Chapter 3
Austin returned like a boomerang to elbow him in his ribs. Zach let nothing on. He let his eyes slide over the woman without rancor because it wasn’t her fault her uncle was possibly attempting to whore her out. “How lovely to meet you,” he said flatly.
“And you are?” she asked Austin next.
“Giancarlo,” Austin informed her, as Zach snorted.
“How do you two know each other?” she asked, beaming with innocent sincerity.
“Rosalie, we don’t speak to bodyguards,” her uncle complained.
“Oh, that’s okay,” Austin said, brushing the other man’s concern aside. “While I am his bodyguard, we met in college.”
College was the key phrase to unlock the protection of the magic that surrounded them—it made everyone’s memories of their attendance a little more blurry than they might otherwise have been. No one noticed the change in the moment, but after they went home they’d have trouble remembering exactly what it was they’d discussed.
“Funny you should mention that, then, because I was just telling Damian Senior here how interested Rosalie was in science,” Lionel said, redirecting his niece’s attention toward who he wanted her actual target to be.
“I am. I’m pre-med,” Rosalie announced to the two of them, before giving Austin a shy glance. Zach knew she wasn’t in on whatever her uncle had planned, so she would be spared the Beast’s ire.
“Pre. Med,” Zach repeated slowly, glaring at Lionel. Even as himself, the age gap would’ve been a stretch—and that was before he factored in his lycanthropy. Zach put his hand out for hers and shook it like he might a man’s. “Best of luck in your scholastic endeavors,” he said and moved on, angling for the nearest waiter with booze.
“What’re you doing?” Austin asked him in a quiet voice as he quickly followed, picking two of the flutes up for himself.
“Not taking advantage of a child,” Zach quietly answered back.
Austin snorted. “If you keep making excuses to not get laid you never will.”
“Pride’s not an excuse.”
Austin moved to block him from departing. “You and I both know pride has nothing to do with it.” He slammed back a flute of champagne, set the glass down on the edge of a pedestal, and eyed Zach over the second one.
“You’re still hung up on Stella.”
Zach ground his teeth together. “So what if I am?”
“She ghosted you,” Austin enunciated quietly. “You’re not her mate, Zach. She knows that I know that, the whole world knows that—so why the hell don’t you?”
“You’re making a scene,” Zach muttered with a growl.
“Oh, everyone’s used to you being angry, why should tonight be any different?” Austin slammed the second glass, and a waiter came up to take it from him. “College,” Austin said, waving the man away. The waiter blinked and wandered off as if he’d never been nearby. “If you weren’t being angry here, you’d be being angry at home besides. You’ve been in a foul mood for months. Which is why,” Austin began, and then continued, saying more words. Zach could hear them, but they no longer held any meaning for him as a woman walked in the door. She crossed the room, heading to the far side of the bison exhibit, and Zach watched her every move.
She had overly long sandy-blonde hair that hung in loose, face-framing waves. Her eyes were brown—not blue—and the slit on her golden dress, which swung open every time she took a step, revealed creamy thighs which did not possess a singular tattoo.
And yet at seeing her, something shifted inside of Zach, like a compass put too near a magnet.
“Zach? Hello?” Austin said, sounding affronted until he followed
Zach’s eyes. “Oh, thank God—yes—she’ll do. I’ll come and help.”
“You’ll be nothing of the sort. Stay here, or else.”
One of Austin’s eyebrows arched. “You do realize I’m not your employee, right?” he asked as Zach brusquely handed his drink over, and then stalked across the hall toward the woman’s side. “I’m going to drink this!” Austin called after him.
ZACH CIRCLED WIDE. The strange curiosity he possessed about the woman now was almost overwhelming, although it wouldn’t do to let anything on, no matter his level of interest. He was too important to let anyone gain power over him. Austin’s estimation of events with Stella might’ve been blunt, but it was also accurate, and Zach knew he’d been a fool to care so much about a woman who thought so little of him.
No, he wasn’t allowed to hope, dream, or relax, in either of his guises. He was too important as the Beast to the company he ran, and as himself to his crew. He, his brother, and other assorted friends helped the real Damian fight off monsters from other Realms. He couldn’t afford to be distracted in either arena.
So his feet slowed as he rounded the tableau, watching the woman relax against the railing, dangling her half-empty champagne glass over the edge, her slender wrists crossed. The deep V of the back of her dress showed the curve of her spine, and she had one golden strappy heel kicked back, the only part of her that was currently moving, rocking back and forth like a slowly wagging tail.
“Mr. Blackwood,” she said, as he moved to lean beside her, looking forward like she was, close, but not too close. The sensation of her presence was even more intense nearby.
“Who are you?” he asked bluntly.
She glanced over and batted her eyelashes at him. “Why do you care?”
“Because I feel like I know you,” he stated it was God’s truth.
The corners of her lips curled up in clear amusement. “Is that a compliment—or a complaint?”
Zach let himself study her, rolling his gaze up and down her body. Lean, but muscled. She was dressed for the occasion, but something in her bearing said she wasn't the usual type that ran in these circles. “Too soon to tell.”
She laughed quietly then, almost inaudibly, but it made the gold of her dress shimmer before she turned toward him. “I bet you sleep with a lot of women, Mr. Blackwood. So if you can’t keep track of them all, I suppose I understand.” She finished off her champagne and gave him a dazzling smile that made her lips look like a brick-red bow, hiding a present that he wanted to unwrap.
“Would you like to know a secret?” he asked, pushing off the railing.
“Of course,” she answered, without hesitation.
His eyes narrowed as he considered her. “I don’t.”
The next hall beyond them had been curtained off as some sort of staging ground for the party, and a series of waiters emerged from it carrying fresh trays of drinks and hors d'oeuvres. The motion of their arrival and subsequent departure created the smallest of breezes, which carried the faintest hint of honeysuckle from her to him.
“Don’t… keep track of them?” she guessed. “That’s rather rude.”