Zayne arched a brow as he screwed the lid off his water.
“Fact-check me. There’s no scientific evidence whatsoever that supports the whole eight-by-eight rule, and I’m not someone who needs to drown themselves in water.” I popped open my soda. “So, let me live my life.”
He downed half the bottle in one impressive gulp. “Thanks for the health lesson.”
“You’re welcome.” I grinned at him as I opened the carton. My stomach did a happy dance when I got an eyeful of the grilled hamburger smack-dab between a toasted sesame bun and a side order of curly fries. “And thank you for the food. You’re a keeper.”
“Good. I want to be kept.”
My gaze flew to him. He wasn’t looking at me as he got busy opening his food, which was a good thing, because my imagination had taken those five words and gone to town with them.
Sensation burst in the center of my chest, and it reminded me oddly of how pepper smelled. It felt like frustration, and I thought it might be coming from Zayne.
That was weird.
“But you really can’t get rid of me at this point, can you?” He looked up through thick lashes. “You’re stuck with me.”
“Yeah.” I blinked and finished unwrapping my burger. I didn’t think of it that way, though. He was my bonded Protector. I was the Trueborn he guarded. Together, we were a force to be reckoned with because we were built for one another, and the only thing that could separate us was death.
Deep down, did he look at us as if we were stuck with one another, even though he hadn’t hesitated when he’d been offered the bond? Wasn’t that what had happened with Misha? Besides the fact that we never should’ve been bonded, I had sensed a growing unrest in him, but I’d been so wrapped up in myself that I hadn’t paid attention.
Not until it was too late.
Zayne had learned that my mother was supposed to have brought me to his father, and because she hadn’t done that, his father thought Zayne was supposed to take in Layla, somehow mistaking me, a Trueborn who rocked a whole lot of angelic blood, for a half demon, half Warden.
Which was kind of a big oops.
I had no idea how Zayne felt about any of that. Or if it mattered to him that it should’ve been me he’d grown up with.
I picked up the bun and removed the thick tomato slice as I opened my mouth to speak. But I made the mistake of actually looking at his carton of food. He’d gotten a grilled-chicken sandwich. My lip curled, because it looked about as appetizing as an unseasoned chicken breast could look. While I smacked my bun back onto my burger, Zayne took his top bun off.
“You’re a monster,” I whispered.
Zayne chuckled. “You going to eat that?” He pointed to the tomato that I had gotten rid of. I shook my head. “Of course not. You don’t like vegetables or water.”
“Not true. I like onions and pickles.”
“Only if they’re on hamburgers.” He carried his box of food around the island and dropped onto the stool beside me, plucked up the tomato, then plopped it on his poor grilled-chicken sandwich. “Eat, and then I’ll show you what I got when I met with Nic.”
We ate side by side, exchanging napkins, and there was no urge to fill the silence with idle words. There was an intimacy in it that was quite surprising. When we were finished, I volunteered for cleanup, since he’d gotten the food and I’d done nothing but sleep. Once I’d finished wiping down the island, I returned to the stool beside Zayne.
“Before we look at what you got, I have a favor to ask.” I took a shallow breath.
“Done,” he replied.
My brows lifted. “I haven’t told you what the favor is.”
He lifted one large shoulder in a shrug. “Whatever it is, you got it.”
I stared at him. “What if I was asking for you to trade in your vintage Impala for a minivan from the ’80s?”
Zayne looked over at me, his brows furrowed. “That would be a seriously weird request.”
“Exactly, and you just agreed to it!”
His head tilted. “You’re weird, Trin, but I don’t think you’re that weird.”
“I feel like I should be offended by that statement.”
Zayne grinned. “What’s your favor?”
“I need help...with training.” I squared my shoulders. “Misha and I trained every day. I don’t need that, but I do need to practice in a certain area.”
That got his full attention. “What area?”
“You know I don’t have much peripheral vision.” I shifted my feet from the floor to the bar on the stool. “It’s literally a blind spot for me, so when I fight, I try to keep enough distance between me and my opponent so they stay in my central vision.”
He nodded. “Makes sense.”
“Well, Misha knew my weakness and he exploited it, which is why he landed so many hits. I would do the same thing in a fight. Anything goes.”
“Same,” he murmured.
“And I doubt Misha kept that to himself. He could’ve told Bael. Maybe even this Harbinger,” I explained. “I need to get better. I don’t know how, but I need...”
“To learn not to rely on your vision?” he suggested.
Exhaling, I nodded. “Yes.”
Zayne’s lips pursed. “Working on that is a great idea and training is always smart. I didn’t think of that.”
“Well, the whole bonding thing did just happen, so...”
He shot me a brief grin. “Let me think of some ways to work on what you’re asking.”
Relieved, I smiled. “I’ll do the same. So, what did you want to show me?”
He unrolled the paper, spreading it across the island. “I got Gideon to print the plans from Senator Fisher’s house that Layla took pictures of. I figured you’d want to see them.”
I hadn’t been able to see them that night, so this was incredibly...thoughtful of him. Leaning over the document that ended up being half the size of the island, I scanned the designs while Zayne rose from the bar stool. I didn’t have experience looking at construction plans, but within a few moments, I knew that their assumptions had been on point. “These really are plans for a school, aren’t they? These boxes are classrooms. This is a cafeteria, and those are dorm rooms.”
“Yep.” Zayne returned to the island with a laptop. “Gideon did a quick records search and he couldn’t find any permits linked to the senator and a school, but I want to see if I can find anything online referencing it while he’s still searching through different databases.”
“Sounds good,” I murmured, staring at the plans.
“Listen to this,” Zayne said after a few minutes. “We know that Fisher is the majority leader and that he’s known to be a God-loving and wholesome man, all about 1950s-era family values.”
“How ironic,” I muttered.
“I can’t even tell you how many websites are coming up, dedicated to him from religious folks. Even ones from the Children of God.”
I rolled my eyes. “Well, that right there should tell you something.”
He snickered. “According to their website, they believe he’s some kind of prophet or a savior who is destined to save America. From what, I have no idea.” Fingers moving over the touch pad, he shook his head. “Luckily these people seem to be a very, very small minority.”
Thank God. There was a twisted irony to the situation with the senator. The man was definitely not a fan of God, considering he was hanging out with an ancient Upper Level demon and going to witches to get enchantments that turned humans into walking cannon fodder—the very same coven that had betrayed us by telling the demon Aym, who was super dead. Thankfully.
Man, I wished I could cast spells, because I’d curse the coven with a pox and then some. “I doubt whatever he’s planning is anything good.”
“Agreed.” Zayne’s fingers tapped away on the keyboard. “Looks like the fire made the news.” He tilted the laptop so that I could see a picture of a gutted, charred house with the headline “Overnight Fire Destroys Senate Majority Leader Fisher’s Home.” “It doesn’t say much beyond blaming faulty wiring.”
I snorted. “I may not be an arson specialist, but I seriously doubt anything about that fire would make anyone think it was due to electrical failure...” I trailed off as I saw the unholy red flames in my mind, saw Zayne, who in his Warden form was almost indestructible, burned and near death—
“Fisher probably has people working with him in the fire department,” Zayne explained, snapping me out of my thoughts. “When demons infiltrate human circles, it becomes an epidemic, with the demon as the disease. The first human they corrupt becomes the carrier and brings others into it. Like a virus that spreads from contact to contact, and the farther the source gets from the carrier, the more the humans don’t realize what or who they’re truly working for.”
“But the senator knows he’s working with a demon. He went to the coven and got that enchantment.” I frowned. “And he also promised parts of a Trueborn—of me—in return. Jerk.”
A low snarling sound raised the tiny hairs all over my body, and I looked around the kitchen to see where the sound was coming from. I’d never seen a hellhound, and I imagined that was the kind of noise they made, but that sound was coming from Zayne.