Night Shift

You do this because you think you can worm your way into my head a little more, and because you are in violation—you haven't come clean with me. I've won this round. "Go borrow a quarter and call someone who cares. Call me when you've got the meet set up. And Perry?"

A long exhalation of hot diseased air I could almost smell vibrated over the phone line. My skin flushed with heat, then chilled, pearly drops of sweat re-wetting my torn, dirty, bloodstained clothes.

"Yes?" Quiet, but with an edge.

I suppressed the urge to scream-laugh like a maniac. A terrified maniac with one hand on the trigger and the gun under her chin.

The laughter receded, and when I spoke I was steady. "The next time you lure me into a setup with a mad hellbreed I'll send you back home, and it won't be a pretty trip."

"I was watching over you, Jillian. Protecting my very dear investment." Each word frosted with black ice. Thunder boomed overhead, more lightning crackling. It was turning out to be a hell of a night.

Sure you were. "Yeah. Fine fucking job you did too, since a Sanctuary had to rescue me."

"You are still alive. Don't press your fine luck, hunter. I like this conversation less and less." His tone had dropped from a tenor to a baritone, the throbbing of Helletöng rubbing hurtfully underneath. The warning was clear.

He's already mad, you might as well. I couldn't help myself. "Poor little hellbreed. You can't possibly think I care." Then I slammed the phone down, before he could respond.

My legs trembled. I sat down hard on my bed, my knees spilling out to either side and my arms turning to wet noodles, every muscle shuddering and rubbery. My pulse beat high and thin in my throat. A sharp bloody noise trembled on my lips, burst free, and echoed like the voice of a bird battering at the side of a cage.

An iron cage, with horsehair cushions and old rusty stains crusting the elaborate scrollwork, while sick remembered pain roiled through my nerves and the scar puckered and prickled, tingling.

You did it. Good job. Very fine work, Jill. Now stop shaking. Stop it.

My room was dark except for the reflections of rippling water covering the walls, stippling my forearms. The shadows had relaxed, no longer full of sharp edges. Gooseflesh remained, hard and cold, swelling up through my flesh like a disease.

Are you listening, God? I was actually wringing my hands like some bargain-basement Lady Macbeth. It's me, Jill Kismet. I just pulled the tail of a huge sleeping dog. I'll be lucky to get out of this without losing a few more gallons of blood. Not to mention a few pounds of flesh.

There was a small sound, like an indrawn breath or a restless movement. My nerves were scraped so raw I almost flinched.

"How much did you hear?" At least my voice was still steady. I had to hold myself very still, denying the urge to reach for a gun.

A patch of wall near the door rippled. He laid aside the camouflage trick, the one Weres use to keep from being seen by ordinary humans. But I could see the blurring of the real world, with its strings of energy, underneath the mere refraction of light.

If I'd just kept to that little skill and told Perry to go fuck himself when he offered that bargain, would I still be alive? I'd certainly be a lot more cautious—and there were a lot of people who might be dead instead of just traumatized.

Was it worth it?

"I smelled fear." Saul's voice was quiet. "That was the hellbreed? The one you made a bargain with?"

My fingers knotted together. If he makes one snotty comment, I swear to God I'll… what? What will I do? Something I'll regret. Make him go away.

That was the goddamn trouble. I was unpredictable even to myself when Perry started playing with me. And just because I'd come away the wi

I brushed my lips with a dry tongue, wished the spit in my mouth would come back. "Just leave it alone." Just leave me alone. All I want is to lie down and shiver for a bit. I'm getting a little sick of the merry-go-round.

He paced into the room, one slow step at a time. "You're shaking."

No shit, Sherlock. "Really? I hadn't noticed. Leave me alone. Go bake some cookies or something."

"Did he scare you like this before the bargain?" Saul sounded curious. The marred light slid over him, his eyes glinting a little as he sank down into an easy crouch, halfway between the door and the bed, not getting too close. For once, observing my personal space.

I shut my eyes. The darkness was not comforting. Go the fuck away. "Of course he did. But Mikhail…"

"Your teacher." Soft and easy, the same tone I suspected he'd use on a frightened animal.

Well, I was certainly one half that description, wasn't I. The other half… well, who knew? You had to be a little bit of an animal to work this job. "I loved him." My voice broke. My fingers ached, I tried to yank them apart and couldn't. "I still do. But he's gone. I wasn't strong enough or fast enough when it counted, even after the goddamn bargain. And now—" My voice rose. "Now I've got this mess on my hands and nothing's going right and I can't even keep my people from being killed in the streets and my God, there were two kids and the scene was a month old, they've been here for at least three weeks if not the whole goddamn month and I didn't know, I've been so busy but there were kids, for Christ's sake, just children, fucking children—" The words spiraled up into a gasp that wasn't a scream because I bit it back, swallowing it. Pushing it down, pushing it away.

It didn't want to go. It had been waiting a long time, this cheated howl. For six months at least, ever since I'd stood beside my teacher's pyre and felt the chill wind against my tear-slick cheeks, as the sobs I couldn't let go bolted down into my stomach and turned into a steady red flame of rage. Against hellbreed, against Sorrows, against Mikhail—yes, I committed that sin. I raged against my teacher for leaving me alone.

But most of all, I turned that blowtorch of agonized grief on myself. Because I had failed to save him.

And now, here I was.

"Shhhh." Saul was on the bed next to me. I flinched, throwing up an elbow—but he caught the strike with one broad hand, shoved it down without missing a beat. His arms circled me, a cage I wanted even as I leaned away from it. "Let it out. Let it go."

"I can't." Heat and water slicked my cheeks. A sob broke the second word halfway, and I went rigid, leaning away from him. "I've got w-work to d-do tonight—"

More hellbreed holes to torch. Because tonight's as good a night as any to do a little murder in the name of getting Perry's voice out of my head. I don't c-care if I'm too't-tired—

The thought trailed off into a hoarse gasp as he pulled me off-center, into the shelter of warmth and the sound of someone else's pulse. Were filled my nose, a musky boy scent mixed in with something that was one of a kind, his, unique. When had I started recognizing that smell?

An even bigger question—when had I started liking it? When had it become safe, as safe as Mikhail's long-gone odor of pepper, leather, vodka, cordite, and foreign skin?

That was what broke me, finally. The remembered smell of my teacher, a powerful sensory memory of the only man who had ever protected me. Gone forever now, buried with him, nothing of that ephemeral imprint of a soul remaining except in my faltering human recollection.

My cold, comfortless, pitiless memory of everything I would rather forget.

I clamped my jaw down over the sobs. Swallowed them one by one as they rose, juddering me like an earthquake. My own personal set of seizures, rocking me off the face of the earth. I made no sound. He was silent too, not even thrumming the deep hum Weres use for wounded animals. He stroked my hair, silver chiming and tinkling; slid his hand under the heavy weight and cupped my nape, his thumb moving soothingly just under my ear. He simply breathed, and held me.