Page 73 of Veil of Blood and Bone

Despite the air of decay and the mold problems, the apartment is warm, inviting, and homey. Worn in most places, but Helene has always been a woman who values use first. Then comfort.

Style has never mattered to her.

“Someone better start answering my questions because I’m about two seconds away from a full blown meltdown and no one wants to see that,” she says.

“You mean, your lovely eruption at the bookstore wasn’t a breakdown?” I tease.

She squeezes the tin of store brand coffee hard enough to dent it. “It wasn’t even close. Now which one of you cares to do the honors of explaining this situation to me? You. You were stalking me.”

She points a sticky spoon toward Nicholas.

“I was watching you. And a good thing I was,” he replies.

As usual, his abrasive tone is sandpaper on my ears. Helene shivers, but it’s not from irritation. Her flash of arousal colors the air in the kitchen.

Nicholas goes rigid in the corner like he’s trying not to breathe. He keeps his gaze fixed on the wall instead of her throat.

Never her throat.

“The creature was another troll, I believe. Why was it here? Why was no one else around when it attacked?”

Helene scoops a greedy amount of coffee grounds into the machine. She grabs the pot and flips on the sink, the pipes belching and hissing before the steady flow fills the vessel. The pipes here put all kinds of minerals in the water.

I taste it from here.

She doesn’t invite either one of us to sit. Nicholas looms in the corner like a surly child, and rather than wait for an invitation, I snake a chair out from beneath the table.

“It was a troll, pretty monster,” I reply. “You’re right.”

“And why did it get so cold?” She dumps the pot in the back of the coffee maker and spills half on the counter.

“The troll is a servant of Kari.”

She blinks. “Kali? The goddess of time and death?”

“Wrong pantheon,” Nicholas corrects.

“And why were you stalking me?” she snaps.

Nicholas scoffs and meets my eyes a second time. We tried lying to her before.

Different lives. Different endings. Never worked.

It doesn’t slow the curse. Lies buried her just as fast.

“Because I can’t stop myself from watching you.”

The coffee maker lets out a plaintive shriek prior to the first gurgle of black gold fills the bottom of the container.

“You’re asking the incorrect questions.” Nicholas says it like a threat.

Helpful as always.

Helene holds his black look for the longest time and grabs the pot, yanking it free before it finishes percolating. Three mugs clank together, and she lines them up in a row, soldiers slapped with disorderly conduct.

More liquid splashes on the already ruined counter. She steps aside and gestures like the host of a game show. “Here. I have no idea how you like them.”

I’m the first to move.