Lover Enshrined

“Pull into that Citgo,” he barked.

Mr. D didn’t catch the left in time, so he swung a louie and backtracked.

“I need chow,” Lash said. “And maps for-”

Across the street, the blue lights of a Caldwell Police Department squad car went off, and Lash cursed.

If the cop had tweaked to their moving violation, they were in deep shit. The Focus had guns and weapons in the trunk. Bloody clothes. Wallets, watches, and rings from dead vampires.

Great. Fucking great. The officer had evidently not been taking an emergency doughnut break, because he was gunning right for them.

“Fuck. Me.” Lash looked at Mr. D as the guy pulled over. “Tell me you have a valid driver’s license on you.”

“Sure do.” Mr. D put the car in park and rolled down the window as one of Caldie’s protect-and-serves came up to them. “Hey, Officer. I gots my driver’s license right chere.”

“I need your registration as well.” The cop leaned into the car and then grimaced as though he didn’t like the smell of them.

God, that’s right. The baby powder.

Lash eased back as Mr. D went for the glove compartment, cool as he could be. As he took out a piece of white paper the size of an index card, Lash quickly checked the registration out. Sure looked like it was official. Damn thing had the New York State crest on it, the name of Richard Delano, and an address of 1583 Tenth Street, apartment 4F.

Mr. D handed everything out the window. “I know I wasn’t supposed to do that turn back there, sir. We just wanted something to eat and I missed the parking lot.”

Lash stared at Mr. D, awed by the remarkable display of acting talent. D was just the right combo of rueful shame, earnest apology, and regular Joe as he stared up at the cop. Shit, he looked like his puss should be on the front of a cereal box as he flapped his gums and threw the word sir around like it was amen at a church. He was everything that was wholesome. Full of vitamins and fiber. Packed with vital, good old American nutrition.

The officer looked at the documentation and handed it back. As he flashed his light inside the car, he said, “Just don’t do it-”

He frowned as he looked at Lash.

The cop’s whatever-this-is-a-waste-of-my-time attitude was gone in a split second. Tilting the radio piece on his lapel toward his mouth, he called for backup, then said, “I’m going to have to ask you to get out of the car, sir.”

“Who, me?” Lash said. Fuck, he had no ID on him. “Why?”

“Please get out of the car, sir.”

“Not unless you tell me why.”

The flashlight dipped to the dog chain around Lash’s neck. “We received a complaint about an hour ago from a female at Screamer’s concerning a white male, six-foot-six, blond crew cut, wearing a dog collar. So I need you to get out of the car.”

“What was the complaint?”

“Sexual assault.” Another cop car pulled up in front, then backed in tight to the Focus’s headlights. “Please get out of the vehicle, sir.”

That bitch back at the bar had gone to the police? She’d begged him for it! “No.”

“If you do not get out of the car, I will take you out of it.”

“Get out of the car,” Mr. D said under his breath.

The second officer walked around the Focus and popped open Lash’s door. “Get out of the car, sir.”

This was so not happening. These fucking idiot humans? He was the Omega’s son, for Christ’s sake. He didn’t follow vampire rules, much less ones that governed Homo sapiens.

“Sir?” the cop said.

“How about you fuck yourself with your Taser.”

The officer leaned down and grabbed his arm. “You are under arrest for sexual assault. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. If you cannot afford an attorney-”

“You can’t fucking be serious-”

“-one will be provided for you. Do you understand these rights-”

“Let go of me-”

“-as I’ve read them to you?”

It took both officers to drag Lash out of the car, and what do you know, a crowd gathered. Shit. Even though he could easily tear these men’s arms off and feed them to both their asses, he couldn’t make a scene. Too many witnesses.

“Sir, do you understand these rights?” This was said while Lash was pirouetted around, pushed face-first into the car’s hood, and cuffed.

Lash looked through the windshield at Mr. D, whose face was no longer apple-pie innocent. The guy’s eyes were narrowed, and one could only hope he was racking his brain for a way out of this.

“Sir? Do you understand these rights?”

“Yeah,” Lash spat. “Fucking perfectly.”

The cop on the left leaned in. “By the way, we’re going to tack on a charge of resisting arrest. And that blonde? She was seventeen.”

Chapter Thirty-seven

Out behind the brotherhood’s mansion, Cormia’s bruised feet traveled across the cropped grass as fast as they would carry her. She ran to lose herself, ran in hopes of capturing some point of clarity, ran because there was nowhere she wanted to go and she could no longer stay where she was.

Her breath tore in and out of her lungs and her legs burned and her arms went numb and still she ran, racing down the flank of the retaining wall toward the edge of the forest, then turning around and heading back to the gardens.

Layla and the Primale. Layla laying with the Primale. Layla naked with the Primale.

She ran faster.

He was going to choose Layla. He was awkward in his role, so he would go for the one who he’d seen around and who had served his Brothers with discretion and grace. He would go for the familiar.

He would choose Layla.

With no warning, Cormia’s legs dropped out from underneath her and she collapsed in an exhausted heap.

When she’d recovered enough to lift her head, she frowned as she panted. She’d fallen on an odd scratchy patch of the lawn, an imperfect stretch that was six feet in diameter. It was as if something had been burned there and the ground had yet to recover.

Seemed apt on a lot of levels.

Rolling over onto her back, she looked at the night sky. Her thighs burned and so did her lungs, but the real fire was in her brain. She didn’t belong on this side. She couldn’t stand the idea of going back to the Sanctuary.

She was like the summer air that stretched between the grassy green ground and the star-studded galaxy above. She was neither here nor there… and she was invisible.

Getting to her feet, she walked slowly back up to the mansion’s terrace. Lamps glowed in the windows of the house and as she looked around, she realized she was going to miss the palette of this world at night: The tea roses’ reds and pinks and yellows and purples were muted, as if the blooms were feeling shy. Inside the library, the deep red of the drapes was like banked fire, and the billiards room appeared to have been constructed out of emeralds, with its vivid deep green.

So lovely. It was all so lovely, this feast for the eyes.

To put off the leaving a little longer, she went to the pool.

The black water spoke to her, its shimmering surface whispering in the lilting sighs and beckoning sparkles of