Asylum (Causal Enchantment #2)(9)
Author: K.A. Tucker

“Oh, not to worry.” Leo chuckled, walking over to turn the knob. “It’s just Max.” He yanked the door open and a large black rump backed inside. It was Max, alright.

“What the . . . ” Leo muttered.

Max was dragging something in with him. A body.

Julian.

I found him about a mile from here, waist-deep in snow, Max reported, gripping Julian’s jacket in his teeth.

Leo rushed to grab Julian under his armpits. Together, they dragged the still body over to lie beside the fire. I jumped off the couch and dove to his side, peering closely at him. Not a moan escaped him. No movement. “How did—” I began, then scrunched my face up in thought. Had I fallen asleep after all? Had Julian snuck past us and left? Or . . . I shot a questioning look at Leo, my eyes narrowing with suspicion.

He went out the window, Max quickly confirmed. I found prints leading from there. He must have pried it open and scaled down the wall.

“Determined fool,” Leo murmured, crouching down to inspect Julian’s pewter-colored lips.

“Is he . . . ” I couldn’t finish. A hollow bubble grew inside me. Another death.

“He’s not well, that’s for sure.” Leo hovered over him, his hands floating inches above his face. “Not well at all. Go and get some blankets and a pillow.”

I was on my feet and running up the stairs two at a time toward Julian’s room. Sure enough, I felt chill air the second I rounded the corner. I stopped at the shattered door and looked into the bedroom. The window still sat open a crack.

I scrambled inside, scooped the duvet and pillows from the bed, and half-dragged, half-carried them out of his room. Only when I was running down the hall did I remember his sister. She needed to know! “Valentina?” I called, my eyes roaming the hallway, wondering which room was hers. No answer. “Valentina! You need to come quickly!” My voice faltered for only a moment. “It’s Julian!”

“I’m sleeping,” Valentina called groggily. Where had that come from? Second door on the right. I grabbed the knob and turned it, only to hear a thud and feel resistance on the other side. Something was barricading the door. “I said I’m sleeping!” Valentina shouted.

“But it’s your—”

“Leave me alone!” she screeched, making me jump two steps back.

“Evangeline!” Leo bellowed desperately from below.

“Coming!” I ran back down the stairs, gripping the railing to keep from tumbling over the blankets.

I found Leo rolling up the sleeves of his shirt. “Make him comfortable and warm,” he instructed.

Comfortable . . . He’s unconscious and frozen. Possibly dead. Make him comfortable . . . I gently slid a pillow under Julian’s head, then draped the duvet over him, covering every inch of his body short of his face. “I don’t think this will help raise his body temperature,” I murmured warily.

“Of course not. Give me some space now,” Leo announced, kneeling beside him. “This will take a while. The trouble these bloody kids are causing me . . . ” he finished in a quiet grumble.

I dove for the nearest couch, hanging over the arm to watch Leo work. He sat completely still, his eyes closed, appearing deep in thought, or as if he were meditating.

Max settled directly beside me, and the other dogs appeared out of nowhere to investigate the situation as well.

“Magic?” I whispered, intrigued.

Yup . . . You know, I could have left him out there. Max began in a gruff voice. When I caught his scent, I went out of my way to find him. I figured you’d want to help him out. I glanced over to see his ochre eyes staring at me, brimming with something I rarely saw in them—anxiety.

My guilt-ridden werebeast was trying to make amends. I reached over and scratched behind his ear. “You did good, Max. Thank you.”

Not that he deserves it, Max said, earning a flat look. But I did it for you, he added quickly, leaning over to nestle against my neck.

“Do you think Julian will die?”

Max didn’t answer.

We sat. We waited.

I woke up to something warm and wet sliding across my cheek. Max’s tongue. Lifting my head from the arm of the couch, I groaned at a kink in my neck left by the awkward position. A colorful afghan draped my body. At some point, someone had tucked me in. I was thankful, given the draft that crept in from somewhere. I rolled my head to peer at the fireplace and saw only embers. The fire was Leo’s department. Where is he? I wondered, rubbing my eyes with my palms.

“How’d I end up back here?” a male voice croaked, startling a gasp from me. Julian was propped on the opposite couch, his face paler than normal, but alive. And he wasn’t scowling for once, which made his face pleasant to look at, his features dark and masculine.

I sat up to face him. “Max tracked you down in a deep snowbank.” I made sure I emphasized who his savior was. “He brought you back and Leo helped heal you. The lunatic butler and the freak mutt,” I added, repeating his words from yesterday.

Julian had the decency to look sheepish as he glanced over at Max.

“Are you stupid?” I blurted before I could stop myself. But then, after thinking about it for all of five seconds, I silently praised myself. He deserved it.

Julian smirked before dropping his gaze to his hands. “Yes, I suppose I am. I don’t know where I am, what is going on, why I’m here. I don’t know anything except that my parents are dead and I’m surrounded by . . . ” He didn’t finish, either because he lost his train of thought or he’d been about to drop another insult and decided against it.

I turned to look at Max. “Where’s Leo?”

Resting for the day.That much magic drained him.

“Okay.” I turned back to see Julian’s wide eyes and the same “Is she crazy?” look his sister had worn the day before. “Yes, I can talk to him telepathically,” I supplied. “I have no idea how. It just happened.”

Julian’s brown eyes shifted between Max and me. “Well,” he said after a long moment, “tell him thanks for me. It was colder than I anticipated.”

“You just did. He understands you,” I said. I glanced down at the floor to see my pictures scattered everywhere. I must have dropped them when Max came in with Julian. Rolling off the couch to my knees, I started gathering them.

“Are those your . . . friends?” Julian asked.

Friends. That word again. It was sounding more odd as time went on. I only nodded.

Julian eased himself off the couch to crouch on the floor and help collect the photos. He held up a picture of Bishop wearing a goofy grin and one of Caden, his face typically pensive. “So which one are you in love with?”

I snatched the picture from his hand, heat rising in my cheeks. He chuckled and continued picking up pictures, pausing on one of Amelie and Fiona. I noticed his eyebrow arch. “Who’s the blonde?”

Despite my dour mood, I grinned. “That’s Amelie. She’s really cute, isn’t she? You’d like her.” Except that she’s a vampire, and she’ll likely kill you.

“Yeah, I’ll bet,” he murmured wryly. I caught the fleeting look of disapproval before he consciously made it disappear. “I’m sorry about earlier,” he said. “I’ve been a complete jerk to you. I deserved what Max did.” Max let out a small grunt of satisfaction. Julian glanced over before continuing, likely a little disoriented by the dog’s uncanny ability to understand him. “It’s just . . . I know my parents were mixed up with some bad things. But they were still my parents and now they’re dead. One minute I’m visiting them for a weekend trip away from med school and the next thing I know, I’m . . . I don’t know where and . . . ”

“Med school?” Julian, the son of a Colombian drug lord, saving lives? Sofie hadn’t mentioned that.

“Yeah, my first year. I fast-tracked my undergrad,” Julian explained.

I watched him obliquely as we collected the rest of the pictures in silence, wary of this new calm, polite version of Julian. Had Leo magically fixed him to be . . . nice?

“Why aren’t they here, with you, if they’re your friends?” Julian suddenly asked.

“It’s a long story,” I muttered. I had no idea where to begin.

He handed me the stack he had collected, then prompted as he climbed back onto the couch, “Well, I’m clearly not going anywhere . . . ”

I glanced at Max, who only shook his head. Not surprising. This world of secrecy was all the big dog knew. Lies and manipulation. Of course he didn’t trust a soul.

“Please?” Julian coaxed, staring back at me with earnest brown eyes that looked more like those of an innocent seven-year-old than a twenty-something med student from a corrupt family. It was probably the same look I had in my eyes when I begged for the truth from Sofie. For once I held the answers, and I couldn’t bear to leave an innocent person in the friendless darkness where I had dwelt.

For the next hour, I gave Julian the Cole’s Notes version of my life as I had learned it over the last month, much to Max’s mortification. Julian sat cross-legged on the couch and listened quietly, all signs of his previous offensiveness gone, replaced with a mixture of appreciation and sympathy. Once in a while he asked a question, querying the venom issue or where Veronique was hiding, but otherwise he just listened, seemingly absorbing my words. He was a wonderful listener, I had to admit. Once I started, I found it effortless to talk to him. It was easier than talking to Caden—but that was likely because I couldn’t focus on any thought for too long around that face . . . Though Julian was becoming more appealing with his new demeanor, it was different.

I spoke briefly about Caden, stumbling over my words and blushing furiously. I left out anything that sounded like “love” and “soul mate” but the knowing look in Julian’s eyes revealed that he’d quickly deduced what Caden meant to me.

At some point, a servant set a tray holding weak tea and lightly buttered toast on the nearest end table for Julian, which he accepted with a polite nod. “It sounds like you’ve forgiven them,” he said, his face incredulous as he stirred sugar into his tea. “After everything they’ve done to you?”

“I wouldn’t say I’ve forgiven them,” I began slowly, feeling foolish again. I couldn’t even answer that truthfully. I had in fact forgiven Sofie. Completely. And there was nothing to forgive on Caden’s end. “Being angry won’t change anything. It will only turn me bitter. Maybe it will surface later and I’ll go on a psychotic rampage.”

“But . . . ” Julian paused, searching for words, “they tried to kill you and you still call them friends. You don’t see there being anything wrong with that?”

“It’s complicated,” I mumbled, shrugging. “There’s plenty wrong with everything that’s going on. I hope that by the time I see them again, they’ll have learned to control themselves.”

Julian leaned forward, his elbows resting on his knees, his hands folded. “And when will that happen? How long? Are you—are we—stuck here until then?”

“Not long. Hard to say . . . ” I worked hard to hide the lie from my face but, by the crestfallen look on his, I knew I’d failed miserably. I couldn’t bring myself to tell him the full truth, that Sofie, an over-protective, borderline stalker, had locked us up here to keep me safe from a pack of vampires until they could be trusted around my blood.

We could die here.

3. The Sentinel

“Soon,” I murmured softly, sliding my hand over the smooth white marble of my baby sister’s tomb, knowing my promise was a blatant lie. One hundred and twenty years ago, she accompanied me, hand in hand, into a dank, dusty room in this very building—then a factory of sorts. One hundred and twenty years ago, I had stared straight into her anxious green eyes and sworn that I’d release her the second I fixed my magical blunder. As tears rolled down her rosy cheeks, I’d chanted the freezing spell, my voice masking her last sobs until the spell paralyzed and preserved her body, and I felt my heart break. I witnessed the magic marble winding around her body, encasing her in her glorious tomb, swallowing her beautiful, curly brown locks. And here she was, tucked away inside the atrium’s focal point when she could be free. All it meant was that Evangeline had to die. Damn the Fates and their twisted sense of humor.

No. While Veronique was locked in her magic-induced coma, my lies couldn’t hurt her. They would torture me, but I’d endure. I would keep her under this spell for as long as it took to outsmart the Fates. Just as Evangeline would remain in her own protective cocoon—for years, decades, a lifetime. I would keep her safe.

“I guess the others are in the cellar?” I said to no one in particular as I strolled away from the statue, my eyes drifting over the twenty or so Ratheus inhabitants who lingered in the ruined atrium, huddled in circles, whispering amongst themselves. Likely still in shock over this otherworldly transportation. The other half—including Caden and his posse—were busy gorging themselves on blood bags in the cellar. Like unruly teenagers, they had broken into Viggo and Mortimer’s stash within an hour of arriving and had stayed there since, satiating their thirst, dooming their previous moral convictions. All of the Ratheus vampires had spent a considerable amount of time in the cellar, but it seemed Evangeline’s friends couldn’t get enough.