Sharon Ashwood - Unchained

“Thanks, Hol, but I’ve got to meet with Reynard. Did your esteemed vamp- in-residence find out anything about the visiting fangsters?”

“He’s got the locals out looking, but so far no joy.”

“Damn.”

“It won’t take long to find out where they’re staying. Vamps are territorial, so the natives are motivated. So, what’s with you and Reynard?”

“There’s nothing to tell.” Ashe could tell she sounded grumpy.

“Yeah, right. You like each other.”

“Sure we do. That’s it. There’s way too much going on to complicate things.”

“Too bad. I mean, the guy’ll probably get out of the Castle only this once. Someone should show him a good time.”

Ashe laughed, but it sounded forced. “He’s got no soul. I’m so over men like that.”

“Well, we’re only talking a couple of nights here at most.”

“He deserves more than a pity fuck. And don’t talk about him like that.” Ashe bit off the next thing she was going to say, bewildered by her sharp response. “Sorry. His situation’s gotten to me.”

“Sure, yeah. And I shouldn’t be joking like that, anyway. But y’know, Grandma said he was great with Eden.”

“He was pure gold.”

Holly was silent for a moment, as if not sure where to take that thread of conversation. Then she jumped tracks altogether. “How’d the meeting with the lawyer go?”

Ashe filled her in on everything that had happened that afternoon. “He’s so fired.”

“Shouldn’t he be arrested?” Holly asked. “He’s doing business deals with a demon, and not a nice one like Mac!”

“I’m pretty sure his office partners are building a big legal fortress around him as we speak. But I’ve got a better idea. I’m going to tail him. Wherever Tony goes next, now that his bookstore is gone, Bannerman is sure to be at his beck and call. We’ll find him that way.”

“There’s a spell—”

Ashe heard Robin’s cry in the background.

“You need to go,” Ashe said. “That sounded hungry.”

“Yeah, catch you later.” Holly hung up.

Ashe disconnected, setting the phone back in its cradle. She wished Holly had left Reynard out of the conversation. There were a handful of people she’d do anything for: Eden, Grandma, Holly, a few of her hunter friends, and, on a good day, Alessandro. Reynard’s name was starting to creep onto that list, fading into view like invisible ink slowly revealed by the heat of a flame.

Reynard needed far more from her than a booty call. He needed someone willing to fight for him, to break the chains that bound him in darkness.

And when she was done fighting? That happy-ever-after thing always slipped through her grasp. She wasn’t Sleeping Beauty or Cinderella. She was one of the knights, slapping the prince on the back and buying him a round after they ganked the dragon.

Awkward.

An interval of quiet followed, but it was short-lived. Ashe had barely pulled on fresh jeans and a tank top and started to make herself a sandwich when the burned-toast smell of a portal came drifting from the living room.

“Hello?” she called, holding the butter knife in one hand. She set it down and shoved open the window to clear the air before the fire alarm went off.

Reynard sauntered into the kitchen, clean, tidy, and looking around with a speculative air. He set the sunglasses on the pale yellow counter. Ashe looked at them, then at him.

“You can see okay?”

“I’m getting used to the light.” He looked around, still squinting a little. “You have a comfortable home.”

Ashe buttered bread. “It’s small, but it’s all right.”

“Where is Eden?”

“Still at Holly’s. She’s safest there, protected by the magic of the house. Caravelli should be up soon. And the hounds are still camped out in the yard, making like super-ugly garden gnomes. I phoned to check in.”

“Garden gnomes? I thought they lived farther south.”

Ashe put the lid back on the butter dish. “Imports.” He watched her open the fridge and bring out containers of leftover chicken, mayo, and salad. He pulled up one of the café stools and sat on it as she worked. It was all weirdly domestic, and it made her twitchy.

“So tell me something about yourself I don’t know,” she said.

“Such as?”

“We’re usually trying to kill something when we’re together. Or on the move. I’m not sure what to expect now that we’re just sitting in a kitchen.”

He gave a slight smile. “Once upon a time I was considered a skillful conversationalist. I used to have more talents than fighting.”

Ashe pulled the lid off the salad container and started searching for bits of lettuce that still looked more green than brown. “Oh, yeah? Like what?”

“I was an excellent sportsman. I rode almost before I could walk. I have a keen interest in astronomy and navigation. Handy when you’ve traveled as much as I did.”

He leaned against the counter, the posture casual but the muscles in his body still coiled. A man doing an imitation of somebody relaxing. “It was part of a young man’s education to tour Europe. Then, when I took up my career with the military, I went to India with the Royal Regiments.”

“That must have been a culture shock.”

He tilted his head, his look far away. “It was an experience. Many of the officers weren’t interested in anything outside their own gentlemanly circle, but I wanted to learn whatever I could. The language. The life in the villages. How the common soldiers lived. That’s where I got the Brown Bess you so adore.”

Ashe returned his smirk. “That wasn’t your usual weapon?”

“Not exactly.” He warmed to the subject a little. “Officers didn’t do the actual shooting in battle, but I liked knowing how to use it. By understanding the arms, I had a better idea of what the men who used them were faced with.”

Ashe thought about that for a moment, and the sound of his voice. She had always become lost in the refined English accent, but she could hear the nuances of emotion now. Rough sadness, layers of irony, respect for the men under him. He wasn’t a stranger anymore. She liked that.

“How long were you there?”

“Four years. Then I was wounded and sent back to England to recover.”

“And then?”

Reynard looked down at the countertop. “My next trip led me to the Castle. There was no more traveling after that.”

Ashe waited for more, closing up the chicken sandwich and cutting it in two. She wanted details about the guardsmen and about how he ended up in an interdimensional prison. No more words came, however.

Would pushing be a mistake? The wrong question at the wrong time might make him clam up, and she was tired of that closed-off look of his. It was like talking to the cardboard Legolas the bookstore guys had left outside the library. She wasn’t going to risk losing the rapport they had going.

The downstairs neighbor pulled up in front of the house, slamming the car door. Ashe closed the window, starting to feel cold.

“Well,” she said quietly, sitting on the other café stool. “What do we do next?” She bit into the sandwich, all the salt, pepper, and mayo doing a happy dance on her tongue. She was so hungry, it hurt.

Reynard picked up a stray twist tie, looking at it with furrowed concentration. He had apparently lost none of his taste for discovering new cultures. “The urn wasn’t in the bookshop. I would have felt it if it were.”

He said it casually, but she heard uneasiness buried under the sangfroid.

“Then we have to find the demon’s other hangouts,” she said after swallowing. “The bookstore burned down, anyway.”

He gave her a sharp look. “Pardon?”

“It was on the news. It might have been the spell I was doing, or something the demon did afterward.” She looked down, mourning again the loss of all those books. “It won’t kill the demon, just make it run someplace else. We find it, we find the next possible urn location.”