Total pages in book: 149
Estimated words: 142050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 474(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 142050 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 710(@200wpm)___ 568(@250wpm)___ 474(@300wpm)
As someone else was brought over, Lyric stared out from her private abyss, and talked about nothing, and smiled when she was supposed to.
This time, when the flash went off, she blinked hard.
And thought about what her brother, Rhamp, was doing right now. He and Shuli, and all the other fighters, were not standing around posing for pictures. When a bright light went off around them, it was because they’d stabbed one of the lessers who hunted and killed vampires, and sent the fucker(s) back to their maker.
Their brilliant flashes were a sign they’d won a battle, saved a civilian, made a difference.
Done something courageous and worthwhile—
“And here, Lyric, before we start things, you have to meet—”
Marcia shoved another person in for advance photos, an interviewer with some kind of podcast, who was followed by another influencer with “an insane amount of followers”—
And that was when Lyric caught sight of a familiar face. Over by the emergency exit.
A shy, reserved, familiar face attached to a lanky body garbed in just Levi’s and a t-shirt, in spite of the cold.
“Oh, Allhan!” Lyric broke out of a four-person lineup. “Hi!”
“Wait, what?” Marcia demanded. “Where are you going—”
“Hey!” As she rushed over to the male, her smile was an honest one. That she hoped wasn’t as desperate as she feared it might be. “What are you doing here?”
Allhan looked at the floor, and even in the dark blue light, she could see the flush race up his thin neck and bloom in his hollow face.
“I mean, I’m so glad you came.” She touched his arm. “I’m just surprised, is all. This is not your usual kind of place.”
As a pretrans, Allhan was about twenty-five years old according to the human calendar—no one was sure exactly when his birthday was, not even him—but he was as scrawny as a twelve-year-old human kid. And then there was the frizzy dark hair. No matter what the season, it was like he’d rubbed a balloon on the crown of his head in the middle of winter and done nothing about the static electricity.
Then again, the guy was live-wire smart. Maybe he actually had straight hair and the heat generated by all that IQ was what had permed up all his—
“What are you doing?” Marcia stepped in between them. “You need to be back there—”
“Oh, it’s okay, I’m just saying hi. This is my friend.”
Marcia’s narrowed eyes did an up-and-down on the male, and somehow her wooden expression was more of an insult than if she’d said the words she was clearly thinking:
Less than. Not worth the effort.
Forgettable.
“That’s just great.” The woman linked arms with Lyric and started walking away. “That’s wonderful. We love friends, just not right now.”
As Lyric threw out her anchor, she wondered whether, if it had been her brother or, like, Shuli, for godsakes, things would be different. But of course they would.
“You need to give me a minute—”
“No, now. This is work.”
“Let me at least say goodbye.” She turned back around. “Listen, Allhan—”
He was gone, the emergency door just shutting.
Lyric put her hands to her face, and felt like screaming. “Hold on, Marcia. I have to go say—”
“You don’t need to worry about the likes of that.”
Later, much later, Lyric would know that it all really started at that moment, with that one syllable, spoken in that tone. Something just snapped.
“All of this is going to wait,” Lyric shot back. “While I go and make sure you didn’t offend my friend.”
Marcia hopped in front and put her arms wide like she was trying to stop a train. Speaking in a rushed hush, she said, “You have two hundred of your followers out there, who paid forty-nine dollars to stand next to you and get their pictures taken. The event is starting at seven. So no, you’re not going—”
“There are things more important than work.”
“Not tonight there aren’t.”
As the little woman stared up at her, that Botox-frozen face straining to reflect all kinds of inner horror, it dawned on Lyric that this thing with Lyrically Dressed, which had started with all the casualness of a sneeze two years ago, had taken on a life of its own.
And it was like feeding a monster now.
“You’re so wrong about that,” Lyric muttered as she pushed the woman out of the way. “Life doesn’t last forever, you know.”
She hit that fire door like it was a solid obstacle.
And as she stepped out, the cold slapped her back just as hard.
“Allhan!” she cried out. “Wait!”
CHAPTER TWO
15 Windsor Lane
Caldwell, New York
If you were going to be a traitor against Wrath, son of Wrath, sire of Wrath, two things were guaranteed to happen. One, every worldly possession you had, whether it was stocks, bonds, or cold hard cash or the house you lived in or the clothes on your fucking back, was confiscated unto the King.