fox?”
“And who has a boyfriend that turns into a feathered snake god, can shift into crow form and talks to coyotes? Jesus, Phoebes. Talking to a fox in my living room is hardly the weirdest thing anyone in this family does. Ione has sex with a goddamn dragon.”
“She doesn’t actually have sex with the dragon. Dev and his dragon demon are two separate entities who happen to share the same corporeal form.”
“Right. Okay. You’re absolutely right. I am being completely ridiculous with this fox-spirit thing. That’s way more normal. Good night.” Her thumb was poised to end the call.
“Rhea, wait.” Phoebe made a noise suggesting she was blowing her bangs out of her face. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be a jerk. After everything that’s happened lately, I guess I owe you the benefit of the doubt.”
“Yeah, I guess you do.”
“What does Theia think?”
It was Rhea’s turn to blow at imaginary hair—or not so imaginary, as her spikes were getting way too long these days, and one in particular kept flopping over and hanging in her eyes. “I don’t know what Theia thinks.”
“You didn’t call her first?”
“I’m not really talking to Theia.”
“You’re what? Rhe, what’s going on with you?”
“Besides talking fox hallucinations? Just trying to deal with the fact that Theia kept Dad’s second family a secret for months.”
“I thought you two found the genealogical information together.”
“That part was all Theia. She knew we had three other sisters, and she knew one of them was living a few miles away from her. And she never said a word to me. Maybe if she had, Laurel wouldn’t have apprenticed herself to a psycho necromancer and tried to kill you.”
“Nobody’s to blame for that but Laurel herself—and that bag of dicks who took advantage of her vulnerability, Carter Hanson Hamilton.” Phoebe delivered the name of Ione’s ex with all due mocking disgust. Though “bag of dicks” was being kind, as far as Rhea was concerned. “You can’t let that come between you and Theia. Does she even know how you feel about it?”
Rhea sighed. “She knows. Anyway, I don’t want to talk about it. I just want to know if there’s any kind of precedent for seeing a ghostly hunting party. Can you check with Rafe to see if he knows anything about the Wild Hunt or if he’s seen anything out of the ordinary in the spirit world lately?”
“Of course.”
“And Phoebes? Don’t mention any of this to Ione or Theia.”
She lay awake later, unable to stop thinking about the haunting eyes of the straggling rider—and his straggling hound—as they’d paused to acknowledge her. The hound had lacked the skeletal appearance, but it certainly possessed the same unnerving gaze. Had all of the hunting party seen her? Or just those two? And why her?
According to Vixen, Rhea’s blood had summoned the Hunt. Of course, the name of the custom ink was Bloodbath. A bit macabre, maybe, but the color really was lovely. And unusual in its intensity. As was the damn itching. The healing skin was driving her mad again as she thought about it.
Rhea drew her leg from the covers. It could do with a little moisturizer. As she stroked the lotion over the Lilith mark, her fingers tingled with the precursor to a vision. Rhea pulled her hand away. She was so not in the mood for another vision.
But the pictomancy had a mind of its own.
This time it was an image of blood pooling onto a pristine field of snow. Something dark and hulking stood in the periphery, casting its shadow on the blood under a stark full moon. And then the darkness seemed to swallow the vision entirely.
There was no clear distinction between when the vision ended and when sleep and dreaming began.
Leo climbed back into bed after dashing from the bathroom over the cold tile floor, folding his arms behind his head on the pillow as he stared up at the ceiling. The vague stuff of dreams fluttered at the edges of his consciousness, but he could never quite recall his. What he remembered, though, was Rhea Carlisle. He had the feeling she’d traipsed through his dreamscape. He’d never met anyone like her. An absurd assertion since he’d dated her twin, but indisputably true.
Her eyes, like Theia’s, were a true gray, made more striking by the dark limbal rings encircling the irises. But Rhea’s gaze seemed to lay him bare. Theia, even after they’d hung out several times, had remained somewhere on the surface with him, never allowing him deeper, her eyes warm but guarded. Rhea’s eyes challenged the one gazing upon them to see her, to be drawn into her. Within moments of meeting her, he’d felt the challenge: I dare you to know me. And he wanted to. Intensely.
But taking the job at Demoness Ink was a bad idea. Because being around someone who wanted to be known, whom he wanted to know, meant risking being known. And, frankly, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know himself. His nightly ritual kept whatever darkness was inside him from coming out, but it was a constant discipline. And the foolishness of romantic entanglements in the workplace aside, that discipline made dating difficult and awkward. Claiming he was busy whenever a potential partner suggested an evening date became quickly suspect, and he couldn’t blame Theia for having gotten weird about it.
And, anyway, what if she came into the shop to visit her sister? She’d never believe he’d just happened into the obscure tattoo parlor in Sedona where her twin worked by chance. She’d think he was crazy. Of course, he was a little crazy. And it didn’t matter what Theia thought of him. What mattered was Rhea. Which was why he was absolutely not going to show up to the job. It was out of the question.
* * *
He arrived at the little upstairs hole-in-the-wall that was Demoness Ink at five minutes to eleven and stood waiting in the lightly spitting snow until he realized, at five after, that Rhea was watching him calmly from behind the counter inside. The corner of her mouth turned up as he met her eyes, and Leo lowered his gaze, shaking his head with a laugh as he pushed open the door.
He brushed the soles of his boots against the sisal mat inside, hands in his coat pockets, before glancing up with a sheepish smile. “How long did you know I was out there?”
“Saw you come up the stairs.” Rhea’s heathery eyes were bright with amusement. “I thought I’d see how long it took you to try the door.”
“Employee intelligence test?”
Rhea laughed. “The opposite of what you’re thinking, though. I like mine a little bit stupid.” She meant her employees, of course, but for a split second he heard it as how she liked her men.
Before the heat in his cheeks at his foolishness could give him away, he took his hands from his pockets and blew on them, rubbing them together. “Well, you’re in luck, then, because I’m an idiot. I didn’t even think to put gloves on. Guess the joke’s on me.”
“The joke was already on you.” Rhea grinned at him, those starkly outlined irises merciless.
