Page 65 of Suck This

CHAPTER 15

Have you ever considered taking a nap and sleeping right into the next morning? Because that’s a struggle for me on a daily basis.

-Acadia to Con

CONSTANTINE

“Was she well when you left her?” I asked Chen.

Chen, who looked a little flushed after just feeding, nodded his head.

“Yes,” he confirmed. “She was pissed, too. Mad that you didn’t say anything to her before you left. Pissed off at me for not telling her that I was okay, and pissed off in general that she had to go to work with a ‘bunch of racist vampire haters.’”

I found my first grin since she’d left.

“Join us at our meeting,” I suggested to him as I stood up, smoothing my tie down as I did. “It’s going to be at the club.”

Chen’s mouth quirked. “I still don’t understand why y’all work there. It’s loud, distracting, and…”

“A place that allows us to feed our curiosity, thirsts, and need to be around our sheep,” Fox drawled.

Chen turned to stare at Fox. “Your sheep?”

Fox’s mouth twitched. “Wrong word?”

Chen nodded.

“Yes, wrong word,” he agreed. “I think you meant to say ‘citizens.’”

Fox shook his head. “No, I don’t think that I did.”

Chen growled.

“Careful, baby vamp,” Pavlov said as he arrived as if he’d been there the whole time. “You’re not a human anymore. You’re Made. You can offend us all you want because we helped raise you. What you can’t do is offend other Masters of the Dead, or Masters of the City.”

That was true.

Chen had a lot of leeway with us that he wouldn’t have with any other vampires, even the vampires that were part of what I considered mine. He was so new in the city that he hadn’t had a chance to establish his place in the food chain. Though, I had no doubt that he would find his place, soon, and surprise a lot of the others.

He was new, yes, but he was strong to begin with. He had a healthy thirst for knowledge, and he’d been made by me. He had a leg up even before he was Made by the most powerful vampire in the city.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Chen drawled smoothly.

The lie slid from his lips so flawlessly that I had to hide a smile.

He was learning, and had learned, from the best.

“The rest are meeting us at the club,” Pavlov said. “They’ve started their party early.”

I rolled my eyes and walked toward the door, exiting it like a normal human would.

We had to be seen as normal if we were to blend in, so that meant rides in vehicles when it would be exponentially faster to just arrive with a small will of my mind.

The drive to my club took less than five minutes, and I likely could’ve walked it just as fast, but important people didn’t show up on foot. Or at least that was what my old master, the man I’d usurped for my current position, had said.

And his words had stuck with me, even to this day.

“Hello,” I said politely to the man at the door.