Avoidance helped settle the emotions. Considerably.
“No,” Mallory agreed, “but the fact that the room heats up by ten degrees every time you two get near each other says something.”
“Shut up,” I said, extending my legs in front of me and lowering my nose to my knees to stretch out. “I admit nothing.”
“You don’t have to. I’ve seen your eyes silver just being around him. There’s your admission.”
“Not necessarily,” I said, pulling one foot toward me and bending into another stretch. Vampires’ eyes silvered when they experienced strong emotions—hunger, anger, or, in my case, proximity to the blond cupcake that was Ethan Sullivan. “But I’ll admit that he’s kind of offensively delicious.”
“Like salt-and-vinegar potato chips.”
“Exactly,” I said, then sat up again. “Here I am, an uptight vampire who owes my allegiance to a liege lord I can’t stand. And it turns out you’re some kind of latent sorceress who can make things happen just by wishing them. We’re the free-will outliers—I have none, and you have too much.”
She looked at me, then blinked and put her hand over her heart. “You, and I’m saying this with love, Mer, are really a geek.” She rose and pulled the strap of her bag across one shoulder. I followed suit, and we walked to the door.
“You know,” she said, “you and Ethan should get one of those necklaces, where half the heart says ‘best’ and the other half says ‘friend.’ You could wear them as a sign of your eternal devotion to each other.”
I threw my sweaty towel at her. She made a yakking sound beneath it, then threw it off, her features screwed into an expression of abject girly horror. “You’re so immature.”
“Blue hair. That’s all I’m saying.”
“Bite me, dead girl.”
I showed fang and winked at her. “Don’t tempt me, witch.”
An hour later, I’d showered and changed back into my Cadogan House uniform—a fitted black suit jacket, black tank, and black slim-fit pants—and was in my soon-to-be-former Wicker Park bedroom, stuffing clothes into a duffel bag. A glass of blood from one of the medical-grade plastic bags in our refrigerator—promptly delivered by Blood4You, the fanged equivalent of milkmen—sat on the nightstand beside my bed, my post-workout snack. Mallory stood in the doorway behind me, blue hair framing her face, the rest of her body covered by boxers and an oversized T-shirt, probably Catcher’s, that read ONE KEY AT A TIME.
“You don’t have to do this,” she said. “You don’t have to leave.”
I shook my head. “I do have to do this. I need to do it to be Sentinel. And you two need room.” To be precise, Catcher and Mallory needed rooms. Lots of them. Frequently, with lots of noise, and usually naked, although that wasn’t a requirement. They hadn’t known each other long and were smitten within days of meeting. But what they lacked in time they made up for in unmitigated, bare-assed enthusiasm. Like rabbits. Ridiculously energetic, completely unself-conscious, supernatural rabbits.
Mallory grabbed a second empty bag from the chair next to my bedroom door, dropped it onto the bed, and pulled three pair of cherished shoes—Mihara Pumas (sneakers that I adored, much to Ethan’s chagrin), red ballet-style flats, and a pair of black Mary Janes she’d given me—from my closet. She raised them for my approval and, at my nod, stuffed them in. Two more pairs followed before she settled on the bed next to the bag and crossed her legs, one foot swinging impatiently.
“I can’t believe you’re leaving me here with him. What am I going to do without you?”
I gave her a flat stare.
She rolled her eyes. “You only caught us the one time.”
“I only caught you in the kitchen the one time, Mallory. I eat in there. I drink in there. I could have lived a contented, happy eternity without ever catching a glimpse of Catcher’s bare ass on the kitchen floor.” I faked a dramatic shiver. Faked, because the boy was gorgeous—a broad-shouldered, perfectly muscled, shaved-headed, green-eyed, tattooed, bad-boy magician who’d swept my roommate off her feet (and onto her back, as it turned out).
“Not that it isn’t a fine ass,” she said.
I folded a pair of pants and put them into my bag. “It’s a great ass, and I’m very happy for you. I just didn’t need to see it naked again. Ever. For real.”
She chuckled. “For realsies, even?”
“For realsies, even.” My stomach twinged with hunger. I glanced at Mallory, then lifted brows toward the glass of blood on my nightstand. She rolled her eyes, then waved her hands at it.
“Drink, drink,” she said. “Pretend I’m some Buffy fan with a wicked attraction to the paranormal.”
I managed to both lift the glass and give her a sardonic look. “That’s exactly what you are.”
“I didn’t say you had to pretend very hard,” she pointed out.
I smiled, then sipped from my glass of slightly microwaved blood, which I’d seasoned up with Tabasco and tomato juice. I mean, it was still blood, with the weird iron tang and plastic aftertaste, but the extras perked it up. I licked an errant drop from my upper lip, then returned the glass to the nightstand.
Empty.
I must have been hungrier than I thought. I blamed Aerobics Barbie. Regardless, in order to make sure that I had future snacks (thinking a stash of actual food would increase the odds that my fangs and Ethan’s neck stayed unacquainted), I stuffed a dozen granola bars into my bag.
“And speaking of Catcher,” I began, since I’d cut the edge off my hunger, “where is Mr. Romance this evening?”
“Work,” she said. “Your grandfather is quite the taskmaster.”
Did I mention that Catcher worked for my grandfather? During that one big week when all the supernatural drama went down, I also discovered that my grandfather, Chuck Merit, the man who’d practically raised me, wasn’t retired from his service with the Chicago Police Department as we’d been led to believe. Instead, four years ago he’d been asked to serve as an Ombudsman, a liaison, between the city administration—led by darkly handsome Mayor Seth Tate—and the city’s supernatural population. Sups of every kind—vampires, sorcerers, shapeshifters, water nymphs, fairies, and demons—all depended on my grandfather for help. Well, him and his trio of assistants, including one Catcher Bell. I’d visited my grandfather’s South Side office shortly after becoming a vamp; I’d met Catcher, then Mallory met Catcher, and the rest was naked history.
Mallory was quiet for a moment, and when I looked up, I caught her brushing a tear from her cheek. “You know I’ll miss you, right?”
“Please. You’ll miss the fact that I can afford to pay rent now. You were getting used to spending Ethan’s money.” The Cadogan stipend was one of the upshots of having been made a vampire.
“The blood money, such as it was, was a perk. It was nice not to be the only one slaving away for the man.” Given her glassy office overlooking Michigan Avenue, she was exaggerating by a large degree. While I’d been in grad school reading medieval texts, Mallory had been working as an ad executive. We’d only recently discovered that her job had been her first success as an adolescent sorceress: She’d actually willed herself into it, which wasn’t the salve to her ego that a hire based on her creativity and skills might have been. She was taking a break from the job now, using up weeks of saved vacation time to figure out how she was going to deal with her newfound magic.
I added some journals and pens to the duffel. “Think about it this way—no more bags of blood in the refrigerator, and you’ll have a muscley, sexy guy to cuddle with at night. Much better deal for you.”
“He’s still a narcissistic ass.”
“Who you’re crazy about,” I pointed out while scanning my bookshelf. I grabbed a couple of reference books, a worn, leather-bound book of fairy tales I’d had since childhood, and the most important recent addition to my collection, the Canon of the North American Houses, Desk Reference. It had been given to me by Helen, the Cadogan Liaison burdened with the task of escorting me home after my change, and was required reading for newbie vampires. I’d read a lot of the four solid inches of text, and skimmed a good chunk of the rest. The bookmark was stuck somewhere in chapter eight: “Going All Night.” (The chapter titles had apparently been drafted by a seventeen-year-old boy.)
“And he’s your narcissistic ass,” I reminded her.
“Yay, me!” she dryly replied, spinning a finger in the air like a party favor.
“You two will be fine. I’m sure you can manage to keep each other entertained,” I said, plucking a bobble-headed Ryne Sandberg figurine from the shelf and placing it carefully in my bag. Although my new sunlight allergy kept me from enjoying sunny days at Wrigley Field, even vampirism wouldn’t diminish my love for the Cubs.
I scanned my room, thinking about all the things—Cubs-related or otherwise—I’d be leaving behind. I wasn’t taking everything with me to Cadogan, partly out of concern that I’d strangle Ethan and be banished from the House, and partly because leaving some of my stuff here meant that I still had a home base, a place to crash if living amongst vampires—living near Ethan—became too much to bear. Besides, it’s not like her new roommate was going to need the space; Catcher had already stashed his boy stuff in Mal’s bedroom.
I zipped up the bags and, hands on my hips, looked over at Mallory. “I think I’m ready.”
She offered me a supportive smile, and I managed to keep the tears that suddenly brimmed at my lashes from spilling over. Silently, she stood up and wrapped her arms around me. I hugged her back—my best friend, my sister.
“I love you, you know,” she said.
“I love you, too.”
She released me, and we both swiped at tears. “You’ll call me, right? Let me know you’re okay?”