Chapter 4

Four

I'm aware, on a visceral level, that when I walk out of the waiting room in the Pledge office, I am officially marked as Bran's girl in the eyes of the mortals in Midnight.

If there was any doubt before, it's all gone now.

Jessie MacMahon belongs to Bran Duval.

I knew this before now. I know that he loves me. But there's something inherently thrilling about other people knowing it too.

When we reach the annex, we find everyone in the office in a gossip huddle behind the counter. Bran clears his throat and leans a shoulder casually against the door frame, arms crossed over his chest.

Most of the office people scatter like scraps of paper caught in a gust of wind.

Only three remain. Alice and Ed and a dark-haired girl I don't recognize.

Alice won't look me in the face and I can't tell if it's because she's disgusted by me, Bran's whore, or if she thinks of me as some lucky interloper who stumbled her way to a throne. Because whether we admit to it or not, there is a hierarchy in Midnight and being attached to a Duval is like being attached to a king.

I suppose even royal whores hold power in court.

I decide I don't care what Alice thinks of me. I won't be ashamed. In some twisted way, fucking Bran loudly in a government office has secured me a certain level of power I didn't know I wanted or needed.

So, while his cum drips out of me, I take the crown and act the part.

"I got tired of waiting," I tell Alice. "Will someone please get me the right paperwork?"

I swear it's like watching bumper cars at the state fair.

Alice turns around and runs into the dark-haired girl. Ed trips over Alice's foot and lurches backward to catch himself, but he bumps a tray of paperwork and it spills off the back counter, crashing to the floor.

Good god. Is this what it feels like for Bran when he walks into a room?

As Ed picks up the mess of paperwork on the floor, Alice locates what I need and places the forms neatly on the counter. "Sign here. And here. Initial here."

I mark where indicated and finish the last signature. "Good?"

"Yes. All good." She nods excessively.

"Thank you, Alice."

"Of course. Our pleasure."

The dark-haired girl giggles at the word pleasure . My gaze only shifts to her because the sound is a contrast from the silence.

But as soon as my eyes land on her, she stiffens and clamps her mouth shut.

A dark flame at the center of me grows a little brighter.

This is fun . I like it more than I should.

“Come, Mouse,” Bran says and smiles smugly at me. He slips his hand into mine and pulls me away. Once we're in the hall and moving for the exit, he bends down and says beneath his breath, "My ruthless little mouse."

"I wasn't being ruthless."

He holds the door for me and I slip out ahead of him.

The sun has dipped low enough that I can no longer see it over the rooflines of the surrounding buildings and the descending light has painted the sky in soft pastel shades of pink and lavender and orange.

The air smells of summer and possibilities.

"I like you pulling rank," he tells me. "It's fucking sexy."

Heat rises to my cheeks. "Stop it. You're being ridiculous."

He slips his arm around my waist and spins me around, pressing me against the railing on the stairs. "Don't tell me what to do."

"As if I could ever boss you around."

He plants a chaste kiss on the corner of my mouth. "You were getting pretty bossy in that waiting room. 'Fill me up,'" he says, mimicking me and now I'm really and truly blushing.

I decide to roll with it. "Yeah, and you listened to me. So maybe I was wrong. Maybe I can get what I want from you if I'm clever about it."

"Naughty little mouse." He tightens his hold on me, sending butterflies zinging across my chest. I like his hands on me. I like being so close to him that I can see the gold flecks in his irises, the throb of his pupils.

Being close to him means he trusts me, and somehow having his trust is almost as good as having his heart.

"You made your mouse a promise. Do you remember?"

He kisses me again. I'm aware that we have an audience with a few onlookers across the street. And it finally dawns on me that Bran has never engaged in PDA with me. Not on this level.

"Mmmm," he says against my mouth. "Who makes the best grilled cheese in Midnight?"

"Stanley." I don't have to think about it.

"And where does this virtuoso of the grilled cheese wield his spatula?"

I laugh again. Bran brings his hand up, threading his fingers through my hair. "At The Greasy Spoon."

A rumble starts at the base of his throat. "I always thought that was an atrocious name for a diner."

"Nevertheless..."

"To the Greasy Spoon we go then," he says.

The diner is close enough to the courthouse that we walk and Bran keeps my hand in his the entire way.

Every time we pass someone on the sidewalk and their gaze strays to our hands, my stomach fills with more butterflies.

The Greasy Spoon is one of those little 1950’s diners crammed into the leftover space between a nail salon and a real estate office. It's only big enough for the kitchen, a counter, and narrow booths along the wall.

A neon sign buzzes in the window while rockabilly music plays through the sound system. The floor is black and white checkered, the walls painted pale blue and pink, the counter covered in chrome, and the booths trimmed to match.

I love it here.

"Where were you in the fifties?" I ask Bran as we slide into one of the booths near the front window.

"On a journey of self-discovery."

I snort. "That sounds like bullshit."

He leans back against the booth, spreading his arm over the seat, his bicep straining against the sleeve of his shirt. "Remember the photo you saw in my bedroom? The self-portrait at the cliff? I mentioned it was taken in the fifties."

"Yes. I remember."

"That was taken in the Porcupine Mountains in Michigan. I had never been to Michigan before then. You can live hundreds of years and still not see every corner of the world." His attention darts to the door as a new customer enters, but seemingly satisfied that the man bears no threat, Bran looks back to me. "By the fifties, Duval House was well established in Midnight and I was growing bored with it all. My brother and I have always gotten along, but sometimes his need to control everything is insufferable."

A waitress comes over. She's dressed in a bubblegum pink uniform with a white apron tied around her waist. Her name tag says Gertrude, but I know her name is Judy.

"Evening, sugar," she says to me and then gives Bran a side-eyed look frothing with wariness. "It's been a while since I've seen you in here."

I've been coming here so long, Judy and Stanley are like my surrogate grandparents, always asking how I've been and what I'm up to. They sometimes feed me more than Kelly does.

"It's been a wild few weeks."

Judy looks at Bran again. "I'll bet."

Bran frowns at her, clearly unaccustomed to humans giving him shit. Especially little old ladies. I can't help but smile. "Can I have my usual?" I ask before Bran can get temperamental.

"Of course." Judy slips her pencil into her bun out of respect for Bran because of the whole stake-thing. "And you?"

"Coffee," he answers.

"Coming right up." She darts away, but not out of fear, out of efficiency. Judy may be in her seventies, but I think she could give me a challenge in a foot race. Bran watches her go.

"So... Damien wanted to control everything," I repeat. "What did you want?"

He sits forward and lowers his voice to a sinister octave. "I wanted to corrupt innocent virgins in the Porcupine Mountains."

"You're lying and deflecting."

He collapses back against the booth. "Yes. I am."

"Tell me."

He picks up the wrapped silverware, unfurls the napkin and takes the knife in hand. The metal glints beneath the fluorescent lighting. "My brother has always believed vampires are the superior race and he's always wanted to be in control. It suits him. He does it well. I won't deny that."

None of this surprises me, but it's still massively insulting to hear Damien thinks Kelly is inferior to him because she's mortal. Or is she an exception?

"The Montenaros," Bran goes on, "the House we were turned by, has always ruled by fear. And their belief was that strength lay in likeness. It's why, when we established Midnight, we segregated into houses." He sets the knife down but separates it from the fork and the fork from the spoon. "That's a Montenaro philosophy."

Judy comes over and I'm frustrated by the interruption. She sets down my glass of cola. Bran gets his black coffee, taking the mug in hand.

"Right back with your food, sugar," Judy says and leaves again.

I'm impatient to hear the rest of what Bran has to say. We've been so wrapped up in me and who I am and my Pledge that I haven't had the chance to peel back his layers.

Now that I am, I'm desperate for more, desperate to get to the center of him and see what lies there.

"What do you believe?" I ask.

Steam from the coffee rises between us.

"I think that there is strength in diversity." He turns the mug, focusing on the swirl of the dark liquid inside.

"Like a mixed house?"

"Exactly."

"Why?"

He pauses, looking around the diner as if to reassure himself there's no one worth worrying over. "Because if you can earn the loyalty of the strongest of each house and they come together under one roof..." He picks up the fork, the knife, the spoon. I know what the symbolism means—you possess all of the tools, all of the talents, all of the skills.

"So do it," I blurt.

His eyes narrow.

I reel back, shocked to hear the words come out of my mouth. I hadn't meant to say it. I hadn't meant to insinuate he should abandon his brother and all of the systems in place in Midnight Harbor. Change centuries of tradition and rock the boat so hard, it might threaten to tip.

But now that it’s out, I can’t take it back, even if it is a little crazy.

And I have to admit, I’m incredibly curious to hear what he has to say about it.