Chapter 23

Twenty-Three

Luynore calledme in two weeks after he'd given me the assignment to gather intel about Remi's business.

It had been two whole weeks of absolute hell.

I felt like the scum most people saw me as. I felt like shit for betraying the one person who'd put trust in me, the one person who seemed to care about me above all others, the one person who I was starting to fall for—no, not starting.

I'd already fallen hard for Remington Ellwood a long time ago.

And now I was betraying him every time Luynore forced information out of me.

And I couldn't fuckin' do a thing about it.

I'd tried, oh how I'd tried.

I'd tried to deny Luynore.

I'd tried to tell Remi about it. So many fuckin' times.

But every time I opened my mouth to tell him, my lips felt like they got sewn together, and I couldn't make a sound.

It had been torture.

And through it all, Remi had been nothin' but kind and sweet, like he always was.

Mother of All, sometimes his tenderness made my heart ache.

If he ever found out about this, he was going to hate me. And my life would be over.

The thought of Remi hating me was almost enough to freeze my feet on the sidewalk outside of Luynore's office. But his obligation kept me shuffling forward.

Terrell looked as upset about this as I felt when Luynore announced that we were robbing the Magical History Museum. Tonight.

I didn't think there was anything I wanted to do less.

Luynore assigned four guys with me, plus Terrell as the getaway driver.

Even though I hated every part of this, I was glad Terrell was waiting in the car. He'd be safe there, and I had a bad feeling about this. At least my ally would be able to get away if need be.

We had a plan.

It wasn't a good one by any means, but it was a plan.

Remi had told me that all the guards wear emblems with runes on them to prevent them from being compelled. I was going to have to use my glamor and sleight of hand to steal the emblem before James—a vampire under Luynore's rule—could do his thing.

I didn't want to do it. But I'd already fought against Luynore so many times over the past two weeks that I had no strength left. It didn't matter in the end, anyway. He was going to win. He'd always win.

I'd be a slave to his whims for the rest of my life.

James and I walked into the museum together, acting as if we were comin' for a visit even though they were almost closed. Luckily, it was a Saturday night, so the place was still crowded. Made it easier to slip in and then slip away from the crowd unnoticed.

I hadn't given Remi a good excuse for being gone. All I'd really said was that I had to run out for a bit and would be back later. He'd looked at me like I'd grown a second head, but all he'd done was give me a kiss and a promise to wait up for me. I told him not to, but he said he wanted to hold me for a little while before he went to sleep.

Because, of course, he had to melt me in the sweetest way possible right before I was about to betray him.

I sucked in a shaky breath as I pulled my glamor magic over myself and James. He nodded at me, looking pissed off and intense. I wasn't sure if he was always like that or if he was as worried and pissed about Luynore forcing us to do this or what.

We stood there for about thirty minutes before the last visitor was ushered out the door and the guards started lockin' up. There were four of them in the building in total. That alone probably said how valuable some of the artifacts were because why the hell would a museum ever need that many guards? Two of them were lockin' up the front while the other two were toward the back of the building.

Since I didn't want to risk anyone gettin' hurt, I waited until the second guard walked off, headin' for the monitoring station on the second floor.

As soon as she was gone, James and I headed for the other guard. He didn't see us, not at first. Why would he? No one should be able to see through my glamor as long as they weren't specifically looking for us.

But as soon as I touched him, he'd notice. And unfortunately, I knew—again, from Remi—that the guards kept their emblems on a chain around their necks, tucked under their shirts. They even had a special collar on their uniforms that had an extra flap on the inside to tuck the chain under to prevent theft. Because apparently, what I was attempting to do right now had happened in the past, and Remi was determined to stop it.

I used my magic easily to block the cameras, making them see an empty lobby.

Bile rose in my throat as I walked with purpose toward the guard and pulled my glamor down from myself, although I left it covering James.

"Excuse me?" I called over, making the guard jump.

"Where did you come from?"

I offered a smile, hoping it was believable because me pullin' this off was the only thing that would keep this man, this human, safe. Luynore had ordered us to take out anyone who got in the way. I couldn't let this man die simply because he was doing his job.

He'd be able to identify me, but I'd at least worn a beanie to cover my purple hair and put in blue contacts, so hopefully, this guard wouldn't be able to give a great description.

I said, "I was in the bathroom. Sorry about that. Do you mind lettin' me out?"

"Of course not." As the guard turned, I slipped his radio off his belt and shoved it into one of my air pockets so he wouldn't notice. Then I swiped his gun and did the same thing, hiding it away.

James came up behind the guy and clamped a hand over his mouth, wrapped an arm around his body, and pulled him to his chest. The guard struggled, but James was a vampire, and there were very few beings that could match a vamp's strength. A human had no chance at all.

I stepped in front of him and muttered, "I'm sorry. Don't worry, we're not going to hurt you, okay?" I unbuttoned the top two buttons on his uniform shirt, then reached under his collar to pull the chain.

I pulled out the emblem, then made eye contact with James because he was going to have to let go of the guy's mouth so I could pull the chain over his head.

"Ready when you are," James said, almost sounding bored.

I gave him a nod, he let go, and I quickly yanked the chain over the human's head.

Before the human even had a chance to yell out, James already had him in his thrall. James spun the man so he was facing him, then took the human's chin in his hand, tilting his eyes up to meet his gaze with more gentleness than I'd expected.

I hated what we were doing, but relief flooded me that I'd been partnered up with a vampire who wanted to hurt people as little as I did.

"You're going to turn the alarm system off, open the doors, then walk to the monitor station. Once there, you're going to ask the other guard to leave. Then you'll turn off all the cameras. Do you understand me?"

"Yes," the human breathed out before repeating James's instructions.

James sent the human a soft smile. "Good. You won't remember what either of us look like. We're blank-faced in your memory. Do you understand?"

"Yes."

"Now, this is important."

The human leaned toward James, seeming to rub his face against the vampire's palm since he still held his chin.

James said, "Everything's going to be okay. No one will get hurt. You're safe, little human. You have nothing to worry about, alright?"

"Nothing to worry about."

"Good." James sent him a small smile. "Go on, then."

We watched the human walk over to the panel on the wall, enter a code, then he held his hand up to what looked like a palm reader, only I knew it wasn't. It was reading the man's aura to make sure it was really him.

As soon as it was off, he unlocked the front door, then turned around and shot James a big, bright smile as he walked past us, heading for the monitor room.

We were still, and as soon as the human was out of sight, James sighed and rubbed a hand over his face.

"Okay?" I asked.

He glanced the way the human had gone. "I hate doing that. I feel like an asshole for taking away his free will."

My eyebrows rose. I didn't know James, not as well as Terrell, but I'd seen him around a lot, and we'd run a handful of jobs together. I'd always thought he seemed standoffish, and he'd never complained—at least not to me—about the shit Luynore made us do.

The fact he was doing it now, and so soon after Terrell had made his own feelings known, just went to show how out of control Luynore had gotten lately. He was making us do crazier and riskier things every time, and I was genuinely worried that one of us was gonna end up getting hurt—or worse.

We stayed silent for a while, and after the red light on the cameras went out, indicating they were off, James opened the door to let the other three men inside. They were basically the muscle and had been told to follow my lead.

"You know where you're going?" James asked.

I nodded. "Yeah. Let's go."

I led him through the museum to the second floor and into a large room that was set up with dragon artifacts. The sign on the wall said Welcome to the Dragon's Lair. Under other circumstances, I would've thought that was cute.

It always surprised me that the king allowed this room to even exist, but since he funded the museum, he obviously knew what they showcased. Clearly, he didn't mind others learnin' about his people.

Maybe he encouraged it to stop all the false rumors. Who knew?

What I did know was that if the dragon king ever found out that I was the one who stole his precious dragon tooth artifact, I'd either be burned to a crisp or thrown into prison for the rest of my very long life, never to be heard from again.

Mother of All, why was I doing this?

My gut clenched in a warning pain, like the obligation knew I wanted to back out and needed to remind me that I couldn't. Fuck.

I'm not backin' out, you asshole.

The pain eased, and I pushed into the room.

I'd been here before, but it'd been a few years, so I had to orient myself. The room was huge and divided into different parts from dragon anatomy to history to whether or not certain legends about them were real. It was a large exhibit, but Luynore had told us that the dragon tooth was on the far wall.

I weaved around the other displays with James and the other three behind me until we stopped in front of the dragon tooth—dragon fang to be exact.

I could only stare at it in awe. It was probably four feet long, thicker than my arm at the bottom and gradually gettin' thinner until it ended in a very sharp point.

The thing was huge, and I couldn't even imagine how massive the dragon who lost it had to be.

I also couldn't imagine how terrifying a mouth full of those razor-sharp fangs would look. A creature that large could easily swallow me up in one gulp.

The fang was inside a case, so I pulled out my lock picking tools, walked around to the back of the display, and got to work. It took less than thirty seconds for me to pick the lock, and then James and one other helped me pull the glass case off of it.

And then the five of us stood there for a solid fifteen seconds, just staring at the thing. Probably all thinking the same thing—how the fuck were we going to get this all the way to the van without being seen?

But then James pulled a folded-up black sheet out of the back of his waistband.

I lifted a brow, and he shrugged, saying defensively, "I needed my hands free."

I waved him off. "Alright, let's cover this thing and head out. I don't want to be here any longer than we have to."

James and I unfolded the sheet, covered the fang as best we could, then waved at the other three to pick it up.

The three men were a combination of gargoyle, shifter, and another vampire, and they were all grunting with effort. It must've weighed a ton. The cameras were off, but I didn't want to risk it, so once it was in hand, I used my glamor to hide all of us.

I wasn't used to glamoring this many people at once, but my magic came easily and didn't let me down. As long as no one came lookin' for us, we'd be fine.

We slowly made our way to the exit of the dragon room, but then I heard a strange noise.

It sounded like…

My eyes widened.

Footsteps.

It sounded like footsteps.

I held up a hand to make them stop, then I waved at them, tryin' to get them to hide, but it was no use.

As soon as the first person rounded a corner with a gun aimed in our direction, I felt my stomach drop, and my heart clench.

They could see through my glamor because they were lookin' for us.

We'd been caught.

We'd been fuckin' caught, and I knew exactly who these men were.

Remi's fuckin' employees.

I closed my eyes as I raised my hands in the air in surrender.

Fuck! Fuck, I'd ruined everything.

Remi was going to hate me.

My heart felt like it was breaking into a thousand pieces.

Why couldn't I just have one thing go right in my life? Why did Luynore have to ruin every single part of it?

Why wasn't I strong enough to stop this?

Why hadn't I fought harder? The last thing I'd wanted to do was betray Remi's trust.

And now I'd ruined everything.

I'd ruined us.

My heart was shattering, and I could barely hold in the sobs threatening to escape.

Oh Mother of All, I'd ruined us.