I gasped as one of the men reached down, pulling back the bright white of the sheet to reveal an even more brilliant glow of fiery orange-red hair.
"No." The word gusted out of me in a breath, my eyes growing wide.
That was Beth's hair, three shades brighter than my own and wonderfully glossy. There was a flash of a photographer's camera, and I whimpered as the sheet was flicked back up over the head of the body on the ground. My hands covered my mouth, and I searched that crowd as if one of the faces of the men swarming Beth might offer an answer. My eyes snagged on another pair, too far away to see the color, but an undeniably sharp gaze in a beautifully handsome face. The man was dressed in a suit rather than a uniform, with a heavy black coat draped over his shoulders and a bowler hat tipped back on his head. He had high cheekbones cut down the side of his face like daggers and a perfect pair of bow lips, which only slightly distracted from his very obvious narrow-eyed stare now fixed to me.
"Miss Nix, I think it would be best if we left the scene," Hunter murmured in my ear.
I startled as I remembered him, finding the small human man at my side rather than the broad and protective orc, and nodded dumbly. I couldn't focus enough to find the striking man in the crowd again, and then Hunter was turning me in place, guiding me back to the carriage and lifting me inside.
He didn't wait for my invitation now, squeezing onto the seat at my side and reaching for my hands. His touch was scorching around my fingers, and I gasped again as we lurched into motion.
"We all…just thought she'd missed a day," I said, my head whipping to stare out the window as we passed the crowd.
There! There was the man again, glaring at our carriage, eyes flicking rapidly, clearly unable to see in through Hunter's protective spells.
"Did it happen tonight?" I wondered aloud.
"I will make inquiries, Miss Nix," Hunter said.
I blinked and turned back to him, the passing street lamps rolling the shadows back and forth over his human disguise in an eerie effect.
"You will?"
"I have connections within the monster community, of course. But my disguise also is well seated with the humans, including the police," Hunter explained. "Would you prefer to return to the theater?"
I opened my mouth to say yes. Someone would need to tell Myra and Reddy. There was a chain hanging from Hunter's pocket, and he didn't stop me as I pulled it free, flicking open the round watch and frowning at the time.
"No. No, we can't. No one but the stagehands who board there will still be there," I said. Ronan would be there, but he wouldn't know what to do in this situation.
The carriage turned, and I realized how quickly we were driving now as I tipped forward into Hunter's chest. But he was warm and he smelled like the earth of a garden, vividly alive in summer, and I dropped the pocket watch in favor of gathering his jacket and vest in my fists. His arms wrapped around my back as I sank into his frame.
"We are nearly to your home, Miss Nix. It will be all right. I'll walk inside with you."
"Stay. Stay with me, please," I whispered, wincing at the crack in my words. When Hunter didn't respond, I arched and tilted my head back enough to look at him, frustrated by the false face staring back at me. "If it won't trouble you…if no one is waiting for you…"
Perhaps he had a mate, and a human girl was simply an object of attraction to him. That happened sometimes.
But Hunter's warm hand reached to my cheek and his thumb stroked my jaw and down over the pulse of my throat. "I have no one waiting for me, little one. Are you sure?"
My laugh was ragged, the shock of seeing my friend on the ground surrounded by police leaving me stiff and awkward and cold in my own skin. "Sure? I've all but begged you to bed me, Hunter."
His brow furrowed and he nodded once. "If there is some sense of obligation, or if you wish to please your employer, you needn't worry. I will come to the theater, support its work, regardless of any—"
"Hunter!"
The carriage jerked to a stop and Hunter stretched around me, opening the door and hurrying to step down, his hand held out to help me down. I swallowed my objection to his statement.
"Come with me, please. I don't want to be alone," I said, stepping down and gripping his hand in mine. He followed calmly, already determined to search my apartment.
Beth is dead. She was in the street.
I knew our neighborhood wasn't safe, but I'd lived here all my life. Some of the villains on Jamaica Street had watched me grow up. I'd always had a sense that I was protected here, but was that really true?
I marched forward with Hunter's hand held tightly, unlocking the front door and ignoring the dark entrance hall and the sense that there might be an unfamiliar shadow lurking in a corner.
Hunter took careful steps behind me, disguising his size and weight with a predator's grace, although not even a light step would muffle the creaks on some of the floorboards. It didn't matter. There was no nosy matron in this house to raise a riot for my virtue, and the other residents were used to my late arrivals. I knew what they must think of me, but the truth wasn't so far removed from the rumor, and I didn't care so long as I wasn't bothered.
My flat was cold as I opened the door, and Hunter immediately prowled through the sitting room and into the kitchen, pulling off his hat at last. I busied myself with turning all the latches, locking the world out, and locking this orc inside with me.
Door hinges and floorboards complained as Hunter searched the rooms, as if he might find the culprit here in my home. I shuddered at the thought, recalled the shadows of men cast over the drape of white on the ground, and stared at the empty narrow fireplace in front of me.
Hunter's approach was less urgent on his way back to me, steps light and quiet. "I apologize for—"
I spun in place and rushed toward him, cutting off the silly speech as I crashed into his chest. "You'll stay the night?"
I regretted leaving the theater early and wished briefly that it was Ronan now wrapping his arms around my back. He wouldn't be so hesitant to squeeze me tight against his chest, and for all his pot-stirring and teasing, he was familiar. Safe.
But Hunter was warm, and his grip grew more secure and confident as the seconds passed, and he'd protected me the night before in the park, and even now, making sure my flat was safe. I'd never brought Ronan home with me, and if I hadn't left with Hunter, perhaps I would've walked alone tonight and seen Beth on the sidewalk and—
Hunter twisted, and his left arm scooped me up from behind my knees, carrying me through the kitchen. My father's old bed was still tucked into the corner, close enough to the stove to keep him warm in the winters, partly because I'd never found the time after joining the theater to move it out, and partly because it was the familiar landscape of my home. Hunter didn't stop. He'd found my small bedroom in his searching, and he carried me there now.
"I will light us a fire," he said, setting me down on my narrow bed.