Heart of Vengeance (Alice Worth #6) - Lisa Edmonds Page 0,75
pain was too much. I doubled over with a groan, holding in the surge with sheer determination. Oh, God, it hurt—far more than the earlier flare had, though this one was much shorter and less intense.
My fingers tightened in Daisy’s fur. She pushed her power into me, strengthening my shields and lessening the agony.
The flare lasted only about fifteen seconds, but it felt like an hour before the rush of power subsided. I took a shaky breath, let go of Daisy’s fur, and raised my head.
“You okay?” Malcolm asked. For some reason, the flare hadn’t affected him nearly as severely. He must be adjusting to the magic of this world faster than me.
I reached for my drink with a trembling hand. “I’m good.”
Lucy watched me, her hands folded around her glass. “Does that happen every time there’s a flare?”
I got the impression my reaction was abnormal, so I said, “No—that was strange. Something’s different here and it’s messing with me a little. I’ll be fine.”
Up on stage, the drummer launched into an extended solo that elicited appreciative shouts, applause, and a few squawks from fans in the crowd.
Lucy sighed and took a drink. “I appreciate his skill and enthusiasm, if nothing else,” she said. “Drummers are a strange breed. I dated one once. It was fun, while it lasted. You know what you call a drummer without a girlfriend?”
“I’ve heard this one.” I chuckled. “Homeless.”
She clinked her glass against mine. “To the drummers.”
“To the drummers,” I echoed. We drank. “I dated a lead singer once,” I confessed. I wasn’t sure what made me volunteer the information. It might have been the moonshine.
Malcolm’s eyebrows shot up. “No way. For how long?”
“A really, really good six weeks.”
Lucy grinned. “If it was that good, why only six weeks?”
“He was leaving to go on tour and I couldn’t go with him. It wasn’t ever going to be a long-term thing anyway. I still have good memories, and some comfy old band T-shirts I’ll wear until they fall apart.”
“Is that where you got all those shirts for Death Kettle you wear around the house?” Malcolm asked. “I wondered about those.”
Lucy almost spat out a mouthful of moonshine. “Death Kettle?”
I hadn’t thought about Cam in a while—really, not since Sean and I had gotten serious. I had no idea how Lucy would react to the news, or how half-demons were regarded here, so I kept the fact that Cam was a half-demon to myself.
Before Sean, all my relationships were brief. Most of them had ended abruptly when the person I was seeing wanted more than just a physical relationship. Cam had asked me to come on the road with him, even offered to pay all my living expenses and promised we’d travel in relative luxury. Not because we were good in bed—or not just because we were good. He liked me, and just sex wasn’t enough for him anymore. Back then, I feared letting anyone get too close. I was afraid they might suspect I wasn’t who I claimed to be, or betray me to the feds or my grandfather. So I pulled the plug and sent Cam off on his tour.
That pattern of short physical relationships lasted until an alpha werewolf, whose eyes crinkled when he smiled, introduced himself to me late one night at Hawthorne’s and found a way into not only my bed, but my heart. Tonight, I sat in this rowdy, smoke-filled, Mos Eisley cantina version of Hawthorne’s, and missed Sean so much that it hurt. We’d only been separated a day, but the distance between us—and the hollow sensation where our nascent bond normally offered quiet reassurance—gnawed at me.
The song finished with a thunderous roll of drums and a screaming note from the lead guitar. When the applause and shouts died down, the singer announced the band would be taking a short break. One by one, the band members left the stage. The drummer headed to a back hallway I assumed led to bathrooms and the others to the bar, where Joey already had drinks poured and waiting.
I caught sight of Leather Guy rising from his chair and ambling toward the bathrooms. There could be many explanations for his casual stroll, but the little hairs on the back of my neck prickled. Daisy nudged me and stared in the direction of the back hallway.
“I need to use the ladies’ room,” I told Lucy. “Hold down the fort?”
“You got it.” She raised her hand, attempting to get a server’s attention. “I’ll get