Page 11

Asher

Once everyone else had left, Calisto and I sat down together to hash out a plan that ensured coverage of his entire family. No matter how much we shuffled and reshuffled, though, we always came up one short. Apparently, money wasn’t everything when hiring security. There also had to be people available to hire. One company I’d spoken to had told me they could recruit extra people, but that it would take a couple of weeks. Another had no one available at short notice, and a third had done nothing to inspire confidence in their ability to do the job well. Those three patterns kept repeating.

“Maybe if I speak to Ben, he can convince Baros to allocate another pair of officers,” Calisto suggested.

I tapped my pen on the piece of paper I’d spread across the table as a visual record of our discussion. If there was one thing I was good at, it was the strategic planning needed to solve a problem. Unfortunately, even I couldn’t make four go into three. “Maybe,” I said, “but I highly doubt it. Ben will have already applied as much pressure as he can.”

Calisto frowned. It only lasted a couple of seconds before he started laughing, his brown eyes lighting up in a way that made me itch to lean across and kiss him. Nothing too passionate, just a light peck. “The answer’s obvious,” he said.

“Is it?”

“We need one more room, right?” He waited for my nod. “And I’m currently in a room?” I gave another nod. “And you have a room of your own?”

“Well, obviously… It’s my house.”

“I move in with you.”

The pen tore through the piece of paper. I released my death grip on it and placed my hand over the hole in the hope Calisto wouldn’t notice. “With me?”

He nodded enthusiastically. “We can share a room.” The light in his eye dimmed as he waited for my reaction and got nothing. He grimaced. “Sorry. That is really presumptuous of me. My family is going to invade your home like an army of… I was going to say ants, but a herd of elephants is probably a better description, and I still want more from you. I expect you to surrender your personal space as well.”

“It’s fine,” I said after a pause. “It’s a good idea. One I should have suggested myself.” Although if it had occurred to me, I doubt I’d have said anything, convinced Calisto wouldn’t go for it in a month of Sundays. He’d spoken with John and Griffin after the meeting. Had they said something to make him reconsider his stance toward me? Was this a softening? With John being one of those people, I couldn't imagine a scenario where that would be the case, but I wasn’t about to look a gift horse in the mouth. With Calisto and me in the same room, perhaps everything else would slot into place.

Calisto’s gaze fastened on the piece of paper, my hand still covering the hole. “I don’t want to be a burden.”

“You’re not,” I assured him, guilt scything through me at making him feel that way. “You could never be. I have a big bed.” It was the wrong thing to say, Calisto immediately looking like he wanted the earth to swallow him. Perhaps he hadn’t thought further than freeing up a room, the practicalities of what that would entail simply not occurring to him. “We can put pillows down the middle of the bed if it makes you feel better.”

Calisto tossed his head in a deliberate show of attitude that didn’t quite ring true. “We’re both adults.”

“We are. And we don’t have to let our feelings get in the way. My feelings,” I corrected when Calisto shifted in his seat.

“I’ve been thinking about that,” he said somewhat tentatively.

“Go on.”

“I think you’ve gotten confused somewhere along the way.”

“Right.” So much for softening. It seemed we were still parked smack bang in the middle of Denial Street. “If it helps you to think that.”

Calisto laughed. “It’s not about it helping me. It’s about what’s true. Talking to John and Griffin helped me get clarity about how it works. The fated mate bond, that is.”

I could see where this was going. “Not every fated mate bond is the same,” I pointed out. “Ben and Griffin can taste what the other tastes and feel each other’s emotions. John and Bellamy can’t do that.”

“True,” Calisto said, his tone suggesting he was far from convinced by my logic. “I just don’t want you thinking anything is going to happen between us, that me moving into your room is anything but a practical solution.”

“Understood,” I said, even as the words sliced my heart to ribbons. “You don’t have to worry about me being anything but a perfect gentleman.”

“Thank you.” Calisto heaved out a breath, the slight redness in his cheeks giving away his lack of enjoyment at not having to spell things out the way he had. “Well, that only leaves one problem to solve.”

“What’s that?”

“How I’m supposed to convince my family to drop everything, leave their homes, and come here?”

“By telling them the truth,” I suggested. “That there’s an unsavory element interested in you because of your job, and that she’s not above using them to get to you. So it’s a precaution to ensure she can’t do that, which not only keeps you safe, but keeps them safe.”

Calisto rubbed his chin while he digested my words. “I guess.”

Calisto spent an hour on the phone, some conversations easier than others. The set of grandparents not covered by the security detail seemed happy to up sticks and come and stay with Calisto wherever he was. His aunt proved trickier, only giving in to his demands when he told her the address. I assumed her interest lay in checking out the house rather than any avoidance of impending danger. His parents turned out to be the toughest nuts to crack, that conversation continuing for far longer than any of the others and triggering a lot of weary temple rubbing from Calisto.

In an ideal world, I’d go over there, place my hands on his shoulders, and he’d soak up the reassurance on offer. Unfortunately, as things were—and I still couldn’t wrap my head around why everything wasn’t going the way it was supposed to—Calisto would either grin and bear it, which would be the opposite of reassurance, or more likely, he’d take steps to avoid the unwanted contact.

And tonight, I’d have to share my bed with him. If it had been anyone else in the world, I would have told them it simply wasn’t happening, that I liked my space and wouldn’t be giving it up. But it wasn’t someone else, it was Calisto. And for him, I would let both my house and my bedroom be invaded and make the best of both.

Calisto heaved out a sigh as he ended the call, lines of strain etched across his forehead. “Did they agree?” I asked.

“Yeah, eventually. But they’re not happy. They think I’ve been keeping things from them.”

“Everyone thinks you’ve been keeping things from them,” I said, careful to keep any judgment out of my voice. “Which… you have on at least one count.” I swept the room with my gaze, the search revealing the same thing it had every other time I’d looked for Baxter: absolutely nothing. “Is he here?”

Calisto shook his head. “Not currently.” He cleared his throat. “Thanks for not saying anything about him at the meeting.”

“You should tell them yourself.”

Calisto’s grimace said he’d rather boil his own head. “Maybe.”

I wouldn’t get a better opportunity to broach the subject. “And while you’re at it, it would be a good time to come clean about anything else relevant to the situation.”

“Like what?” Calisto had gone still.

“You may not be aware of this,” I said, “but the necromancer council has files on every registered necromancer in the country.”

Calisto crossed his arms over his chest and stared me down. “Good for them.”

“The files are supposed to be confidential, but if there’s one thing you can never accuse Cade of, it’s letting a few rules and regulations get in his way. He has copies for all the necromancers in his employ. John’s and Griffin’s make for fairly standard reading. John is nowhere near as interesting as he likes to think he is. Yours, though…”

I let the words hang there, hoping Calisto would feel the need to fill the void, that his natural politeness would kick in. My tactic failed, Calisto doing nothing but stare obstinately back at me, his lips pressed together in a thin line.

Given my personal interest in him, my natural impulse was to let it go, to shrug it off and say it didn’t matter. There was a niggle, though, that refused to go away. One telling me this was important. Maybe even more than important, that it was the key to the entire thing—an explanation to O’Reilly’s interest in Calisto when he wasn’t a centuries old magic mask with an occult power, or a demon you could make a deal with. And if Cade had gotten hold of a copy of Calisto’s file, then it was entirely possible O’Reilly had too.

“There is a full page in the report,” I said, “on a man called Edmund Wainwright.”

The twitching muscle in Calisto’s cheek said the name had landed heavily. “Saying what exactly?”

“That there were strange circumstances around his death and his subsequent resurrection.”

“And?”

“That he lived on the same street as you.”

Calisto let out a laugh. “Since when is that a crime?”

“They put two and two together and assumed a link between the two things.” I watched him carefully, searching for further signs of strain.

“Oh well, if they assumed that, it must be true. I’m surprised something as well regulated as the necromancer’s council would include assumptions in their reports, though.”

I wasn’t buying this act of his. It was paper thin. He was hiding something, and I intended to find out what it was. Taking a chance, I reached out and took hold of his hand. Calisto stared down at our intertwined fingers, my skin far paler than his. “Talk to me, Calisto. You can trust me. I’d never do anything to hurt you.”

He shook his head. “There’s nothing to tell.”

I tried a more direct approach. “Did you bring Edmund back?”

“I was a kid when he died.”

Which wasn’t a no. “All necromancers have to start somewhere. That’s how they discover their powers. When was your first resurrection?”

Calisto went to tug his hand back, but I held on fast. “Surely someone has asked you that question before?”

“You mean it isn’t on my file?”

Was it? I did my best to recall what it said. “I don’t—” The doorbell chimed, Calisto capitalizing on my momentary distraction to retrieve his hand. He held it with the other one, rubbing the area where my fingers had touched like I’d scalded him. Had he felt something? Hope flared in my chest at the thought he might have.

Calisto cleared his throat. “That’ll be… Well, I don’t know which of them will have gotten here first, but you should probably find out and let them in.”

I nodded. “We can talk later.”

“There’s nothing to talk about.”

The doorbell chimed for the second time, and I hurried toward the camera covering the street, reaching it just as the woman went to press the button for the third time, her body language screaming impatience.

“That’s my Aunt Margarita,” Calisto said from a position close enough to my back that I could feel his body heat, the urge to step back and mold my body to his, almost overwhelming. “And the man behind her, who looks like he’s regretting all the decisions he’s ever made in life, is my Uncle Thiago. I apologize in advance.”

The man did look somewhat harried. “You apologize? For what?”

“You’ll see.”