she would come to trust and rely on him in such a short time? Don’t get used it, she reminded herself. You’re perfectly capable of handling life on your own. And you’re not alone anyway. You’ve still got Spirit.
Spirit. No doubt he was curled up on one of the Gideon’s beds right now. “Can we stop and get Spirit before we head to the Tomb?” When had she started to think about the bar using the vampire name?
“I think we can risk it. Do you have enough energy to cast an invisibility spell on you both?”
“I think so, but I’ll only need to cloak myself. Spirit has his own powers, and one of them is invisibility.”
Gideon nodded. “Good. The Tomb will be crawling with cops.”
A lone raindrop sparkled like a diamond in his thick hair, and Thalia successfully fought the urge to brush it away. She folded her hands in her lap. It was better if she didn’t touch him. But, oh how she wanted to. She forced herself to remember how much it hurt when he’d pulled back from her in the kitchen. Her throat ached. She would be a fool to court that kind of pain again.
The rain seemed to have cleared the city streets. For the most part, they were the only ones on the road as they traveled to the Tomb. They’d dropped Spirit at Mina Shaw’s house. Spirit had insisted it was his place to go over the preparations for the ritual of power and ensure everything was done correctly. He didn’t say it, but Gideon got the feeling he was afraid someone might tamper with the spells.
The police had been watching the house, but it had been only a matter of minutes to slip inside and retrieve the familiar, who had escaped the police’s notice by literally vanishing.
Gideon had wanted to get Thalia some dry clothes, but her suitcase had been taken. His own clothes were still in his closet, probably because the police had already examined them and found nothing. Gideon had vaporized the blood-soaked clothes from his earlier encounter with the rogue. A decades-old amendment to the Code required careful disposal of blood. Vampires didn’t shed hair or skin cells. No vampire DNA could find its way to a crime lab. Nonetheless his clothes were much too big for her. So they’d stopped at Wegmans and bought Thalia a dry shirt emblazoned with the Lilac Festival logo. There had only been a few left, as the festival was in May. He glanced at her. She looked great in purple. Her hair had dried and, freshly brushed, it shone with the glossy highlights of a raven’s wing. He clenched the steering wheel. He ached to touch her, could already imagine the feel of her hair sliding through his fingers, but held back, reminding himself of the consequences.
He checked the time on his watch. Almost one a.m. He hoped the rogue hadn’t already chosen another victim while they’d wasted their precious time with witch politics.
After Thalia challenged Heath, they’d left the community to gossip, drink punch, and eat cookies. For people who thought the end of the world was coming, they sure had an odd way of showing it. Gideon pushed his lingering anger aside and focused on the confrontation he hoped was coming. This had to end, and quickly. He couldn’t afford to become any more attached to Thalia. If anything happened to her, the beast would be almost impossible to contain.
He’d thought about trying to convince Thalia to stay with Mina while he checked out the Tomb, but he didn’t dare. His earlier vision returned to torment him. Her delicate body, sprawled on the indifferent ground, devoid of life, forsaken like so much jetsam cast onto a beach. No. He didn’t dare leave her alone.
Gideon found a parking spot on the street a few blocks from the Tomb. The plan was to cloud the mind of anyone they encountered, make them seem like just another couple. They couldn’t afford to waste Thalia’s energy.
He couldn’t remember ever taking more than a day or two to enforce the Code. Who the hell was this rogue?
As if he’d conjured him, a low moan issued from a nearby alley. It sounded like a man in the throes of wild sex, but Gideon was not deceived. He grabbed Thalia’s hand and sped around the corner in time to see a bent figure drinking from the neck of a man in a black leather jacket.
He wrenched the misshapen