Page 68 of Something Worth Keeping
Julian laughed and settled back in the booth, coffee warm in his hands, his mate beside him, a shadow wrapped around his ankle, and the comfortable certainty that this - all of this - was exactly where he belonged.
Epilogue
Rook pulled his jacket sleeve down over the blood spatter - third shirt in a week, damn it - and surveyed his work with mild dissatisfaction.
The body disposal was textbook. Syndicate enforcer, three sexual assault charges that never stuck because witnesses kept recanting, last seen threatening a waitress outside her apartment. Clean takedown, minimal mess, corpse already dissolving in the chemical bath he’d prepared in the maintenance closet.
Efficient. Professional. Completely lacking in romantic potential.
He kicked the empty syringe into the corner and sighed. It had been two months since Cillian had stumbled ass-backwards into fated-mate bliss, and Rook had been paying very close attention to the mechanics of that particular miracle.
Step one: Be in an alley while actively murdering/feeding from someone. Same thing, for an Eldritch Guardian.
Step two: Have your future mate walk past and offer disposal advice instead of screaming.
Step three: Mated bliss.
Rook had the first step down perfectly. He practically lived in alleys and killed things in them regularly. He even made them aesthetically appealing in a murder-hobo sort of way.
But nobody ever walked past. Not one single curious human who looked at a seven-foot shadow creature covered in teeth and thought, “Yes, this is fine. Also, have you considered the dumpster schedule?”
Cillian made it look so easy. He just stood there, broody and impossible, and Julian had materialized like a library-scented miracle with his littleglasses, his complete lack of survival instincts, and his absolutely perfect observation about body-disposal logistics.
Meanwhile, Rook had processed eleven targets in the past month - rapists and traffickers, the kind of corruption that tasted like battery acid going down - and the closest he’d gotten to a meet-cute was a drunk college kid who’d pissed on the dumpster Rook had been using. Not exactly fated-mate material.
He grabbed his bag and headed for the alley exit, stepping over the chemical puddle. The enforcer’s wallet went into his jacket pocket. Silas could pull useful intel from credit cards before they discarded it properly. His phone buzzed with a message from the group chat.
Thorn:Status?
Rook:Target processed. Heading home.
Cillian:Julian wants to know if you’re coming to dinner.
Rook:Is he cooking, or are you?
Cillian:I am. Julian is researching mate bond physiology.
Of course he was. Because Julian treated their relationship like a research project, and Cillian looked at him like he’d invented sunlight specifically for that purpose.
Rook was happy for them. Really. Genuinely delighted. Also, maybe slightly irrationally jealous.
He emerged from the alley onto Foster Street, near the theater district. It was late enough that the shows had let out, early enough that the bars were still packed. Clusters of well-dressed humans filled the sidewalks, laughing and talking and completely oblivious to the apex predator walking among them.
Rook kept his human form locked down tight - six-foot-two, dark hair, leather jacket that hid the strange proportions of his shoulders. He’d perfected his shape over centuries. Attractive enough to blend in, forgettable enough not to draw attention.
Nobody looked twice. He was invisible. Again.
Maybe that was the problem. Maybe he needed to be more obvious about the murder. Really commit to the aesthetic. Cillian had been in full void form when Julian found him, after all. Perhaps Rook’s mistake was being too tidy, too humanish about things…
Something caught his attention. Not in the alley he’d just left. Not in any alley at all.
Across the street, outside the Garrison Theater’s employee entrance, a man was backing asmaller figure against the brick wall. The body language was all wrong. The smaller person had their hands up, defensive, while the larger man crowded into their space.
Rook’s predator instincts flared hot and immediate. He crossed the street in four strides, dodging a taxi that blared its horn. Up close, the situation clarified into something that made his teeth ache with the need to bite.
The smaller person was male, maybe mid-twenties, wearing black pants and a white shirt with a bow tie - a theater staff uniform. He had sandy brown hair, wire-rimmed glasses, and a medium build. He was also being currently pressed against the wall by a man twice his size in an expensive suit.
“…told you I’m not interested,” the smaller man was saying, voice steady but strained. “Please move.”
