Of Wicked Blood (The Quatrefoil Chronicles #1) - Olivia Wildenstein Page 0,127

to house an eyebrow but now sits hairless on his blackened forehead.

“I like the new do, Prof. Party in the back. Churchy in the front.”

“You’re such an ass, Slate,” Adrien says but smirks, so maybe he’s not mad.

But I am. “You know, being a jerk’s really off-putting.”

I don’t look to see what that does to Slate, but I see what it does to Adrien—makes his gaze, which had looked a little lost and wild, firm up. I don’t know if what Charlotte insinuated is true. I don’t know if Adrien actually harbors feelings for me. She probably said it out of spite.

“Papa has some hair clippers at home. I buzzed his hair once. Turned out fine. I’ll gladly help you out. Unless you want to keep it—”

“No. Definitely not.” Adrien runs his palm over his forehead then higher. “I definitely don’t want to keep it this way. Thank you, Cadence. I appreciate your offer and will take you up on it.”

“Cadence, Alma, I’ll drive you home,” Papa offers, but I shake my head.

“I need to walk, Papa.”

Alma casts a longing glance at the snowmobile seat, but in the end, she hooks her arm through mine. Once the distance has grown between us and the four men, she says, “There are so many screwed-up parts about this evening, but right now, I need to know, do you still have feelings for Professor M, because—”

I pinch her arm and hiss, “Alma, he’s right behind us.”

Instead of dropping the subject she drops her voice. “He called out your freaking name while making love to his girlfriend, Cadence.”

“I’m sure that happens to lots of people.”

“Um, no. When you’re doing it with someone, you’re not thinking about other people. Or if you are, you’re thinking about them silently. Totally silently.”

“He was probably inebriated or something. But can we just not talk about it?” When she lets out a puff of breath, clearly annoyed I don’t want to analyze every angle of Adrien’s mishap, I add, “We can dissect it when it’s just the two of us and everyone’s gone, all right?”

She glances over her shoulder. “Why is everyone coming to your house by the way? And what’s inside the metal pot? Please tell me it’s not an organ.”

How well do I know my bestie? Of course that’s where her mind went.

“It’s not an organ. It’s a gold leaf. One of the Quatrefoil’s.”

Her mouth rounds in a perfect O.

“And they’re all coming back to the manor so we can lock it inside the safe, because if anyone but Adrien touches it, that person becomes cursed.”

“I was hoping to get some action tonight. Didn’t realize just how much I’d get.”

“You and I both. So much for losing my virginity . . .”

“There’s still time. Plus you have two willing candidates.”

My cheeks go so hot that I’m tempted to fan myself even though it’s minus ninety-two degrees outside. “Oh my God, Alma, shh.”

Her lips close around the wickedest smile that stays in place during our entire slog through the snowcapped circles of Brume, Papa’s snowmobile rumbling softly behind us.

39

Slate

It’s one giant slumber party, except it’s all slumber and no party.

Adrien, Alma, Bastian, and I crash at the De Morel house. Alma with Cadence, Bastian with me, in the same room as last time, and Adrien in the suite off of Rainier’s that apparently his nurse-slash-physical-therapist-slash-dominatrix Jaqueline uses sometimes.

The minute we arrived, Adrien and Rainier locked the piece in the safe. Then Cadence set off to give Prof a proper buzz-cut, while the rest of us retired to the bedrooms, too beat and shell-shocked to do much of anything else.

I scrub up four times in the shower, but the stink of barbequed dragon and soot still clings to me. I have no idea how I got out of that whole mess unscathed. I mean, yeah, I hurt like hell and there are plenty of scrapes and bruises all over my already scraped and bruised body, but for facing a demonic guivre, I’m in damn good shape.

For being in Brume, I’m in damn good shape.

This town’s a killer.

I dress in the university-issued sweats and a T-shirt with the school logo De Morel’s house elf left out on the bed.

“You should have seen me face the beast down with Adrien’s sword,” I tell Bastian as I step out of the bathroom, water spiraling down the nape of my neck from my waterlogged curls. “I’m getting a plaque with Slate Ardoin, Dragon Slayer Extraordinaire made for the house.” I slash the air