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1
NEVER
I checked my outfit in the mirror for the fifth time, doing my best to ignore my little brother’s defiant expression in the reflection. “I told you, it’s a date not a hunt.”
He motioned toward the dagger he couldn’t possibly see tucked safely inside my boot. “Then why do you have that?”
At seventeen, Matty was an observant little shit who had somehow managed to grow four inches taller than me while looking like a spitting image of our mom. At least what I remembered of her. And when he looked at me with that confident smirk and all too familiar tilt to his head, it took some serious effort not to hold the likeness against him.
I shrugged. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
“Come on, Nev. Let me go with you. I’ll do everything you say.” He traced an ‘X’ over his chest with one finger. “Cross my heart.” His boyish smile always gave my heart a painful little squeeze, but it also reinforced my standing rule not to take him on hunts with me.
He was strong enough to handle the daylight-dwelling demons, but he was still a little too immature to go up against the real baddies that stalked the night. And entirely too immature to keep his mouth shut about it afterward.
Most of the world didn’t know about the demons. As far as I knew, it was just us lucky Darlings who could see them moving through our world. The last thing I wanted was for him to end up locked up in some mental health facility because some naïve idiot decided he was delusional.
That had happened to our great-grandmother, and it wasn’t the kind of legacy I wanted to continue.
“I’m going to a party.” I turned to face him, planting my hands on my hips in my best big sister power pose. “An adult party, with my boyfriend. No demons. No hunting. And you have a makeup test to study for.”
His upper lip curled. “I could ace it with my eyes closed.”
“You sure about that? You already failed it once.” I held up a hand before he had a chance to argue. “And falling asleep at your desk is not a good excuse.” It was his own damn fault for staying up late playing video games the night before his big chemistry test.
Instead of shrinking under my sisterly stare, he eyed my outfit. “Where’s your costume?”
“I don’t do costumes.”
“Everyone does costumes on Halloween, especially when they’re going to a party.”
“Clint didn’t say anything about dressing up.” I turned to check my reflection again, tugging the cropped leather jacket around my waist and giving my ass a little shake. It was truly amazing what the perfect pair of jeans could do for a girl’s confidence, especially when she wasn’t feeling much like socializing.
Matty flopped back on the mattress with a dramatic groan. “Why are you still dating that asshole anyway?”
I pulled a scarf off the mirror’s frame, balled it up, and threw it at his face. “Language.”
“I’m not a kid anymore. I can say asshole,” he muttered through the thin fabric.
“Not around me.”
“Killjoy.”
“Brat.” I walked over and lifted the scarf off his head to find him grinning up at me like an idiot. His playfulness could be so damned contagious. It was the only thing that saved him from a lifetime of being grounded after I’d caught him sneaking out. “Not a chance, and you are not to step one foot out of this apartment tonight.”
He might have been a few months shy of adulthood, but the way he rolled his eyes at me brought back memories of the terror he’d been growing up. I loved him to death. Enough to walk away from a full-ride scholarship and my last year of college to take care of him after his dad skipped out. But that didn’t mean he didn’t get under my skin.
“Up, Matty. Go study.” I pointed at my bedroom door.
“What about the trick-or-treaters? They’re going to be a huge distraction.”
The universe chose that moment to take his side as a knock invaded the apartment.
I stalked out of the room, shaking my head at his little crow of triumph. When I reached for the knob, I paused just long enough to plaster on what I hoped was a convincing aren’t-you-just-the-cutest-thing smile before pulling the door open. A trio of tiny children in store-bought disguises held out their plastic pumpkin pails and screamed “trick or treat” at me.
“Aw, how cute,” I cooed, praying the cringe wasn’t showing on my face.
In this batch, we had a princess, a fairy, and a pirate, and I had the sudden, inexplicable urge to educate the poor kid on the truth about pirates and how they’d been grossly romanticized by modern society. Real pirates were little more than drunks and wanderers who had pillaged and raped freely, spreading fear and disease from port to port. They were deplorable. Disgusting.
