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“Yes.” That was something I could do. I started to go and fetch one and changed my mind. I pulled off my t-shirt and handed her that instead. “Here. I’ll get a clean one, but let's get the bleeding stopped now.”
Her gaze scanned over my bare chest, and heat flooded me again. More than my fangs were going to start popping out if she kept looking at me like that. She took the shirt and pressed it to her head. She winced, but she seemed okay.
“You said someone hit you?” I asked, looking down over the main room. I hadn’t seen an intruder, but I’d been focused on Delphine. I should probably go and look, but I didn’t want to leave her alone.
“I think so.” She frowned. “I was coming up the ramp, looking for Dolly, and there was someone behind me.”
“Dolly?”
“The dolphin I adopted,” she said.
“Oh, this is the shark tank.”
“I forgot.” Her cheeks reddened and I could see the smattering of freckles across her nose.
“Did you see anything about them? Were they a man? A woman?”
“No.” She bit her lip. “I didn’t see.”
A grunt came from behind me, and I spun around, ready to attack.
“It’s only me, vampire,” Tripp said, his hand raised and a swirl of purple magic in his palm.
I’d been so distracted by Delphine, I’d let him sneak up behind me. I backed down. I’d been on the receiving end of one of Tripps magical grenades once and I had no desire to face it again. Those things stung.
“What’s going on here?” he asked, taking in our wet clothes and Delphine’s makeshift bandage. “Was there some kind of accident?”
“She came here for . . .” I trailed off. I didn’t even know how to begin to explain it. “Someone followed and attacked her.”
“Attacked her?” Tripp frowned and came closer. “Let me see your head.”
Delphine glared at him, but she lifted the bandage. Her blonde hair was matted down with blood, and there was a growing bump with a jagged slash across it.
“Looks bad,” I said, squeezing my hands into fists. “Does she need a hospital?”
Tripp scowled. “That’s the last thing we need—for someone to get sent to the hospital from here. Then they really will start thinking these strange happenings are our fault.” He stood still, closing his eyes and mouthing some words I didn’t know. Then his hands filled with a yellow glow that he used to make symbols in the air. I did know that shape, the Norse Uruz rune for healing.
The magic settled over Delphine and her skin knit itself back together and the swelling disappeared. She was still covered in blood, but she was healed. Even after all my years walking the earth, sometimes Tripp’s magic still amazed me. He was incredibly strong for a witch.
She touched her head in surprise and blinked her eyes. “I don’t really feel drunk anymore either.”
Tripp grunted. “Clean her up and get her home, Levi.”
“Okay,” I said.
“But who attacked me?” she asked. “And how did they follow me in here?”
“You were probably drunk and hit your own head on something in the tank,” Tripp shot back as he walked away.
Delphine shot to her feet. “I wasn’t. And there was the old man—”
Tripp paused and turned back to face us. “What old man?”
“In O’Malley’s, this man stopped me and demanded to know what magic I’d done in the aquarium. I got away, but he followed me out to the street and watched when I rode away in the rideshare.” She was still rubbing her head as if she didn’t quite believe she’d been healed.
“You were drunk though,” Tripp said.
“Yeah, but I remember him,” she said. “Do you think he hit me?”
