“They’re just not my thing. Plus, you’ve got no idea how powerful this snake is.”
“What is your thing?” I asked, my cheeks suddenly burning as I realized what I’d said. He’s not going to say “you,” you sap. A romantic comedy this ain’t. After all the babbling I’d been doing lately, he probably already thought I’d lost my marbles.
He seemed oblivious to my embarrassment. “I’m fine with Purge beasts like Tobe. If they could all be like that, things would be so much easier. Instead of guessing whether they’re going to attack you, or paralyze you in your sleep, or rob you of your life breath by breath, they could just tell you.”
“Where’s the fun in that?”
“You’ve got a weird attitude toward danger, Harley,” he said with a smile.
“When you’ve lived on the mean streets of Mount Hope, nothing seems dangerous anymore. Put a gun in my face and I’d just shrug and give you my money,” I replied. “I think Katherine might be the only thing that actually one-hundred percent terrifies me. Give me a thousand car-jackings instead of her.”
Quetzi shuddered, his tongue flicking out of his mouth as his feathers ruffled. I frowned at him through the glass. What have you got going on under those shiny scales of yours, huh? Clearly, there was some reason the serpent didn’t like Katherine, not that hating her guts was anything new; I had a feeling we could all get on that particular bandwagon. Still, the mere mention of her name made Quetzi mad. Whatever beef they had with one another, it ran deep.
I wondered if Quetzi would help us fight Katherine. If he had a grudge against her, maybe it’d be a win-win for all of us. Right now, we could definitely use all the help we could get.
I was still pretty shaken up after my first encounter with the Big Bad. It seemed impossible that we’d somehow managed to escape with our lives, though I guessed we’d only made matters worse, in a lot of respects. I’d pissed her off, big time, by trying to bury her alive, and put massive targets on our backs as a result. She’d already been after me, but we might’ve had a bit more time if I hadn’t made her extra mad. Now, there were no more ifs regarding her, only when.
“How’re you feeling about her after the factory thing?” Wade asked.
“Even more freaked out.”
He nodded. “I didn’t expect her to be so… I don’t know. It’s hard to put my finger on, but she wasn’t what I expected.”
“She’s got the Merlin-Shipton sense of humor, that’s for sure,” I muttered.
“When you were down in that hole, what did she say to you?”
“It wasn’t what she said down there that scared me,” I admitted. “It was what she said before, when the rest of you were running for it. She said she’d kill me last. She said she’d make me watch you all die, slowly and painfully—and creatively, since that seems to be her speed—and I really think she meant it.” Bitter tears sprang to my eyes, though I quickly forced them back. I wasn’t going to shed tears over Katherine’s threats. No way.
To my surprise, Wade crouched down beside me and put his arm around my shoulders. “We won’t let that happen, Harley. We know what she’s up to, and we’ll fight her tooth and nail until she surrenders or we kill her. She isn’t getting her hands on any of us, I promise you that.”
“You can’t promise that,” I murmured, my heart racing at his closeness. I could smell the spicy scent of his cologne and see the faint graze of stubble that ran along the edge of his strong jaw. Damn, you’re a handsome bastard. Ugh. Why’d you have to be so freaking cute? Seriously, it’s not cool, man.
He flashed me a smile that made my insides squee. “I just did.”
With him being so close to me, my mind turned to Stella and the way she’d jumped fearlessly to protect Channing from Katherine’s magic. She loved him so intensely that she’d nearly sacrificed herself, even though he didn’t love her back; it was kind of awe-inspiring. Do I feel that way about you, Crowley? Would I save you from a ball of destruction? Yeah, probably.
Realization dawned. Wade had done the same thing for me, in shielding me from the debris of the collapsing factory.
Wait… does that mean… no, it can’t, can it?
I had no idea what to do about it. He’d given no thought to his own life when he’d knocked me to the ground and covered me like that. He’d thought only of my safety. Surely, there was only one reason he’d have done something so insanely stupid.
This is your moment, Merlin. You’re all snuggled up, he’s being charming, and he saved you from a cave-in. It’s now or never.
“Wade… can I tell you something?” My heart was hammering a mile a minute, my palms clammy and gross. If he’d reached out for my hand, he’d probably think he’d touched an eel instead.
He looked down at me. “Sure. What’s up?”
“I… I’m getting really frustrated with these restrictions,” I said. “Like, I want to be satisfied with the way things are, but I can’t. There’s so much more that I could explore, and I feel like I’m being held back—like I can’t just reach out and grab what I want, you know?”
Smooth, Harley. Way to chicken out by chatting all vague and stuff. He’s not going to have a clue what you’re talking about.
“With the Suppressor, you mean?”
“Uh… yeah,” I replied, my heart sinking. “Like, if I could just let it all out at once, then maybe I wouldn’t have to feel this… this all-consuming whatever inside me, all the time. It’s messing with my head. It’s making me act all crazy, and it’s getting to the point where I’m not sure how much longer I can go on without… uh, letting it all out. Or, at least, getting it to come out. How do I even do that? I don’t have a clue.”
Harley, you bumbling coward.
“That sounds like… a lot is going on,” Wade said, his brow furrowed. He looked even more adorable when he was completely baffled by something, and I was clearly confusing the heck out of him. Despite my best efforts, he didn’t seem to be picking up on the subtext. I just looked like a babbling idiot, and he looked like a beautiful, bemused, gorgeous creature that I wanted to smooch the face off of.
Enough with the mush! I’m about to barf. Now, if he’d stop blinking those deep green peepers at me, maybe I could get a grip. Lovesick puppy dog was not a state I’d ever thought I’d find myself in. The hard-as-nails Harley I knew would have kicked my ass for getting this way, yet here I was, melting into a puddle of adoration, waving goodbye to tough-guy me.
Fortunately for my self-respect, Tobe appeared, interrupting Wade’s and my weird moment.
“Sorry to disturb you,” he said in his signature growl, “but Alton has asked me to pass on a message. He wishes to see you in his office, Harley, at your earliest convenience. I believe he meant now, but I think he was being polite.”
“Thank you, Tobe. I’ll head there right away.” I sounded a little too eager, jumping at the chance to leave the awkward conversation with Wade. He was confused; I was confused; we were all confused. It seemed better to leave the situation to stew for a while, until I could muster the balls to admit how I felt. Stella’s warning rang in my head—that I should probably come clean while I had the chance. Yeah, but not now. I look like a beet and it isn’t cute.
“See you later, maybe?” Wade asked.
I nodded effusively. “Yeah, sure, absolutely, love to.”
Wishing I’d stopped at “Yeah, sure,” I hurried out of the Bestiary and headed toward Alton’s office. By the time I got there, my cheeks had just about cooled and my heartrate had returned to a normal pace. Rapping on the hefty double doors with their ominous lion-knockers, I pushed through into the office beyond. Alton sat behind his desk, and he looked up as I entered. However, he wasn’t the only one in the room. Sitting in one of the high-backed armchairs was a bald teenage boy.
I frowned. “Sorry, am I interrupting something? I can wait outside until you’re done.”
“Not at all. In fact, we were just waiting for you,” Alton replied, gesturing for me to sit. “Harley, this is Tarver. He’s new to the San Diego Coven, recently moved here from—where did you say you were from?”
The boy smiled nervously. “Iowa.”
“Yes, Iowa, of course. Anyway, I was wondering if you might do the honors of taking Tarver on a tour around the coven.” Alton looked to me with a steady, slightly weird gaze.
“Me?”
He nodded. “Yes, I’m sure you know enough of the coven by now to show him the ropes.” He smiled a secret smile that kind of creeped me out. All of this was unsettling, but what could I do? I didn’t want to seem rude to this kid.
“Um… okay?” Confusion fogged my brain. I was still fairly new, too; I hadn’t even known there was a pool here until a couple of days ago, and I still doubted I’d seen everything this place had to offer. Wade had given me the quick tour, or so it seemed. There were probably a bunch of rooms and cool things that I’d yet to discover, so why did Alton want me to take Tarver around?
“Off you go, then,” Alton instructed.
“Okay… uh, let me show you what this place has to offer,” I said, putting on a smile. Tarver practically leapt out of his seat with excitement and followed me out of the office and into the labyrinth of the SDC.
I took him to all the usual places first, like the banquet hall and the Main Assembly Hall, and explained the points system to him. I tried not to make us sound too lame, but we were still lagging way behind the other covens without any sign of a boost to our ranking. Even battling Katherine Shipton face-to-face hadn’t won us any favors with the Mage Council. Apparently, according to Alton, it “was still undergoing further verification, as to whether it could qualify as a viable means of awarding points,” as they could only take our word for it. Even with the bolstering witness statements of Channing and Stella, Levi was being a complete tool about it. They’d given us an extra hundred for rescuing Micah, but that still left us with a long way to go.