It was the hardest thing I'd ever had to do, given that all I really wanted to do was to wrap myself in Azriel's arms and let the rest of the world go to hell.
Which was still a very real possibility if we didn't get to the remaining keys first.
* * *
I was half an hour late by the time I got to Lucian's. Even though we'd been going against most of the traffic to get into the city, it was still peak hour, and that generally meant madness no matter which side of the road you were on.
I climbed out of the taxi and stared up at the old Victorian building. There were still workmen on-site, despite the fact it was nearing five thirty. Maybe they were making use of daylight savings and trying to get ahead of schedule. My gaze swept the top floor, but I wasn't sure what I was searching for. The windows were covered by heavy plastic, so even if Lucian had been standing at one of them, I wouldn't have been able to see him.
I took a deep breath, then released it slowly, but it didn't do much to ease the tension slithering through me. And standing here wasn't doing a whole lot for it, either. I waited for a tram to pass, then crossed the road and made my way through the scaffolding into his building.
The old lift rattled upward and came to a bouncing halt at the top floor. The doors groaned open, but it took me several seconds before I could force myself out.
And I wasn't entirely sure whether the reluctance stemmed from not wanting to meet with the dark sorceress or not wanting to have my suspicions about Lucian confirmed.
Damn it, I liked sex. I especially liked having sex with Lucian. I didn't want a return to the nun-like state I'd been in before this madness had all begun.
Of course, confirmation that he'd placed a compulsion spell on me wasn't exactly a deal breaker, but it would worry me. If he was being dishonest about that, then what the hell else was he being dishonest about?
I walked through the clouds of dust that filled the room, my footsteps echoing softly in the vast emptiness. There were no workmen on this floor, just the sound of their jackhammers and whatnot echoing up from the floors below. Lucian's lemongrass and suede scent filled the sub-layers within the dusty air, but it was entwined with an energy that was uneasy and shadowed. His dark sorceress was here.
I snuck under a dustcover and entered the kitchen. Except for the addition of four folding chairs, the room hadn't changed since the last time I'd been here. Lucian and Lauren stood near the chairs, but there was nothing relaxed about either of them. In fact, the heat in Lauren's cheeks and her sharp gestures very much suggested I'd walked in on the middle of an argument. Hell, Lucian was all but hissing in her face.
And yet, something in the way they stood—in their very closeness—was oddly intimate.
Unfortunately, thanks to all the noise the builders were making, I caught only a couple of chopped-up sentences of his conversation with the sorceress—it means nothing, I will have my revenge regardless.
And while Lucian had made no secret of either aim, I had to wonder why he was now saying those words to a sorceress he claimed to barely know.