Aurelie glanced up to find that the quietest of the Applebaum brothers, Lex, was still lingering in the corner of the room. Aurelie had thought she liked him best. Now she knew it was simply because he talked less than the others.
“Why not?” she asked, finding she didn’t care anymore if word got back to Uncle Leo that she’d been rude. She had no idea why he’d ever imagined the Applebaum children would be a good influence. They were arrogant, ignorant, and self-important. A trifecta of exasperation.
“Because he might have married you, before. Now he’ll tell everyone some ugly rumor about you, and you’ll be ruined.”
Aurelie almost laughed. “Who said I wanted to marry Miles Viridian?”
Lex crossed his legs and brought a heretofore hidden glass of whiskey up, raising it to her. “Ah. Well, forgive me for misunderstanding. I thought that’s what all you young ladies wanted. My mistake.”
Aurelie couldn’t tell if he was mocking her, and she found she didn’t care about that anymore, either. “Please thank your father for the lovely dinner,” she said, and went to the front door without waiting for a response. She would walk back to the university. Miles would probably be relieved she was gone, and though she was sure the Applebaums would provide a carriage if she requested it, the walk would clear her head.
If this was the life Uncle Leo envisioned for Aurelie, then he clearly didn’t know her at all. The thought was so demoralizing that by the time she was halfway home, she felt no better about her predicament. Worse still, if she returned early, Bonnie would start asking questions, to which she could hardly provide an honest answer. “I insulted the boys and left without a proper goodbye” wouldnotsit well with her maid.
With a desperate glance at her surroundings, Aurelie’s eyes landed on a café emitting an inviting glow from its windows.One drink, she told herself as she trotted across the street.One drink, just to clear my head.
Chapter 7
Des
Des watched in utter disbelief as the Blake girl emerged from the large stone mansion she’d disappeared into just two hours ago, alone.
What in the name of Aciano did she think she was doing, walking at night without a chaperone? Had the tall, gangly twig of a boy who escorted her earlier expired from lack of nourishment?
Des receded farther behind the hedge he and Gareth were using for cover, grabbing the younger boy by the collar and yanking him backward just in time to avoid the girl’s notice. Not that he should have bothered. She seemed completely oblivious to anything as she sighed and lifted her hair from her neck, clearly relishing the feel of the cool breeze on her skin.
The moon was bright, and there were still plenty of people out and about, but even grown men didn’t walk these city streets alone at night. Not when demons were afoot. Had she no sense at all?
“What should we do?” Gareth asked as the Blake girl began to make her way down the street.
“Follow her, of course.” He was beginning to think this entire endeavor was a complete waste of time. Whomever the tall man with the thrall was, the Blake girl was not involved. How could she be, when she looked about as threatening as a potted plant? A very small potted plant, wearing a fancy dress. Still, they couldn’t verywell leave her to be eaten by a demon, not when Commander Yew expected him to keep her safe in her uncle’s absence.
Wisteria City, for all its stagnation the past one hundred years, was still considered the crown jewel of the kingdom, which didn’t say much for the kingdom as a whole. Along the main boulevard, old shopfronts leaned heavily against their neighbors, leaving corner buildings to jut precariously over their foundations. Here and there, lots stood vacant where a structure had crumbled beyond repair and no replacement could be built in its stead.
Des, who only ever viewed the city from a hunter’s eyes, watched as the Blake girl made her way blithely along. Perhaps he shouldn’t be surprised that the dean’s niece wasn’t afraid, considering she spent her entire life behind the university’s iron gates.
“What’s that?” Gareth said, suddenly gripping Des’s arm with surprising strength.
His eyes caught what he should never have missed in the first place: a pair of glowing red eyes in an alley, just feet from where the girl was passing.
His hand went to his sword automatically, but the demon, mostly translucent in the glow of the streetlamps, didn’t attack. Instead, it drifted in the girl’s wake, maintaining a respectable distance of fifteen feet or so.
“Is itfollowingher?” Gareth whispered.
Des grunted an unintelligible response. He’d known there was something off here. He should know better than to discount his own instincts, even if Commander Yew had doubted him.
The girl crossed the boulevard toward Café Dahlia, a common gathering spot for Wisteria’s young and wealthy. Des had never setfoot inside, and he certainly wasn’t going to start now. The demon, perhaps realizing its quarry was unreachable for the moment, drifted into a nearby park.
“Now what?” Gareth asked.
Before Des could answer, he heard someone shout his name from across the street and swore under his breath.
Daisy and her partner, Jasper, sauntered toward them, oblivious to thesomniaand the girl. “Shift over?” Daisy asked, her wide smile softening Des ever so slightly. “We just finished.”
“We’re tracking Dean Blake’s niece,” Gareth replied, pointing toward the café.
Daisy’s eyes lit up. “She’s in there? Then what are we standing out here for? Let’s go meet her!”
As Daisy and Jasper began to cross the street, Gareth looked to Des for instructions. The plan had never been to meet the girl, simply to observe her. Besides, there was a demon loitering somewhere nearby, and he couldn’t very well leave it to find a new victim.