“Langford.” Wesley had turned back to them, his tone knife-sharp.
But Sebastian was already backing up. He couldn’t be here, couldn’t risk losing his magic around all the guests, or losing his composure and revealing Wesley’s secrets. He reached for a story that would help Wesley’s cover. “I’m going to check on Matilda.”
Wesley’s expression flickered. “Sebastian—”
“All clear!” a man yelled, from down the sidewalk.
“Christ, finally,” Langford said.
Wesley’s eyes were on Sebastian. Sebastian cleared his throat. “I’ll see you in the morning, Lord Fine.”
And as the crowd pushed forward, he stepped backward, losing himself behind the bodies. Sebastian waited, arms shielding the monogram and holding the robe shut tight, as the crowd flowed around him. He waited for the last of the people to go in before he trailed in behind the other grouchy guests in their various night clothes.
Langford and Wesley were nowhere to be seen in the lobby, but at least a dozen snapping people were packed around the front desk. Sebastian stood off to the side, but when the desk clerk looked his way, he gave the room number on six. “Do you happen to have a spare key?”
The harried clerk shoved it at him and went back to the angrier guests.
Sebastian took the stairs up to six, avoiding the elevator, and let himself into the room he’d been in briefly with Mateo.
It was dark and silent, nothing but the trunk for show, since half his clothes were in Wesley’s trunk now. Cold too, from the window Mateo had left cracked to try to chase out the smell of old smoke. The curtains were open, framing the lights of the building across the street. Six stories down on the street, cars were still puttering past, the city refusing to sleep, because he was back in Manhattan, like he’d been in February.
You ever see real violence?
Sebastian shook his head to get rid of the echo of Langford’s voice. He sat on the edge of one of the single beds and pulled the chain on the light, flooding the room with yellowish glow. He caught sight of his reflection in the mirror, and winced. Between the rain on the roof and a night in Wesley’s bed, his waves were a wild mess, paired with a stubbly jaw and deep shadows under his eyes that were ever-present these days from the brooch.
The brooch that was, of course, still in Wesley’s closet, but was Major Langford staying on Wesley’s floor? Would he see Sebastian, if he went back down? It was nearly two; too late for a suspicious man to believe business associates were at work and Sebastian had already put Wesley far too at risk because he couldn’t keep his feelings to himself.
So he couldn’t join Wesley now. He had to stay and sleep here, where there was no Mateo in the room anymore, no familiar paintings or anything else to anchor him or remind his blood it was free. Just a cold room with thin blankets, and the lights and sounds of New York, where he’d hurt countless others while under blood magic.
All that blood and gore happening right in front of your face—or at your own hands?
Sebastian’s magic was still too close to the surface, like horses straining at their reins. If Wesley hadn’t taken him up to the roof, he would have lost control completely down on the sidewalk. How welcome it would have been to see Wesley now; he was the only thing that made New York bearable.
Sebastian hadn’t had a blood terror since York. But every night since then, he’d had Wesley, warm and solid, a constant reminder against his skin that the blood magic was gone.
But Wesley was probably asleep by now, probably sick of Sebastian’s clinginess and enjoying having a bed to himself. Or maybe he was angry, because Sebastian had almost let his temper get away and revealed Wesley’s secrets to Langford.
More reasons Sebastian didn’t get to use Wesley as an anchor, not tonight. He’d have to accept that tonight there was a risk of blood terrors. He used to accept that risk every night, back when he’d been resigned to it, had known every night brought the potential for that horror, that he might wake up trapped in his own body, unable to move, with no idea how long it would last.
He just hadn’t realized how desperately he didn’t want to go back to that place.
You ever had no choice but to do things civilians could never stomach?
Sebastian shoved Langford’s voice out of his head, because if he thought about that any closer, his magicwouldescape and he’d have the sixth floor on the ground. Maybe he could sleep in Wesley’s warm robe tonight. Maybe all this extra magic would keep the blood terrors away.
Unless having more magic made it worse. Or unless it was like the relics themselves, and the longer they had been buried, the stronger they’d gotten.
Maybe he was in for the worst blood terror he’d ever had, the next time they came back.
He abruptly moved from the foot of the bed to the nearby chair. He had letters to write, a book he could read. He could keep the window open, take off the robe, and he’d be cold enough to stay awake until he was ready to try sleep.
Or he could just not sleep at all.
Chapter Twelve
Wesley’s spine felt tight enough to snap as Langford walked beside him back to the suite. “Finally,” Langford was saying. “The things I have to tell you—”
“He was a prisoner of war.”
