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"No," Cain promised, "he's something much,muchscarier. He's also a nice guy. You see, Thane, demons are real, and you just signed a contract with one."
Yep, he definitely needed a drink.
Somehow, he'd just fallen further down this rabbit hole of demons and evil. Not that Thane was convinced these people were actually evil, but the Church would say they were. By helping them, that madehimevil too, and the implications of that all led to the same place: either his new friends would kill him or his own people would.
He was so fucked, but when the enigma of an accountant returned, Claunek had their new documents with him. It wasn't just the normal ID. No, this strange man had also made birth certificates, social security numbers, and set up bank accounts in their new names. Thane was given a page with instructions on how to transfer everything in an untraceable way. It was just a website, and the directions said that once activated, Thane's current accounts would be emptied and his new ones filled via a bank in Panama.
In other words, they had a future now. Maybe not an easy one, but this? It was magical. It was impossible. Claunek also seemed to have been doing it for a very long time, and Thane could only hope it wasn't some elaborate scam. Still, Cain trusted the guy, and Thane had no choice, so he told the supposed "demon" thank you, and tried to accept just how much his view of reality had changed.
When Nikki came by their apartment to remind them that they had a party planned that night, Thane just went with it. He changed out of his nice "wedding" clothes and into something a little more casual. Dahlia, on the other hand, pulled out a little red dress. Very little. Very red. An impressive set of heels went with it, making her tall enough to look in his eyes.
Then, they all walked four blocks to the club Nikki had picked. Thane suggested driving, but Roarke nixed that idea. He intended to get Thane drunk, he said. Plus, all the eidolon were used to a time before easy transportation. Walking was normal for them. Even now, so few owned cars, and walking meant they could all trickle in without making a scene - because more eidolon were coming. It was feeding night.
From the moment he'd woken up that morning, Thane had felt like things had been moving just a little too fast. He was fucking married! His big plan had been to come to Iowa to set things up. Instead, they were already in motion, and he wasn't sure he was in control anymore. For his entire life, he'd been the one making decisions, giving directions, and leading the show. Now, he was just the sidekick, a little too aware that he was the weakest in the group, and unsure how to deal with any of it.
That was how he ended up leaning his back against the bar with a bottle of beer in his hands and watching Dahlia dance with Nikki on the other side of the room. He had to admit that they looked good. Nikki was a curvy girl with the kind of ass that made men stop to notice. Dahlia was tall and lean, but in an athletic way. One was light, the other dark, but neither was too extreme. Blonde and brown, tall and shorter, sensual and seductive. Naturally, half the room was watching the pair have fun.
But Dahlia was smiling. He watched as she threw her head back and laughed. This was the woman who'd drawn his eye in that first club, the supposed thrall he'd intended to save. Instead, she'd changed everything. Some of it was good, some of it was bad, and yet he'd still married her.
Married.
Her.
Fuck, but that was a lot to take in! A few hours ago, he'd given that woman his last name, but she'd been dead for thousands of years. Now, she was in a club flirting with every man but him. They were fuckingmarried, and it seemed that she had every intention of picking up her next snack right in front of him. Even worse, Thane had agreed to this. He'd said he understood. Their marriage was just an alliance, so why the hell did he want to punch every guy who checked her out?
"Brooding?" Roarke flopped beside him, mimicking Thane's pose as he somehow managed to make the question sound like a taunt.
"Fuck off," Thane grumbled. "Like you'd be any better."
Roarke shrugged, dismissing that. "Hundred years ago, maybe. Two hundred years ago, probably. Today?" The man shook his head. "It's the modern world, remember? I mean, last night you were the one giving me the speech about men of your generation being so open-minded or whatever bullshit you spewed."
Thane just grunted. Roarke was right, and he knew it. The problem was that he didn't like it. For his entire life, Thane had lived under the assumption that he could have any woman he wanted, and she would always be his. If she cheated, he'd punt her ass to the curb so fast it would make their heads spin. He was supposed to be the one in charge, making the decisions - and it seemed he kept coming back to that.
"Just trying to figure out how I'm supposed to act when my wife is trying to hook up with someone else," Thane said, hoping that came off a little more detached than it felt.
From Roarke's laugh, he'd failed miserably. "Thought it was just a marriage of convenience?"
"Alliance," Thane corrected.
"Both make it sound pretty meaningless," Roarke pointed out. "You aren't acting like it's meaningless. Does the terrifying and dangerous hunter have a crush on the big bad monster?"
Thane lifted his beer and took a long drink before bothering to reply. "From the way you look at her, it seems I'm not the only one."
"Yeah, because she's fucking hot," Roarke agreed. "The difference between me and you, though? I know that I can't feed her. Oh, I'd love to hook up with her, but it would just be for fun. That means I've already accepted the fact that she's going to fuck other people. You? Nah, you're still trying to sort that out in your head, I bet."
Thane mulled that over for a bit before deciding to take another drink. It was safer than answering. Unfortunately, Roarke seemed to have no intention of filling the silence. The whole time, Dahlia kept dancing, but now some guy was making his move. She'd noticed, giving the bastard the kind of smile that made men's dicks get hard.
"So, any advice?" Thane finally asked.
Roarke reached over to slap his shoulder. "You stop thinking about what the fuck you're losing letting your wife fuck around, and you start focusing on what you're getting."
"What the fuck am I getting?" Thane shot back.
"Well the right to fuck around yourself, to start." Turning, Roarke caught the bartender's eye and gestured for another round for both of them, then kept going. "This thing between you two is an open relationship. It has to be. My advice to you? Get monogamy out of your fucking mind as fast as you can."
"In case you missed it," Thane said as the bartender walked over with another pair of beers, "I just got married. Today."
"No shit?" the bartender asked as he slid over the beers. "Congratulations, man. These are on the house. Here's hoping it wasn't the shotgun type of wedding."
