Inked

The earth stilled.

Dizziness swam through Lily, a vicious, sucking exhaustion. She pried her eyes open and shook her head, trying to clear it. What…?

Adele lay motionless beneath her. Lily pushed up on one trembling arm, suddenly afraid she’d squeezed the woman to death or something. She’d done…something. She couldn’t quite remember…

But Adele was quite alive—and staring up at her in horror. “What did you do to me?” she whispered. “What are you?”

Lily dragged in one shaky breath. Another. Several feet behind her, Jason was panting like he hurt. But panting meant he was alive.

From farther away she heard Ma

She got one more good breath into her and called back, “I’m good. I don’t know about Mariah. Jason’s hit. Drag Rule out of there, if you can.” The earth had stopped moving, but there could be loose rocks. Aftershocks.

Then and only then did she look at Adele once more. “What am I?” She smiled a nasty, satisfied smile. “I’m the FBI bitch who’s arresting you. You have the right to remain silent. Anything you say can and will be used against you in a court of law. You have…”

EPILOGUE

It was raining—a rare and splendid event here in San Diego, though it happened with a

The apartment was on the top floor, high enough that the loss of privacy was more symbolic than real; Lily was getting used to it. At the moment, curled into Rule’s body, warm and drowsy with the aftermath of passion, it didn’t bother her at all.

She stirred, unready for sleep. “This morning I notified the manager at my place that I’m not renewing my lease.”

His hand stilled—then brushed the hair from her face so he could press a kiss on her temple. “Good.”

“We have to talk about how we’re going to split expenses here.”

“Mmm. Do we have to talk about it now?”

She smiled. “I guess not. But I’ll need to know how much your utilities run, and the—”

He propped up on one elbow, kissed her firmly, and said, “I’ll print you out a spreadsheet in the morning.”

“We’re leaving in the morning.”

“My printer’s quick.” He stayed propped up, looking out the window. His words had been light, but his eyes were heavy.

No wonder about why. Steve’s memorial at Clanhome had been today. His body wouldn’t be released for another couple weeks, so they would be making yet another cross-country flight then, for the burial. Lily wouldn’t attend that, but Rule needed to.

After a moment he said, “I haven’t been kind in my grief.”

“Grief is seldom kind.”

“No.” Now he looked at her. “But I regret being an ass.”

A smile flickered at the corners of her mouth. “You apologized already.” When he woke from the bane stupor, and right after throwing up the first time, he’d apologized for using her password. He’d done it again when the dry heaves hit.

Wolfbane really did make lupi sick as dogs…though that was a phrase she’d refrained from using. So far.

“I felt guilty,” he said quietly. “I’d allowed such distance to grow between me and Steve…he still mattered, but…” His words ran out, leaving his mouth tight with pain.

“Don’t a lot of relationships have cycles? Neither of you had given up on the friendship. That’s what counts. If Adele hadn’t killed him, there’s every chance you and Steve would have grown close again when the time was right.” She flattened her hand on his chest. “She robbed both of you of the chance for that.”

“She nearly robbed me of more. If you hadn’t checked your messages, or if you hadn’t understood right away something was wrong—”

“Let’s not go there.”

After the nausea passed, Rule had been keenly embarrassed by how easily Adele had tricked him. She’d called and asked him to meet her for a memorial ritual at the spot Steve was killed. Rule had pla

Rule smiled, but his eyes had that determined look. He wasn’t finished. “In addition to guilt, I was afraid. I’d allowed myself to lose one dear friend in some ways even before he died. How did I know I could keep you—keep us… Hell. I don’t know how to say it.”

“Oh, because you have such trouble with long-term relationships, you mean? Like Cullen. It’s terrible the way you’ve allowed that friendship to falter, and him so easy to get along with.”

For a second she thought she’d said exactly the wrong thing, reminding him of a missing friend. Then he barked out a laugh and eased back against the pillows. “Easy to get along with. Yes, that’s how I think of Cullen. Are you trying to say that all relationships don’t follow the same path?”

“Also that I’m not Steve.” She threaded her fingers through his. “I don’t let go easily. Kind of like chewing gum. You’d have to keep scraping me off.”

“There’s a romantic image.” He squeezed her hand, clearly amused. “I wanted it to be Robert Friar, you know. He seemed…a more worthy enemy.”

“I know.” She suspected Rule considered Steve’s death at the hands of a jealous lover somehow undignified. But to Lily’s way of thinking, death was like sex—it mattered, it had meaning, but it was not dignified. “You lupi aren’t exempt from human nature, though. Part of your nature is human, and you’re tangled up with humans.”

“True.” He sighed.

She glanced at him. His eyelids were drooping. She smiled and fell silent.

He’d been sleeping more than usual, but he said that was normal, even though nearly three days had passed. Apparently getting over bane sickness was like getting over the flu. Even after the bug had been defeated, the body wanted extra rest.

Of course, for Rule, extra rest meant getting seven or eight hours’ sleep instead of five. Lily snuggled down into the covers more fully and closed her eyes…but her brain wasn’t ready to shut down.

There were still some loose ends with the case that bothered her. What had Friar’s lieutenants been doing in town? The timing was coincidence, had to be, but she’d like to know what he was pla

Then there was the weird way Adele had burned out her Gift. The woman had nary a hint of magic left. They were keeping Adele’s role in the earthquake quiet—it had been a small quake, fortunately, and anomalous, which meant the seismologists were puzzled. Lily figured they could go right on being puzzled. She didn’t want any other Gifted assholes hearing about it and deciding to give it a go, in the hope they could pull it off without burning out. And she didn’t want the un-Gifted population to have one more reason to fear their Gifted brethren.

But it nagged at her that she couldn’t remember exactly what had happened when…

Her phone buzzed. The same phone—it had survived being tossed off a short cliff with a snake with nary a scratch. The buzz meant it was Croft, so she sat up and reached for it on the bedside table, frowning. It was pretty late, D.C. time. “Yu here.”

“Yes, I am,” Croft said jubilantly. “And someone else is, too. Someone you want to talk to. Here.”

Lily didn’t talk much. She listened, she laughed, and if her eyes filled, that was okay. And of course she passed the phone to Rule, who’d heard it all anyway.