fucking rude. This is a public bar, yeah?"

My wings rustled at my back, and I waved my hand through the air. "I didn't…I didn't mean it like that. I just wasn't expecting any of you tonight."

" You being…" Natalie leaned forward, resting her elbows on the bar top.

I huffed and searched the bar for Theo, her werewolf husband. "You know…our…the…"

"Your…friends?" Natalie suggested slowly, eyes glinting with humor.

I stared back at her, jaw fixed as my tongue played over the word in my mouth for a moment. I'd had friends in the past, but those connections always seemed to fade over time. Had I found myself making new ones? It hadn't occurred to me to try, but perhaps that was what Rafe and Khell and the others were becoming after all.

"What do you want to drink?" I asked.

Natalie relaxed and smiled. "Why don't you ever offer to surprise me, like everyone else?"

"Because you would gleefully heckle my efforts. But, if you insist…"

Natalie brightened further at that, probably a confirmation of my suspicion. She nodded. "Please. Also, Sunny and Hannah should be here soon. We instructed the guys to stay home. Girls' night. Plus you now."

I turned away, determined not to investigate why that declaration pleased me.

"I suppose I do really prefer beer," Natalie mused at my back. "But it's the thought that counts, you know. I assumed you just didn't like me."

"I am ambivalent about all of you," I lied. I did like Natalie, mostly because she struck me as someone who didn't impress very easily. And if I couldn't impress her, I wasn't going to humiliate myself by trying.

"Well, that was so obvious, now I know you do like me," she muttered.

"Of course he likes you. What's not to like?"

I glanced over my shoulder and nodded at Sunny, who beamed and waved in answer. Behind her, the tall, slim shadow of Hannah shot me a wary look and slid onto the seat on Natalie's other side.

I usually made Sunny something custom—she was easy to please—and I had yet to solve the mystery of Hannah. Tonight, I decided to triple an order for Natalie, setting three half full beers on the bar and three shots.

"Don't touch those yet," I warned, and then dug in a drawer for a lighter. "For the record, this is illegal."

"Girls' night," Natalie hissed in approval.

I topped all of the shots with 151 and then lit them on fire. Hannah's eyes brightened and she laughed, and Sunny released a minor squawk of surprise. Together, they lifted the shots, blowing out the fire and then dropping them into their beers and chugging quickly. Over the rim of the glass, Natalie waggled her eyebrows at me, and I found myself laughing.

"Flaming Dr. Peppers," she announced, then politely tucked a quick belch behind her hand. "Classic. Better than usual. Did you make the liquor yourself?"

"Of course."

"Well, that was a way to start the night," Hannah mused, but she smiled at me, which I accepted as a rare victory. "Mocktails from here on out for me."

I nodded, and Sunny giggled and bounced. "Well, I am going to get trashed. Khell's picking me up at one."

"No road head," Natalie said, pointing firmly at her best friend, who rolled her eyes.

"Khell will just pull over," Sunny said breezily. "And then I'll get road head too."

"Maybe a little more alcohol," Hannah said, holding my gaze with wide eyes.

"Drinks and snacks, coming up," I offered. "Which of your ne'er-do-wells' tabs should I put it on?"

"Khell's," Hannah said at the same moment Sunny said, "Rafe's."

"Mama's paying," Natalie said, smoothly sliding over her credit card.

And because I was not running a charity for my friends—which, yes, they were that—I accepted the card and sent a warning to my kitchens to keep the fryers hot.

Even staying out of the trio's way, keeping my ear on the rest of the room, I learned more about my friend's sexual prowess than I might've cared to. Well, no, I didn't really mind.

And really, good for Theo. I'd underestimated him.

It was a shame Victoria wasn't here. She might've had some academic uses for this gossip.

Khell arrived promptly at one and accepted the cheerful heckling of the girls as he scooped Sunny up off the stool and carted her out the door. Hannah and Natalie both waved their goodbyes, but I was surprised to see they kept their seats rather than heading out for the night too.

"—just wonder if he'll feel differently when the supper club takes off and gets interrupted with our touring schedule."

I lifted my eyes up at Hannah's words, her half smile tilted in Natalie's direction. Natalie shrugged in response.

"You'll figure it out when that happens. Rafe's right that the scarcity is part of a supper club's appeal."

"It could lead to really big opportunities for him. And they're already scheduling us for a festival circuit," Hannah said with a grimace.

Natalie's smile was sly. "Hey, some of those festivals are here in Chicago, at least."

"True," Hannah said, eyes lightening.

"The rest of the band is eager to get back on the road?" I asked, giving up any pretense of not listening in.

"Actually…well, no. Kiernan is glad to be home too. He wants to write a new album. The label wants to milk this one for as much as they can." Hannah sipped at her mocktail. "I think Mikey and Kelsey could go either way. We were all glad for the break though."

"If Rafe quits overthinking, he could easily have two dinner club events before you have to leave again," I said.

Hannah grinned at me. "I'll tell him you said so." I shrugged, unconcerned with the idea of Rafe's blustering. "How's the study going?"

"Very well, I think," I said. "I haven't told Victoria yet, but I have rather more volunteers for demonstrations than I suspect she needs. Or has time for."

"I'm very offended that humans are being left out," Natalie said, without an actual hint of offense. Her smile widened. "But Theo is relieved. And I understand why she doesn't need human comparisons."

I lifted my chin in thought. "There may be something to explore with human and monster relationships specifically. Perhaps for a second study."

"Planning a new professional venture as a research assistant already?" Hannah asked me, her chin propped on her hand, something coy in her tone.

"I make a very concentrated effort not to overstep my place in helping Victoria," I said, my own tone a little too tight.

Hannah's smile softened. "Of course. I'm only teasing."

Which, it occurred to me, Hannah had never really done before. I relaxed and nodded to her, but my thoughts were turning in a new direction, and I glanced back and forth between the two women, wondering if my curiosity might lead me to overstep after all.

"What?" Natalie asked, pointing at me, her brow furrowing. "You've got a funny look."

Hannah huffed a laugh as I bristled. "You do look on the brink of something."

"I have a…hypothetical question…related to the study that I'm curious about," I said.

"Isn't that for Victoria to discuss then?" Hannah asked.

Given the hypothetical was Victoria, I shook my head. "I don't want to accidentally…influence her own lines of inquiry."

"Hit us," Natalie said with a careless wave of her hand.

I wet my lips and then set about pouring myself my own drink. "There's an open booth. Let's go there. Nora can handle the bar." The bar was crowded, but it was also nearing closing, and mostly we were dealing with people finishing their drinks and winding down for the night.

Hannah and Natalie hurried to claim the booth, and I followed them out a moment later, finding them whispering with their heads bowed as I approached.

"This is exciting," Natalie declared, her eyes a little glassy from drinking. "I hope you know I love giving my opinion on things that aren't my business."

I refrained from answering and settled into the booth, carefully spreading and draping my wings at my sides.

"It is okay that you're asking us, isn't it?" Hannah pressed me.

It probably wasn't, but… "I don't see why not," I said. I just had to frame it carefully. "There was a case…an interview, with an individual that finds achieving orgasm challenging."

Both women sat back in their seats, Natalie with surprise, but Hannah was wary.

"This isn't really relevant to the study. I suppose this is something I've been mulling over myself," I continued. "They, the individual, claim that it is more satisfying for them to have that aspect of sex ignored."

"They enjoy sex?" Natalie clarified with a raised finger.

I nodded. "Yes. But not when it's focused on their pleasure."

"Okay…" Hannah said slowly, head tilting. "So…what's your question, exactly?"

I placed my hands on the table top, frowning upon finding it sticky. "Well, I suppose…should their partner really not try to offer that to them? It's not impossible for them to achieve an orgasm, but the process seems to be tangled up in some kind of mental or…" I floundered for a moment and shrugged slightly. "Emotional impediment?"

Natalie slumped. "I mean…if the partner knows they can get them to orgasm…"

"The partner is hypothetical," I said quickly.

"It's all hypothetical," Hannah said, eyes narrowed.

"Well, yes. But in this case, let's say yes, the hypothetical partner is absolutely certain he-they can?—"

Mercifully, Natalie interrupted my bumbling. "It's a hypothetical of ' can't ' achieve orgasm, and not one of 'doesn't want to?'"

My head jerked back. "Why would they not want to?"

"Hypothetically," Hannah muttered under her breath.

Natalie shrugged. "Some internalized sense of sexual shame."

Victoria's broken pleas, the eager thrust of her body, the sight of her back arching to take me deeper all flashed through my mind. Her ease in the aftermath, relaxed and pleased and smiling.

"I can't say for sure. They said they can't."

Natalie's expression twisted, and she shrugged. "I think I'm leaning that…yeah, hypothetically, go ahead and prove them wrong."

Even though it was the answer I wanted to hear, it gave me an uncomfortable twist in my chest. I turned to Hannah and found her expression too sober, too knowing .

"Really good sex is about trust. Taking someone at their word, not trying to prove them wrong or yourself right. Just observing their boundaries, even if they're smaller than you'd like, would matter the most to that individual," Hannah said softly.

Disappointment was strangely a relief in the moment.

"Ohhh, yeah," Natalie murmured, nodding. "She's right."

"The partner would have to decide if he?—"

"They," I said quickly—too quickly, probably.

"—could be satisfied with that. At least until there was enough trust to discuss the boundary."

"You're right, of course," I said.

Hannah relaxed back in her seat and offered me a smile. "It's certainly an interesting hypothetical."

NWU's campus was a perfect setting for the fall, far enough out of the crowd of the city to have broad green lawns and a quintessential autumnal range of changing trees. Classic graystone buildings with green ivy crawling around mullioned windows set an ideal scene for academia. It was too easy to imagine Victoria walking over the curving sidewalks, arms full of books and crossbody drumming against her hip. Or there, sitting in the shade of a grand old oak as she typed a paper, or in the crowded halls of the old Gothic buildings, stuffed with seated amphitheaters for lectures.

It'd been a week since I'd seen her. A week since we'd fucked on the desk in the little schoolroom I'd set up just for that occasion. Since she'd shivered and clasped my cock inside of her.

I was undoubtedly too eager to see her again. Especially when I knew we'd be meeting with not only an interview subject, but also under the supervision of her professor. I should've declined the meeting altogether. It was clear that Victoria wasn't quite sure whether or not she wanted me to come, and I wouldn't be needed. Not when I did my utmost to be unobtrusive to her interviews.

Was it curiosity over her reticence that drew me today, or just the basic urge to see her, even in such a stifling setting?

A startled squeak stopped me in the hallway, and I blinked at the young woman who'd nearly collided into me. She was tall and quite pretty, with large dark eyes and a smooth sheet of black hair. A hand rested on her shoulder, and I followed the arm up to the man at her side, handsome, older, and distinctly academic. The girl's eyes widened as she stared up at me, her lips slightly parted in some human combination of shock and awe.

Glancing around the hall, it was clear that the majority population of NWU was human, and what other species I spotted easily blended in with the crowd. Even then, this young woman would never have seen my like. I stared back at her and watched her shake herself and stare down at the floor, realizing her own rude gawking.

"Sorry—"

"You must be Elias," the man said, his hand retreating from her shoulder as the other lifted in my direction. "Phillip Stanton."

Now it was my turn to be startled. I'd been imagining someone…older and less good-looking as Victoria's thesis advisor. Why, exactly, I didn't know.

Personal preference, perhaps, a dry tone mocked at the back of my thoughts.

I shook the man's hand as he gently ushered the girl away from us. "I'll see you in class next week, Swathi." He turned back to me. "We're just here, actually. I offered my office, but I suppose it would've been a bit cozy for all four of us," Stanton said with an almost pointed glance at my wings.

He gestured to a door I'd already passed, apparently too lost in my own thoughts, and we both did our best surreptitious study of one another as we wove through a pour of students to reach the door. I was subtler. I had the advantage of my gaze being unreadable.

Phillip Stanton was busy looking me over as we stepped into a comfortable study room, but I caught Victoria's flush as we entered together, the nervous bounce of her gaze between us before she calmed and called up that frustratingly smooth facade she often wore. She was standing with Dana, our selkie interviewee, who offered me a quick smile and nod of acknowledgement.

"Oh good, we're all here," Victoria murmured, with a final flick of her eyes in my direction.

The room had a large dark mahogany table at the center, with a matching set of weathered wood and leather chairs surrounding it, and Victoria pulled out the seat at the head of the table for Dana before taking the one at the corner next to her. The back wall had three slightly outdated computers available, and the rest of the room was bare. Stanton closed the door behind our entrance, and the roar of the hallways muffled to a gentle white noise.

Stanton was sliding around the table toward Victoria without a beat of pause, her shoulders stiffening and spine straightening. I felt a foreign urge to drag him back by his collar, to toss him out of the room, and it was such a strange and unusual sensation that it made me want to wallow and explore in it.

Was this jealousy?

How fascinating.

I settled at the far corner of the table and wondered if Victoria looked relieved or regretful. She made it too difficult to tell.

"I'll take notes," I offered, drawing out an old notebook and inkwell pen.