“Thoughthiefis the incorrect word,” he carries on like I didn’t speak. “What’s the name for a person who breaks in and leaves something?”
My grin widens, more a baring of teeth than a smile. “Santa Claus.”
Elethior’s jaw twitches. “I got a call earlier tonight from campus security,” he tells me. His voice stays even, despite the rise and fall of the music, and I have to watch his mouth to catch what he’s saying.He has snake-bite piercings through his bottom lip. “Apparently, someone left bones, skin, and a chattering skull in my lab space. Are you saying I have Santa Claus to thank for that?”
He wasn’t the one to find Sten? Damn.
I resist the urge to check the time, but by my calculation, Sten barely lasted four hours before the preservation spells failed him. Double damn.
“Wow,” I say. “You must’ve beenreallynaughty if that’s what Santa left you.”
Elethior sucks his teeth. “You’re lucky nothing important was damaged.”
“Wait.” I fake a gasp. “Are you accusing me of something? I’ve been out all night, partying it up. These guys can vouch for me.”
Orok sways on his feet and shrugs. Way to back me up, dude.
It’s Crescentia who leaps to the rescue.
She tosses her empty beer bottle onto the table while glaring daggers at Elethior. “Awfully hypocritical of you to come over here and lob baseless accusations when your family has been proven guilty of more than a few heinous crimes.”
Oh. Maybe weshouldhook up after this.
Crescentia missed a party one time when she was off in DC lobbying for a ceasefire after another portal to the Demonic Plane popped open somewhere in the Midwest. The Arcane Forces always respond to those with an aggressive counterstrike before any demons or fire elementals can sneak through, but destroying the portal so violently causes untold damage to the surrounding area.
And who provides the bulk of shit used for these counterstrikes? Who has the market cornered on magical weapons, deadly spells, even the specialized training those soldiers receive?
The Tourael family.
But Elethior is ignoring Crescentia’s social justice energy, his focus on me.
The fact that he looks smug sends a shiver of ice down my spine.
“I didn’t accuse anyone of anything,” he says to me. “I know for a fact it couldn’t have been you to break into my lab. Do you wantto know why I’m so certain? Why I didn’t throw your name to the security guard who called me?”
“Because I’m the picture of motherfucking innocence?” I give him my best syrupy smile.
His nostrils flare and he leans in. I hold my ground and let him get an inch from me, the heft of his cologne clotting the air, choking me with earthiness and roses.
“Hardly,” he growls. “It’s because I know you’re not good enough to have broken my ward, like you’re not good enough to win that grant tomorrow. Are you, sweetheart?”
The fucker pats my cheek.
Maybe that last cup of vodka cherry whatever did have a mystery potion in it because I blink, then Orok’s holding me back by the collar of my gray T-shirt, his other arm belted around my waist.
Elethior’s torso is bent slightly backward like he was dodging me, and I don’t remember lunging. But I definitely did; I feel the burn of movement sizzling in my muscles, feel the flash-bang of fury aching along the sides of my body.
“Don’t youfuckingtouch me,” I snarl, and Elethior plunges right back, getting so close that the world is consumed in the harsh angles of his half-elven features, the abyss of his eyes.
“Don’t fuck with my lab,” he snaps, and I wrench against Orok’s hold.
“Seb,” Orok hisses.
We’ve drawn attention. A dozen or so people watch us, and the music still plays, but one idiot chants, “Fight, fight, fight.” It doesn’t catch, especially when Elethior pivots his glare in the guy’s direction, and the attitude plummets from the crackle of entertainment to the lightning strike ofThis is not a joke.
Elethior faces me again and straightens his tight black shirt like it somehow got mussed in his few sharp movements. He licks at the silver ring on the left side of his mouth and sizes me up before shooting a bored look at Orok.
“When he loses the grant to me tomorrow,” Elethior tells him, “don’t let him come near me. I’m done with his bullshit.”
