Still, a medical room in a club. He was reaching, but it meant we still had a way out of this.
I turned to Sloane and smacked her on the arm. “I told you this wasn’t the way to the restroom.”
Sloane’s frown cleared and she rolled her eyes. “Yeah, well, maybe if you didn’t drink so much you wouldn’t need to pee so often.”
“My head hurts.” Poppy pouted.
Jessie put her arm around Poppy’s shoulders. “Let’s get you home.”
She made to move past the meat suit, but he held his ground.
“What’s the rush?” He climbed up a couple of steps. “I’m sure we have something for that headache in the medical room.”
Like a revenant with a straw. No thanks. I needed to act. Fast.
“No!” I plastered a frown and a pout on my face. “What I’d like is to pee.” I tottered down the steps toward him and laced my arm through his. “You work here, right? You can show me to the restroom.” I tugged him down the steps. “Ooo, biceps.” I gave his arm a squeeze, then shot Sloane a look over my shoulder. “His biceps are bigger than yours, babe.”
Sloane snorted. “Stop acting like you want cock.”
We were at the bottom of the steps now and I was leading the confused meat suit toward the hidden door.
“I do like cock.” I stroked the meat suit’s arm and winked at him. “Are all the staff as hot as you? I’m gonna have to tell all my friends at the sky-diving club about this place. Pure adrenaline junkies, addicted to danger, but they do love a little eye candy.”
His eyes narrowed. “Danger, huh?”
“Oh, you have no idea. Always getting into some kind of trouble.”
That’s it, think of all the lovely chaos you can get from them.
His body relaxed as we reached the hidden door. “How about I get you some free tickets for next weekend? How many?”
Yes. “Can you do twenty?”
His eyes lit up at the prospect of having twenty chaos-pumped women to feast off.
“Is that too many?” I pouted. “Can you not swing it?”
He brushed open the door and steered me out into the club. “Oh, I can swing it all right. Wait by the bar.”
He hurried off and I sagged against Jessie. “Fuck.”
“Quick thinking, dude,” Jessie said.
“We need to go,” Sloane said.
“Not without those tickets,” I said.
She gave me a confused look.
“There’s no way the four of us can take on all those revenants, but with a few more of these bracelets and several more witches playing human, we might be able to swing it.”
“Smart,” Poppy said. Then to Jessie, “I told you she wasn’t a waste of space.”
I raised both brows at Jessie and crossed my arms.
She shrugged. “Fine, I take it back.”
A guy approached us and held out an envelope. “Sam says he’s sorry he couldn’t deliver these himself, he has business to attend to, but he’ll book the VIP room for you and your friends next Friday night and is looking forward to seeing you.”
I simpered at the guy. “Thank you.”
He walked away.
“Now we leave,” Sloane said. She glanced back at the hidden door. “But we’ll be back.”
We would, because there was no way we were leaving those humans to be batteries for the revenant fuckers.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Lauris drove while we sat silently in the car. The mood was low. We’d failed tonight, almost been caught.
“What happened?” he asked.
“I recognized one of the humans,” Jessie said. “Works at the local bookstore. Emily something. Loner.” She sucked in her cheeks. “I’m thinking those humans in that room have been there for a while. Maybe all loners. Humans that won’t be missed. Humans they can use up nice and slow.”
“They’ve figured out how to keep them alive,” Sloane said softly. “Prolong the feeding. These humans must have a lot of turmoil inside them, darkness these fuckers can feed off.”
“We need to get them out,” Poppy said from beside me.
I squeezed her hand. “We will.”
“I need a drink,” Jessie said.
“Outliers?” Lauris asked.
“Do it.”
Yeah, I could use a drink too. Or maybe three.
Ten minutes later we were pulling up outside Outliers. Lauris cut the engine, and we climbed out and headed toward the bar. He didn’t follow.
“Hey?” I shot him a quizzical glance. “You coming?”
He looked down the street. “Yeah. I’ve gotta go do something real quick first.”
“We’re gonna need a ride back in an hour,” Sloane said.
“I’ll be back.” He gave her a jaunty salute and sauntered off down the street.
“Where the fuck is he going?” Jessie asked.
Sloane watched him until he turned the corner at the bottom of the street. “Gargoyles may work for the witches, but we don’t own them. Let him have his privacy.” She headed for the bar. “And let us get a few drinks.”
Outliers was heaving with supernaturals, and we had to shove our way to the bar where a man with long turquoise hair and turquoise-tinted skin served drinks like he was on fast play.
He grinned at Sloane while pulling two pints and topping up a whiskey with Coke so effortlessly it made me want to applaud.
“The usual?” he asked.
Sloane nodded. “Yeah and—”
His gaze flicked over us. “Martini extra dry, Guinness, and…” His gaze lingered on me. “Single malt whiskey, smooth.”
“You got it,” Sloane said. “And double it all up, will ya, Lauter.”
“On it.”
He prepared the drinks in superfast mode, then shoved them on a tray and slid it toward Sloane. Jessie cleared a path to a miraculously empty table in the corner of the bar, which Poppy hurried over and claimed.
I looked back at the bar where Lauter was still working like a demon, except he was fey. He had to be. “He’s like Leana.”
“Who?” Sloane asked.
“The owner of
