House Rules - Chloe Neill Page 0,4
I said honestly. Many of the Rogues had purposely avoided the House system, and now we were inviting them here to socialize.
A shifter carrying four stacked aluminum trays that smelled of porky goodness walked past us, and I couldn’t help but stare as all that meat disappeared from sight. “I need to find him later,” I absently said. “How’s work?”
“Shiftery,” she said, pointing to a white delivery truck that was parked at the open gate in the Cadogan fence. “I feel a lot better, but I’ve developed a new problem.”
“What’s that?” I asked, fearing a new magical addiction or another demigod with an attitude.
The answer came quickly, and it was decidedly shorter than a demigod.
“Mishka!”
Mallory frowned as a barrel-chested woman with bleached hair stepped out of the truck and headed our way. She was a shifter named Berna, and she tended bar and worked the kitchens at Little Red. She also supervised Mallory, apparently to Mallory’s chagrin.
“She calls you Mishka?” I wondered.
“Among other things. And she’s driving me crazy.” Mallory picked up more aluminum trays, then turned to Berna with an obviously forced smile. “Yes, Berna?”
As soon as Berna reached us, she poked me in the arm. She was always concerned I wasn’t eating enough—which was never the case; it was just my vampire metabolism—so the poke was actually an affectionate hello.
“Hi, Berna. The food looks good.”
“You eat enough?” she asked in her heavy Eastern European accent.
“Always,” I assured her.
“You eat more,” she said, then poked Mallory. “You back to work.”
“I was just saying hello to Merit.”
Berna made a sarcastic noise and pinched my arm. Hard. “Still too thin,” she pronounced, then walked away, yelling at another shifter who was heading toward the back of the house carrying plastic bags of yeast rolls.
“I should get back to work,” Mallory said. “She has a very specific plan about how this gig should operate.”
“I take it you two aren’t getting along?”
“She’s driving me up the freaking wall.”
“Berna’s intense,” I said, rubbing the sore spot on my arm. “Motherly, in her way, but intense.”
“That’s precisely the problem. It’s been a long time since I’ve been mothered, and twenty-eight is too late to start.”
Mallory’s parents had been killed in a car accident years ago, and she didn’t have any living relatives.
“I can see how that would be awkward.”
“It is. But she means well, so I’m going to shake it off later with a hot bath and stack of gossip magazines.”
I wondered whether she’d also shake it off by talking to Catcher Bell, her boyfriend—or at least, he’d been her boyfriend before her unfortunate magical incidents. I wasn’t entirely sure where they stood, but since she didn’t bring it up, I didn’t either. Not that the curiosity wasn’t killing me.
“Do the bath and magazines help?” I asked.
“Less than they should. But when you aren’t supposed to use your magic, you do what you can. It’s like the world’s worst diet.”
“Mishka!”
“I’m coming!” Mallory yelled, then smiled apologetically. “It’s good seeing you, Merit.”
“You, too.”
She looked up at me a little shyly. “Hey, maybe we could do something sometime? If you’re up to it?”
It killed me a little that I hesitated before responding. But I still needed time. “Um, yeah. Okay.” I nodded. “Give me a call.”
She smiled a little brighter, then jogged back to the truck to arrange food at Berna’s command.
Say what you would about Mallory, but the girl was trying to claw her way back into her life. I had to respect that, and I truly hoped she could make it stick.
CHAPTER TWO
PAS DE DEUX
An hour later, the yard was full of vampires of the Rogue and Cadogan persuasions. They seemed to be mixing relatively well—which was the entire point of a mixer, really.
If the fashion was any indication, the crew here today was much more eccentric than the Rogues who’d previously visited the House. A few were outfitted in the black military-style duds we’d seen before. But the others wouldn’t have passed a military inspection. They wore heavy biker leathers and tie-dyed shirts, classic Goth ensembles and cocktail dresses.
Some of them had been snubbed or excluded by the House system, and some of them had purposely chosen the Rogue life. None of them seemed the worse for it.
Ethan worked the crowd like a master diplomat, moving from cluster to cluster of vampires, shaking hands and listening attentively while they chatted.
Luc stepped beside me. “Not bad for a last-minute party.”
“It was only a last-minute party because we’ve been focusing on the transition,” I pointed out.
Ethan