She swallowed hard. “But you suspect me.”
“Do you think I shouldn’t?”
Her mouth bopped open and closed. “I can see why you would. It’s no secret that I don’t like that she’s around. But it’s also no secret that I don’t like pain. I have nothing to gain from playing with her. The only thing it would get me is hours of torture. She’s not worth that for me.”
“Hmm. Any theories on who in our lair might be tempted to toy with her?”
“If I did have any, I wouldn’t name names.”
“Noble. Euan wasn’t so noble. He pointed the finger right at you.”
She. “Of course he did. It’s just like him to throw someone under the bus to divert suspicion from himself.” She paused. “I didn’t do it, Maddox. I swear to you, I didn’t.”
“Glad to hear it,” he said. “Enjoy the rest of your evening.”
Surprise rippled across her face. That surprise quickly gave way to wariness. Just as Euan had done, she waited a few moments before teleporting out of the office.
“Think she was telling the truth?” Hector asked him.
Maddox rubbed at his jaw. “She meant it when she said Raini wasn’t, in her mind, worth going through hours of pain. But she’d play such games if she thought she could get away with it. As for having nothing to gain by it? That’s both true and false. Hurting Raini wouldn’t gain her what she wanted.”
“Which is to be your co-Prime,” said Carmen.
Maddox nodded. “But it would gain Marcella the mere satisfaction of pissing off both me and Raini. She’s spiteful enough to do that.” Nevertheless, he wasn’t convinced she was to blame.
“It could be Euan and Marcella working together, though I doubt it,” said Hector. “Neither would trust the other not to be setting them up to take the fall. What now?”
“Now I try tracking the sender of the email,” replied Maddox. “I’ve had Raini forward it to me. And if it does lead me anywhere, I would say it will lead me to Dwain.”
“At least you don’t have to worry that she’ll be physically harmed by whoever’s doing this,” said Carmen. “They appear to be content with simply fucking with her.”
“Not if they’re the one who sent the astral projector her way,” Maddox pointed out.
Hector frowned. “But I thought he was aiming for … You think he meant to hit Raini?”
Maddox shrugged, feeling his jaw harden. “What I know for sure is that my demon wouldn’t have been able to handle knowing she was so vulnerable. It would have worried about her day and night. I’d have been no better. My attention would have been divided, which isn’t good when you have halo-bearers on your ass.
“Also, I’d have spent more time with her than usual, trusting that she was safe while with me, so someone could have then made a case that I was too distracted by my anchor to lead the lair properly anymore. That would have caused a massive wave of unease among the lair, considering our demons are relying on me to keep them safe from the halo-bearers.”
“Making her vulnerable would have, in a roundabout way, made you vulnerable—not just to attack from halo-bearers, but as a Prime,” Carmen realized.
“Which would have suited both Euan and Marcella,” said Maddox. “Euan, because he wants to be Prime. And Marcella, because her only hope of mating the ruler of this lair is if said ruler isn’t me. So, yes, there’s a very real possibility that one of our own betrayed me this way. I don’t think they did, but we can’t rule them out.”
Carmen sighed. “Hell.”
CHAPTER TWELVE
“I was actually a little disappointed.”
Pausing in typing an email on his phone, Maddox frowned at the bartender. “You were disappointed that no brawls occurred? You spent most of yesterday complaining to me that there were bound to be brawls between them and our lair and that you didn’t want to have to deal with the fallout.”
“Yeah, but a part of me was hoping we’d get to kick some angel ass,” said Alonso, hanging a glass above the bar. “I know they chose to fall, but they’re still angels for the most part. Viper must have warned them all to curb their behavior, though, because they were polite as my Grandma Edna.”
“Your grandmother’s name was Ophelia, not Edna. And she was never polite.”
“You know what I mean.” Alonso held up a bottle of bourbon. “Want a refill?”
Maddox nodded. “Sure.”
Alonso topped up Maddox’s glass and then went back to cleaning the long bar. The club would open in a few hours, and the space would be filled with people, music, and flashing strobe lights. For now, with only him and Alonso around, it was quiet.
Maddox took a swig of his drink and turned his attention back to the email he’d been typing. He’d no sooner pressed “send” than two things happened. One, he sensed that he and Alonso had company. Two, Alonso cleared his throat hard.