Page 75 of Roguefinder

“What the fuck was that dungeon club?” he asked against my shoulder.

“What Carlo wanted us to see,” I said.

Caleb grunted. “Gross.”

I brushed my lips over his hair, smiling in spite of myself. “He showed us the humans and the orgy so we’d stop looking for whatever else he’s hiding.”

Caleb yawned again, his warm breath teasing my skin. “What d’you think he’s hiding?”

“I wish I knew.” And it was just another mystery piled on top of the others. Worry and doubt swirled in my mind. One doubt in particular rose to the surface.

I needed to tell Caleb about the Council. If we were being moved around a chess board by people playing a different game, he deserved to know.

“Caleb, I need to tell you something.”

His soft snore answered me.

I looked down.

He was asleep. His face was slack, his lashes thick fans on his cheeks. A lock of blond hair had escaped my attempt to smooth it and curled stubbornly over his forehead.

I tucked it back with the others.

And I lay in the quiet bedroom with my worries circling like vultures and the sounds of Rome drifting from the night outside the window.

Chapter

Fourteen

CALEB

Jesse had been at it since dawn.

Maybe longer. I’d woken to the smell of coffee and a shallow indentation on his side of the bed. When I tracked him to the kitchen, I found a small tower of pancakes and Jesse in full professor mode.

That was an hour ago, and he was still head down as he tried to figure out Carlo’s game and the mystery of the opera house door. Three open notebooks spread in front of him, each one covered in his blocky, slanted handwriting. An abandoned coffee mug sat at his elbow. Pens were lined up like soldiers waiting to be ordered into battle. Post-it notes ranged around the perimeter. Every few moments, he paused, flipped through a notebook, and scribbled more notes.

I toyed with the handle of my mug and watched the morning sunlight make a halo around his dark head. A gray crew neck sweater stretched over his shoulders. Probably cashmere. Jesse’s wardrobe was a lot nicer than mine. Everything about him was nice.

No, fine, my dick corrected. Everything about Jesse van der Meer was fine. And it was a goddamn tragedy that we hadn’t fucked last night. My first time seeing my boyfriend in a suit and I’d ruined it by rubbing up on a door.

But there was definitely something wrong at Carlo’s opera house—and not just the interspecies orgy in the basement. The second I’d touched that door, something had hollowed out my bones and filled them with liquid pain. An instant migraine had pounded behind my eyes. The walk home was hazy in my memory, but the searing, blinding misery of the door was a mosquito suspended in amber.

Across from me, Jesse frowned at something he’d written. He grabbed one of the Post-its, scribbled on it, and stuck it next to one of the notebooks. Then he went back to writing.

“Can I get you anything?” I asked.

He didn’t look up. “Hmm?”

“More coffee? Slutty little glasses?”

He kept writing, dark brows drawn tight and the tip of his tongue between his teeth. He’d look damn good in glasses, but lycanthropy ensured he’d never need them. Another tragedy.

“Jesse,” I said, sharper this time.

He jerked his head up. “Yeah?” He blinked a couple times, then scrubbed a hand over his jaw. “Sorry. Did you need something?”

“How long have you been awake?”