consultation, and she had obviously been practicing; Olivia could feel her energy slowing down, and even after the initial shock of the needle scraping into her skin, she’d maintained her calm, holding off the healing like a seasoned professional. Olivia knew from experience that the girl would be sitting there with her silvered eyes closed, her canines out as if she’d just fed.
After a few minutes their breathing fell into sync, and Olivia guided the girl’s energy with her own, siphoning off the sparks of heat and electricity that shot from the skin of every person she’d ever tattooed and grounding them to help the girl last longer. She didn’t have much of a pain tolerance, but with Olivia’s help she’d be fine.
She was the last client of the night. Olivia cleaned up her station feeling closer to happy than she had in months—she’d missed this. The ritual of setting up, working, cleaning up . . . she liked every part of it when it went well.
She left work about two hours before the sky began to lighten. She was hungry—funny how quickly she’d forgotten what a drain the work was—but she didn’t stop to feed until she was well out of the Shadow District. The less time she spent there, the better.
Once upon a time she’d spent nearly every waking hour in a District very similar to the one in Austin, stalking around the city with a sword at her hip. Now she slunk home with her tail between her legs, living not in a Haven, but in a crappy warehouse loft on the East Side, surrounded by humans.
If Jeremy could see her now, he’d laugh . . . right before he killed her.
It was possible he didn’t hate her. It was possible he understood she wasn’t to blame, and that what happened after that night was punishment enough . . . but she wasn’t going to call him up and ask, show him the scars, swear she had tried to protect them . . .
She shook her head with a sigh. There was no use thinking about it. What was done could not be undone. She had failed, broken her promise to him, and the best she could hope for now was to live out her life here, where no one had the slightest idea what she had once been.
Still, when she heard the Second was dead as well as the Prime, part of her had the idea, for just a minute, that she could go back to her old life, this time working for a new Prime—
Oh, hell no.
She had built something of a life here, and as long as the Queen still lived and the regime didn’t change, she could keep living it. The kind of people she had worked for, who would know her, didn’t live in this territory. Now that Jeremy was gone, as long as she kept her head down, she would be safe.
She was no fool. Not anymore. Maybe once in a while she missed having a purpose larger than etching butterflies into skin, but that part of her life was over. She was just a vampire now, just a tattoo artist and painter, and she had no intention of getting within ten miles of a Signet ever again.
Really, she should have known better.
The walk home was long, way longer than from the café where she’d been working, but the buses didn’t run again until way too close to dawn for her comfort. If she had been human, she might have been nervous as a woman alone in East Austin at night, but muggers and gangbangers were pretty laughable as a threat to even the weakest vampire, let alone one who had once been trained to kill. She didn’t travel with a sword—that would draw more attention than she wanted if she happened across any Elite—but she had a stake in her bag and a knife in her boot. Outside the Shadow District, she had little to fear other than the sun.
She came around the corner of her building and froze.
Her unit was up a short flight of rickety wooden steps; it was the only one that had its own entrance, which was part of why she had chosen it. Everyone else who lived in the converted warehouse had to go in through the front of the building.
The streetlight was dim and tended to
After a few minutes their breathing fell into sync, and Olivia guided the girl’s energy with her own, siphoning off the sparks of heat and electricity that shot from the skin of every person she’d ever tattooed and grounding them to help the girl last longer. She didn’t have much of a pain tolerance, but with Olivia’s help she’d be fine.
She was the last client of the night. Olivia cleaned up her station feeling closer to happy than she had in months—she’d missed this. The ritual of setting up, working, cleaning up . . . she liked every part of it when it went well.
She left work about two hours before the sky began to lighten. She was hungry—funny how quickly she’d forgotten what a drain the work was—but she didn’t stop to feed until she was well out of the Shadow District. The less time she spent there, the better.
Once upon a time she’d spent nearly every waking hour in a District very similar to the one in Austin, stalking around the city with a sword at her hip. Now she slunk home with her tail between her legs, living not in a Haven, but in a crappy warehouse loft on the East Side, surrounded by humans.
If Jeremy could see her now, he’d laugh . . . right before he killed her.
It was possible he didn’t hate her. It was possible he understood she wasn’t to blame, and that what happened after that night was punishment enough . . . but she wasn’t going to call him up and ask, show him the scars, swear she had tried to protect them . . .
She shook her head with a sigh. There was no use thinking about it. What was done could not be undone. She had failed, broken her promise to him, and the best she could hope for now was to live out her life here, where no one had the slightest idea what she had once been.
Still, when she heard the Second was dead as well as the Prime, part of her had the idea, for just a minute, that she could go back to her old life, this time working for a new Prime—
Oh, hell no.
She had built something of a life here, and as long as the Queen still lived and the regime didn’t change, she could keep living it. The kind of people she had worked for, who would know her, didn’t live in this territory. Now that Jeremy was gone, as long as she kept her head down, she would be safe.
She was no fool. Not anymore. Maybe once in a while she missed having a purpose larger than etching butterflies into skin, but that part of her life was over. She was just a vampire now, just a tattoo artist and painter, and she had no intention of getting within ten miles of a Signet ever again.
Really, she should have known better.
The walk home was long, way longer than from the café where she’d been working, but the buses didn’t run again until way too close to dawn for her comfort. If she had been human, she might have been nervous as a woman alone in East Austin at night, but muggers and gangbangers were pretty laughable as a threat to even the weakest vampire, let alone one who had once been trained to kill. She didn’t travel with a sword—that would draw more attention than she wanted if she happened across any Elite—but she had a stake in her bag and a knife in her boot. Outside the Shadow District, she had little to fear other than the sun.
She came around the corner of her building and froze.
Her unit was up a short flight of rickety wooden steps; it was the only one that had its own entrance, which was part of why she had chosen it. Everyone else who lived in the converted warehouse had to go in through the front of the building.
The streetlight was dim and tended to
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