After the war, London is in chaos.
Packs are battling it out for dominance in the streets, lycans are killing each other in illegal fight dens. The Royals are being murdered.
All Juliet wants to do is forget - forget Sebastien, forget the wa...
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By the time we made it to the TDN portal that night, Theo and I were both on edge. We'd taken a taxi right into the middle of Oxford Street to mask our smell but as the flashing red numbers on the metre climbed higher and the cab crawled forward with slow-moving traffic, it started to feel like we were just pouring money down the drain.
I lost my patience eventually, tossing money on the front seat and climbing out the back with my senses on high alert. The street was still teeming with shoppers, people rushing up and down to catch buses and wayward children, but there was no fresh lycan scent.
On the one hand, I was glad — Theo and I would make it to the portal without any problems — but on the other...
Does Michael have any clue how to police this place?
I scowled. So not my problem.
I pushed through the crowd, hissing at one woman who managed to dig her elbow into my ribs. She spun around to glare at me but when she saw the look on my face, she paled and backed up, disappearing quickly into the fray.
Theo hurried after me and I could practically hear him growling every time someone so much as brushed against his sleeves. I hadn't realised how tense I was until we hit the next dimension, and little pinpricks of pain shot through my ribs as I relaxed.
I winced and pulled open the glass front door.
Ricardo was waiting in the lobby, his head tilted toward Betty as he chatted to her. She was gazing at him adoringly, stars practically shining in her eyes, but he seemed distracted — until he noticed our arrival. He straightened then, his eyes flicking warily from me to Theo.
His gaze lingered there and something about the way he stared, his eyes sharpening, was almost... predatory. My muscles tensed with the urge to yank Theo behind me. He might have helped us the other night, but something didn't add up. I'd been around the block enough times to know that people rarely helped anyone out of the goodness of their cold, undead hearts.
I could always kill him...
I flexed my fingers experimentally. But no — I couldn't do that. Other lycans might have been fair game, but vampires were protected under the Supernatural Alignment Act. If I killed Ricardo without proof of provocation, I'd have Supernatural Crime Control come down so hard on me, I'd rather throw myself at the mercy of the Impurists.
But how much had Theo told him? He was clearly up to speed on the current territorial disputes — which meant he had to know we were unaffiliated — but did he know about the Royals?
When his eyes slid back to me, his expression turned wary.
I almost smiled. Good.
"You're working on the Hex set tonight," he told us briskly. "Maintenance work. Are you —" He jerked his head at me. "— sure you're good to be here?"
