“Noted.”
She cracked her knuckles, clearly enjoying this more than was appropriate. “Come on then, let’s meet your haunted loo.”
Grabbing the tote, Thorne led the way upstairs into my loft and immediately stopped in her tracks. She surveyed the room with a single, slow blink—the kind that usually preceded either sarcasm or prayer.
“Well,” she said at last, in a tone too cheerful to be sincere. “At least it has walls.” She set the container down. “It’s giving me very cryptic chic vibes. Fitting for a vampire, no?”
I laughed. “Not this vampire.”
She moved toward the tiny bathroom and nudged the cracked door open with two fingers. A low, guttural growl rumbled from the pipes—deep and unmistakably angry.
Thorne froze.
Then, with great care, she took a single step back. “Right. Yup. That’s definitely possessed. I’m not going in there. Ever.”
“Fair,” I said.
“I think we need more white sage.”
That seemed like a safe assumption.
Thorne dug into the container and pulled out a row of cleaning materials. “I can’t do anything about the exorcism right now. We need a witch—preferably a Ravenspell—for that. But we can do something about the mess.” She lifted two spray bottles. “Which do you want to tackle first? Walls or floors?”
“Walls,” I immediately said. Anything that didn’t require more kneeling.
We immediately set to work, scrubbing as hard as we could.
“I can’t believe you’ve been sleeping here,” Thorne said after a few minutes. “Are you sure you’re not secretly part ghoul?”
“It builds character,” I replied. “Or tetanus. Time will tell.”
She laughed, the sound bright against the gloom. “You’re tougher than you look, Laurent.”
We worked in companionable silence for a few minutes. The kind that wasn’t awkward or weighted, but easy. Strange, how natural it felt. The two of us, working together against mildew and demonic toilets and judgmental ghosts.
Eventually, we moved onto the furniture. Cleaning what we could, tossing the rest. The room was actually starting to look habitable, which shocked the hell out of me.
“So,” I said, “Lucien dropped by last night.”
Thorne paused mid-wipe and made a face. “Well, that didn’t take long. Did he flash his fangs at you? Order you to skip town before he ruins you? That’s usually how it starts.”
“None of that, actually.” I leaned against a crooked wall. “He was oddly polite.”
“Lucien St. Germain doesn’t do polite,” she said flatly, tossing the rag into the corner. “He does imposing. Cold. Vaguely threatening with a dash of aristocratic menace. He’s basically the personification of an expensive casket.”
“Well, someone must’ve swapped him out for a newer model, because he didn’t threaten me. He didn’t sneer. He barely blinked. He just listened as I chewed him out.”
Thorne turned and stared at me. “He listened while you chewed him out?”
“Yup, then he left. Didn’t insult me once—well, he tried, maybe? Something about me having claws and how he looks forward to seeing me use them. It might have been a compliment. But other than that, no power games.” I crossed my arms. “Honestly, I think I’m insulted.”
Thorne moved to the windowsill and leaned against it, staring at me like I’d grown a second head. “That’s weird.”
I nodded. “That’s what I said.”
She didn’t answer right away. Her eyes narrowed slightly, not in suspicion, but in thought.
“What?” I asked, suddenly wary of her scrutiny.
