Demon Forged

must be done.”
    Anger stabbed through her psychic scent. She closed her eyes, averted her face.
    He waited, feeling as if his heart was clenched in her fist. It squeezed tighter when she pushed away from the wall. Without looking at him, she strode down the hall toward the exit.
    “Irena—”
    “I’ll wait, Olek. Go do what you must.”
    Her agreement didn’t ease the ache in his chest. He watched until she turned the corner, then listened until he could no longer hear her quiet footsteps.
    He drew a deep breath, then returned to the conference room. Michael nodded once, indicating that he’d heard Alejandro’s plan to take Rael’s position—and was giving his approval.
    The Doyen must have already signed the exchange to Lilith and Hugh. Alejandro couldn’t read Castleford’s face; Lilith regarded him with a bemused expression.
    “We should have done this two years ago,” she said.
    It was too much. He had Michael’s approval and Lilith’s, when he could not have Irena’s. He could not remain here without breaking.
    “If we are finished, I have duties to attend to in Argentina.”
    Duties that required Alejandro’s swords to draw blood. He had never looked forward to it more.
    “We are.” Lilith glanced at Taylor. “Except you. You’re staying until Savi comes?”
    Taylor nodded. “We’ll let you and Cordoba know if we find anything on Margaret Wren.”
    At the moment, Alejandro didn’t care if Wren had enslaved Rael with a bargain and had arranged Julia Stafford’s murder herself.
    He bowed stiffly and left.

CHAPTER 14
    Taylor didn’t smoke often—just often enough that a collection of ash had gathered in the one of the empty flowerpots that lined the small balcony of the second-level apartment she and her mother shared. And just often enough that she knew how slowly to open the sliding door so that it wouldn’t squeal and wake up her mother—who’d come out, see her lighting up, and give her a look. The daughter of a nurse should know better. Did know better. But sometimes didn’t care.
    She drank a lot more often.
    Tonight, she did both.
    She didn’t have a view, except for her mom’s flowerpots—mostly empty for the winter—and the contemporary stylings of a brick wall about three feet from the rail. She glanced down, into the tiny space between houses. Though gates blocked each end of the gap, a vampire could sneak through there, and easily leap up. No vampire was there now. Just garbage cans, a red plastic wagon tipped on its side, and what looked like a beheaded Cabbage Patch Doll.
    Fun. The kid living in the house next door was probably someone she’d meet again, in about twenty years. Then again, maybe not. Sometimes they started out bad, and ended up okay.
    She took a sip of her red wine—a glass a day kept vampires and heart disease away, so tonight she was having four. She looked up at the dark sky. Just clouds, and a few wires. She didn’t see a Guardian. Somewhere out there, a novice was probably practicing his stalking skills.
    Unless they weren’t. Maybe they were like the tree in the forest. If she didn’t see them, were they there? If they were, she didn’t need to raise her voice.
    Quietly, she said, “If you’re here, you might as well come have a drink with me.”
    She waited. No wings in the sky. No one hopping over the gates in a single bound. Figured. She turned to stab out her cigarette. She hadn’t really expected—
    Oh, shit. A large hand came out, covered her wine before she sloshed the contents all over his white linen tunic.
    She really should have stopped at just one glass. She blinked up at Michael.
    She hadn’t expected anyone—but she really hadn’t expected him . Not the Doyen. And he was the last one she’d have wanted here. Irena might give off mob enforcer vibes, but Michael was the one who scared the crap out of her. Part of it was that he seemed to try to appear nonthreatening, like some kind of guru, but underneath that tunic were ropes of muscle and the chest of a gladiator. Did he think he could hide that? And his bare feet—they were fine, as feet went—but the point was, he obviously didn’t have to go all out with the steel-toed boots or even the soft leather stockings that Irena wore. His bare feet screamed: I could rip apart a demon and I’m not even wearing shoes.
    God knew what he could do to humans. And he definitely wasn’t one. All the right parts were in all the right places, but he was built like he was