House Rules (Chicagoland Vampires #7)(61)
Author: Chloe Neill

Just minutes until dawn, and he was still gone.

Surely he’d come back before the sun rose. Where else would he sleep?

I curled into his winged chair in the sitting room, listening to the clock tick away the seconds of his absence. The shutters over the windows descended, and the sun began to rise. My eyelids grew heavier, but still the door stayed closed.

The apartments creaked – the sounds of the ancient House settling and adjusting as the wind fought it outside.

I stayed upright until sleep threatened to knock me to the floor, then clumsily shuffled to the bed and climbed beneath the covers. The sheets were crisp and chilly, and I curled into myself to preserve warmth, an island of heat in the tundra of pressed cotton that our bed had become.

It was to be a war of attrition, of cold sheets . . . and I was losing.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CARD TRICKS

I woke up alone, the bed cold beside me.

I sat up, my mind whirling with possibilities – namely that he’d decided to let Lacey console him. But before I’d even put my feet over the edge of the bed, the door opened. Ethan walked in. He was in shirtsleeves, his jacket in his hand.

I said a prayer of thanks that he was okay, that the apparent vampire assassin hadn’t snuck into Cadogan House and taken him out. But then the anger started to build again.

"Late night?" I asked, as calmly as possible.

"Continued strategy session," he said. "We nudged dawn, and I fell asleep on the couch in my office."

"And Lacey?"

"She was there," he simply said. He walked to the bed and laid his jacket across it, then took off his cuff links and watch.

"All this because you’re angry at me?"

He didn’t look back at me. "We were working, Merit."

"Until dawn? Without enough time to return to your bed? To me?"

"What do you want me to say?"

"I want you to admit that you’re angry at me. That you want her to want you, and that you’re giving her license because you’re angry with me."

"You’re just jealous." His tone was dismissive, as if I’d come to him with a childish complaint.

"Of course I’m jealous. You two were cut from the same cloth. And I think, in your heart of hearts, she’s the type of woman you imagined you’d end up with."

"As opposed to the stubborn brunette I actually ended up with?"

"Yes," I pointedly agreed, then bucked up my courage. "Are you spending time with her to punish me about the RG?"

"I don’t have time to play games."

"You’re avoiding me."

"I’m busy."

"You’re angry."

The dam burst. He glared at me. "Of course I’m angry, Merit. I am goddamn pissed off that you undertook a dangerous course without talking to me about it, and that you’ve been working with him all along without telling me about it."

He moved a step closer. "If I were to tell you Lacey and I weren’t just working together because of our similar outlooks, our similar training, but because we shared a bond that you couldn’t touch, how would you feel?"

He was right; I’d feel miserable. The hypothetical alone made me sick to my stomach. On the other hand . . .

"I don’t spend time with Jonah to hurt you."

"If that’s what you think I’m doing, then you must have forgotten the challenges facing the House right now."

The words notwithstanding, he wouldn’t look at me when he answered. Yes, I’d hurt him, and there was little doubt his mind was on other things. But he knew damn well what he was doing and how it was affecting me. He was lashing out, even if he didn’t want to admit it. Even if he wanted to imagine himself above such human concerns.

He put an elbow on the chest of drawers, then rested his forehead in his hand. "This won’t help us. Fighting each other."

He was right. We were at a stalemate, and we would be until one of us stepped back, until one of us was satisfied about the fidelity of the other.

So he changed the subject. "The transition team is meeting in half an hour to consider our response. We have, we believe, some thoughts about the contract and the necessity of making the payment to the GP considering their bad behavior. We’ve called the bank, as well. But if we don’t come up with a solution respecting the House proper, we’ll have to give in."

"They mean to break us," I said, tears blossoming at the thought of leaving the House.

"They anticipate we’ll bend."

But we wouldn’t. We couldn’t. The colonies didn’t bend to the British, and I didn’t imagine that we would, either.

"Your murder investigation?" he asked.

"We’re no closer to finding out than we were yesterday. I have nothing, Ethan. Nothing at all."

And we’re so far apart, I silently thought. So far apart it’s killing me. God, I need you. I need help. I need someone to steer me in the right direction. I need an answer.

But I’d already asked him for more than he was able to give. He offered up a good-bye, then headed downstairs for another meeting with his team.

Which I was apparently no longer a part of.

* * *

I showered and donned leathers in case the transition was messier than we’d expected, and made the usual beauty arrangements – bangs brushed, hair ponytailed, lips glossed.

I walked downstairs, a couple hundred suitcases for the ninety-ish vampires who lived in Cadogan House still staring back at me like a reminder of my failure: If you’d found a way out of this, convinced Lakshmi to help, we wouldn’t have to leave.

I glanced into Ethan’s office, saw that it was full of vampires. Ethan, Malik, Lacey, the librarian, Michael Donovan, but empty of mementos. Despite the crisis – or because of it – someone had packed away Ethan’s knickknacks: trophies, photographs, physical reminders of his time in the House.

That was utterly depressing.

I’d be in and among vampires for the rest of the night, most likely. But for now, I wanted a moment with the House, with my home, to say good-bye, so I bypassed the office and headed through the hallway to the back door, and then outside.

The cold was jarring, but refreshing, as if the cold had cleansing power of its own. I walked down the path to the garden in which Ethan and I had shared moments, and where the fountain had finally been turned off for the winter.

I glanced back, the House glowing gold in the darkness of Hyde Park, three stories of stone and blood and memories.

A GP issue we hadn’t been able to fix.

Four murders we hadn’t been able to solve.

A relationship I’d broken.

What if I’d been wrong? What if joining the RG had been a violation of my obligations to the House and his trust in me? What if I’d managed to take everything that was good in my life – my place in the House, my vampire family, and Ethan – and tossed it in the trash on a whim? Out of some misguided belief that joining the RG had been the right thing to do? What if I’d played my hand incorrectly, made the wrong decision, and because of that I’d lost everything?