“Wait…here it is.” I found my sweater around my waist. “Miracle.”
Sneaky as I could be, I slipped out of the bathroom, only I wasn’t fast enough to avoid catching my toe between the swinging door and the frame. I struggled my way out, pausing just out of sight of the bar. Across the way, on the other side of the second pool table, gaped the exit.
I’d walked through some bad neighborhoods in my day, protected by nothing but a Swiss Army Knife, resting bitch face, and a no-nonsense attitude. No one ever bothered me.
Maybe it was because I looked homeless. Whatever the case, this was a tiny, dead town, even with Broken Nose Harry. I didn’t need to embarrass myself by engaging in small talk with a very attractive sober man. I’d likely do or say something stupid, and it would result in never being able to show my face in this bar again. Best not to chance it.Eight“What’s she doing?” Austin asked Niamh, hearing every word Jessie was muttering to herself beyond the wall, just out of sight. She clearly didn’t know she wasn’t out of hearing range for someone like him.
“Sounds like she’s trying to sneak out.” Niamh rattled her ice cubes around her glass. “Any chance for another—”
“No,” he said, seeing an elbow poke out and then get pulled back in. It was like she was playing a game of drunk hokey-pokey, a thought that almost tugged another smile out of him. “Has she explored the house yet?”
“Now, that information might cost another—”
“No,” he told Niamh again.
She sighed. “She just got there today, like I said, and she only remembers the broad strokes from when she was last there. She’s startin’ from scratch.”
“But you think she’ll find it?”
“She found it when she was ten before life trampled the imagination out of her, like. Her life experience will work against her, so it will. She will believe what she sees, most likely, and keep her eyes closed to the magic. That might prove to be enough of a barrier to keep her out.”
“And if it doesn’t?”
“Then the house will judge. It will be beyond you.”
He gritted his teeth. “Instruct Earl to give her no help. He should stand in her way, if need be.”
“All due respect, Austin Steele, but that house is out of your jurisdiction. It was here before this town, and will be here long after. It does not answer to you, and neither do those who protect it.”
Austin pinned the older woman with his stare, feeling the primal fire build within him. His power expanded, consuming him, easily topping the power radiating from her aged frame.
“I am not young, Mr. Steele,” she said in a deathly quiet voice. “Few of the original protectors have been. And yet, the house still stands. There is always someone to welcome in the new chosen. If you pit yourself against us, you will find yourself in a different sort of hell than you were expecting.”
Austin’s gut flipped. His resolve hardened. “I will not see my town turned upside down.”
“You will not have a choice.”
“I will if that girl fails.”
A sly smile pulled at the woman’s baby-soft skin. “She is no girl. She comes to us in the prime of her life, with all the illusions and naiveties of youth stripped away. She is intelligent, independent, and confident in her skin. The only way to derail her is to kill her, mark my words. And if you do that, all that you’ve worked for will be stripped away. She’s protected as a Jane. She is protected by that house. She is protected by us. In this, Austin Steele, you’ll need to find another avenue. Brawn won’t work. Neither will swinging your pecker around. You will either need to join us and protect her, keeping her on the right path, or step aside.”
He leaned in, almost losing control of his fire. “I will not join in the ruin of this town. You’re mad, old woman.”
“Then help steer her, child. Think with your head for once. Flex that muscle between your ears. She will need guidance. Put down your fear, and help minimize the effects of another chosen.”
He turned away, anger and frustration raging through him. He’d put his blood, sweat, and tears into sanctifying this town as an independent entity. He’d battled more alphas than he could count, keeping them away from his territory. He’d taken out clans sent for him, withstood higher-level magic, and taken away the sly knives of assassins hired to put him in the earth. And he’d done it all to protect the people of O’Briens.
But if that house chose someone new, everything would change. The new chosen would have the power to tear down the borders he’d struggled to maintain, leaving them vulnerable to magical folk on a mission. Those wishing to align themselves with the new master of Ivy House were likely to trample peaceful residents in the wrong place at the wrong time. Battles would kill innocents in the crossfire.