The Demon's Song - By Kendra Leigh Castle Page 0,10
you laying it on so thick. Sofia didn’t do anything.”
Sofia blinked, startled at the speed with which she came back to herself. The room reappeared in sharp relief, from the sea of red on the tiled floor to the two men, each unusually handsome in his own way, glaring at each other.
“Sofia can answer for herself, I’m sure. I’ll take care of this, Phenex. You’ve got a crowd to entertain, and I’ve got a mess to get cleaned up. I told you, we’ll talk later.”
Phenex crossed his arms over his chest, and Sofia saw, with a wave of relief, that he had no intention of going anywhere. The expression he wore was arrogant, unimpressed, and decidedly mulish.
She wondered, suddenly, if it was a mistake to be putting so much faith in him, so blindly. Still, right now, he was all she had.
“It’s fine,” Sofia heard herself saying. “I’d rather he stayed.”
The man—Justin, Phenex had called him—looked almost comically surprised, though he recovered quickly. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Phenex’s smirk.
Oh, God, what had she gotten herself into?
“Suit yourself, then. What can you tell me, Sofia? May I call you that?”
“Yes, please,” she replied, finding his formality bizarre. She wished she was still with Amy, and anywhere but this blood-covered bathroom. “I didn’t know him. The one he was”—she couldn’t bring herself to say biting—“attacking is my roommate Sara. The blonde who just left is my other roommate, Amy. We came looking for Sara tonight because she’s barely been home lately. Her mom is worried, we were worried... She hasn’t been right since she started working here a few months ago. It was only getting worse, and things had gotten to the point that this was the only place I thought we might be able to see her. So we—”
“Sneaked in,” Phenex finished for her. When she turned her head toward him, he looked as amused as he sounded. “I knew you were up to no good.”
He looked too appreciative of the fact for Sofia to really be offended by the observation. Anyway, he was right. Or partially right. Whatever her intentions had been, not much good had come of this trip. Then again, Sara was still alive. She hoped. This mess would be worth it, Sofia thought, if that held true.
Justin’s sigh was exasperated. “Phenex. Not helping.”
“We came in through the kitchen,” Sofia admitted. “I said we’d brought Sara her wallet, since she was supposed to be working tonight. And that’s about it. We saw her with that guy, followed her in here, and I found...what I found.”
“And then punched what you found in the throat and the nuts,” Phenex said. “You take martial arts?”
“I’m an ER nurse at Georgetown,” Sofia replied, a little unnerved by Phenex’s casual attitude about violence. Then again, she reminded herself, that was probably one of the least unnerving things about him, all things considered. “I know how to handle myself.”
He looked intrigued, and there was a flicker of that sensual smirk. “I bet.”
There was no mistaking his meaning, and Sofia had to force her attention elsewhere. What kind of a guy hit on women in situations like this? What kind of women liked it? Her kind, apparently, Sofia thought, utterly disgusted with herself. She turned her head to watch Justin frowning at the mess that had once been a fanged psychopath. When Sofia forced herself to look more closely at the head, those fangs were still very much in evidence. She went cold as the harsh reality of the situation hit her again like a bucket of ice water. Fangs. Wings. And her friends were gone.
“Are Sara and Amy going to be okay?” she asked, the panic she’d so successfully kept at bay trying to work its way up the back of her throat again. Staying calm in crazy situations was one of her gifts, a thing that helped her excel at her job. But even she had her limits.
“Amy is being returned home as we speak,” Justin said, which was comforting until his eyes went carefully blank. “Sara is going to require extra care for a while. You shouldn’t worry. We’ll get it sorted out.”
She felt slightly ill. “Are you kidding? Of course I’m going to worry!”
Justin shrugged, an infuriatingly casual gesture considering what they were standing in the middle of, and what Sofia had just seen. She glared at him helplessly as frustration joined fear to twist into a hard knot in her stomach.