“Relax, Sparky. It’s fine.”
“Cade…”
“Just trust me, okay?”
Trust the crack in the sidewalk. Trust the spilled salt. The broken mirror. Sure, Tallulah, trust the black cat.
Trouble was, I did.
Chapter Five
I understood what he meant by trust me as soon as he pulled into the parking lot.
The whole place was abandoned, in spite of all the light spilling from the building itself. Only one car was there aside from ours—a shiny Mercedes with the vanity plate LSTRSRT.
Last Resort.
Cute.
Rich people were weird.
Cade had cut the headlights before we arrived—another perk of vintage cars—and we parked far enough from the main building to avoid being seen by anyone inside.
Clouds were rolling over the lake, coming down from the mountain and settling in low and menacing overhead. Most people couldn’t see clouds at night, they could merely sense their presence because of the added layer of darkness or the absence of stars. Me, I could see them fine, every textured bubble and heavy, rain-filled thunderhead.
A doozy was headed our way, and I hadn’t asked for it.
Sometimes a storm was just a storm, but I recalled Sido’s warning that Seth was coming, and knew this wasn’t any old storm. The metallic tang in the air was too familiar and too personal to ignore. Seth wanted my attention, and he wouldn’t leave until he got it.
I hoped he would lay off long enough for me to get the job with Cade done. If I was going to get a godly scolding, I’d like to have it happen without an audience.
Cade turned off the car, and we sat in the darkness with the windows rolled down. I took deep breaths of the perfect, peppery, prestorm smell. Whatever else it meant, the coming storm could always calm me.
“So what’s the deal with this guy?” I fiddled with the zipper on my jacket, desperate for any break in the silence.
“You know, the usual dirtbag nonsense.”
“If it were the usual nonsense, Ardra wouldn’t bother. He has to have been a very naughty boy.”
“Sometimes she just likes to fuck with people.”
“Don’t they all?”
In the dark I saw the twist of his smile and the faint gleam of mischief in his eyes. “Be careful. That’s sacrilegious language.”
“The temple can’t hear me out here.”
“But the gods
are always listening.”
I snorted. He wasn’t wrong exactly. Seth could hear and see me whenever he so chose, but he only chose to when it suited him. The rest of the time he didn’t care, so I’d learned not to worry about it. If he was going to peek on me while I showered, there wasn’t much I could do to stop him, and I wasn’t going to stop showering. I applied the same logic to the rest of my life as well.
“What did he do?” I asked again.
“We got a lot of requests on this one. He doesn’t pay his staff properly, he steals from his business partners. Cheats on his wife.”
My nose wrinkled. I especially disliked the unfaithful, and I bet Cade knew it. I’d brought a little hail down on bad husbands and wives in my time.