Grace cast a hunted look over his shoulder before turning back to her. “He was very busy,” he said, “and very surprised to realize you’d talked my whole family into helping him.”
“I thought that was supposed to be a secret,” she muttered, crossing her arms.
“Well, someone broke into his room, and when I stopped him, the secret sort of got out.”
Tabby’s expressive brown eyes widened, and her lips parted slightly. “Uhm… someone broke into the room?”
“You didn’t get that far?” Grace asked, trying to remember what, exactly, he’d said to Tabitha about the trip during the day.
“Grace, you had better start at the beginning!”
Grace let out a sigh. “Maybe you can just come to the family meeting tonight,” he said, rubbing the spot between his eyebrows that felt like it was permanently knitted together. “There’s people. We did things. I’m not good with linear exposition.”
Tabitha cocked her head. “That’s about as self-aware as I’ve ever heard you,” she said bluntly. “What’s wrong?”
“Have you ever spent the night with a guy?” he asked, and her eyes got even bigger. He wondered if he’d surprised her.
“You’ve met Sanjay,” she said, referring to her boyfriend of about a year.
Grace nodded. “O, he of the amazing velvet infinity-pool brown eyes. I remember.”
Tabby’s tawny skin grew darker at the cheekbones, and she pulled at her leotard neck. “I may have said that.”
“I only remember because your last boyfriend—”
“Kevin,” she supplied.
“Yeah, he had big brown velvet infinity-pool eyes too.”
She blew out a breath and fanned her face. “I have a type. Sue me.”
Grace was diverted. “But when does a type become a fetish?” he asked.
But she’d apparently had enough. “When I start licking their eyeballs instead of their cocks,” she snapped crudely. “Can we take a right turn back to your point now?”
Oh! Oh yeah. “Do you like sleeping in the same bed?” Grace asked, hungry for the answer.
“Yes,” Tabitha said just as bluntly. “Why?”
“Do you ever get tired of it?”
“No. I mean, when I’m sick, yes, but most of the time, we don’t sleep together because we have different places and different shit to do. Again, why?”
“So it’s not weird to like it.”
“No. Why?”
“Because I’ve been doing it with someone. No, not the thing,” he added, “although that happened, and it was great, and I’d love more. But the sleeping together—we did that.”
Her breath caught, and he appreciated that she seemed to get the gravity of the situation. “And?” she asked carefully.
“I like it,” he said, and he couldn’t believe he’d said it, but it was true.
“Good,” she said, nodding encouragingly. “Are you going to do it some more?”
“That would be nice,” he said, biting his lip. “I… I keep waiting for him to leave.”
A brief smile flitted across her face. “But honey, you deserve someone who stays.”
Grace wrinkled his nose. “I don’t know why. I’m a terrible person.” At that moment, his watch flashed a text, and he sighed. “My ride is here,” he said without looking. Josh had business in the city, and he’d promised to pick Grace up. Technically Grace owned a car—a Kia Sportage, because it came in a color that had matched his hair for a whole three months. But he didn’t really like to drive; he always ended up places he shouldn’t be, and he’d forget where he’d been going in the first place. He and Josh used to live about six blocks away from Aether Conservatory, but after their adventure clearing Josh’s dad’s name, they’d moved back into the mansion. Grace liked it there—he wasn’t complaining—although he suspected Josh kept the apartment in Chicago because… maturity and things.
“Okay,” Tabby said, looking bemused. “I’ll ask Grandfather if he wants to come by to eat.”
“You can come by without him,” Grace said, nodding, and she nodded back.
“I can. Grace?”
He paused in the act of scooping up his dance bag before he ran out the door. “Yeah?”
“You’re a good person. This guy who was with you in Vancouver and now here—he’s lucky.”
Grace shook his head. “His last boyfriend died.” He let out a sigh. “I’m probably just a phase.”
And then, before she could answer, he ran out the door and down the stairs, shouting, “Bye, Dance Master!” before he disappeared.
When he got outside, he was surprised to see that it was not Josh in the waiting black SUV, but Hunter.
“Where’s Josh?” he asked suspiciously.
“Josh was doing some legwork,” Hunter said mildly. “He apparently knows a policeman who works organized crime, and he was looking for dirt on Sergei Kadjic. I was with him, but it was time to pick you up, and I was available, and apparently this guy will only talk to Josh.”
Grace scowled. “Wasn’t Sean, was it?”
“No,” Hunter said, frowning. “Nick Denning, I think.”
Grace relaxed. “Nick’s okay. He has a wife and kid. The other guy just wants back in his pants.”
Hunter gave half a laugh. “Grace, how do either of you know cops?”
Grace frowned. “I don’t know. Josh talks to everybody. Asks them their life story. Then, when he needs information, he knows who to call.”
Hunter chuckled. “Yeah, that’s how he roped me into this merry band of thieves. Can’t say I object.”
Grace suddenly thought about it—Hunter’s life before Grace. It wasn’t something he was used to doing. “So,” he said suspiciously, “what were you doing when he found you beating up muggers in the garage?” The sting had been his idea, actually, but he’d had a dress rehearsal the day their friend had offered to be a mark.
“I thought I was beating up muggers,” Hunter said, negotiating traffic in the Loop with ease. Grace sighed. Everybody drove better than he did.
“I mean with your life,” Grace snapped, feeling off-kilter. “Were you between assassin things? Were you planning a coup? What?”
Hunter let out a sigh. “I was getting over losing Paulie,” he said, his square jaw hardening as Grace eyed his profile. “And I was trying to decide what I wanted to do with my life.”
“So you met Josh and…?”
“And I kept taking classes, for one thing,” Hunter said, his jaw loosening up now. “And I realized I’ve got skills. Yeah, they’re often used for violence, but that doesn’t have to mean they’re bad.”
Grace digested that for a moment and sighed, staring out the window. “You could probably run for office,” he said, completely unironic. “You’re pretty honest.”
“Yeah, well, I was raised honest,” Hunter said, which was unsurprising. He was so straightforward. It was probably one of the reasons he was so good at disappearing in plain sight. Nothing to see here, folks, just a man doing a job. “There weren’t a lot of opportunities in the middle of the heartland,” he continued. “I wanted to see the world, know people I hadn’t grown up with my whole life. Hello, military.”