Dragomir retreated to his lair, wherever it actually was, and the werewolves faded away. I didn’t see Jamie again, although most mornings when I left the cabin I saw dinner-plate sized paw prints in the mud and snow. I left him dinner on the porch most nights, when I could keep Hopper from devouring it first, and took comfort that it was always gone in the morning. Although it could have been racoons.
Archer and his team stayed in town, renting out one of the vacant stores to set up a “production company” and studio. They even came up with some fake projects to justify sticking around. They were out filming birds and shit in the woods all the time, even after the snow started built up with each passing week.
It was two weeks after our little confrontation in the woods that I heard from Archer. He sent a text to my phone while I stood in my lab waiting for the centrifuge to finish, and asked to meet for dinner.
Since he hadn’t so much as looked in my direction since I sided with a vampire over him, I figured he had bad news to deliver. Still, though. A free dinner was a free dinner. I could at least get an appetizer and a beer out of it before the promise of whatever happened between us disappeared forever. Of course, he could have come up with evidence that Jamie and Dragomir weren’t behaving and wanted to arrest me in a public place where I wouldn’t make a scene.
Well. Joke was on him. I’d make a scene anywhere I wanted.
Archer picked the only Italian restaurant in town and had already gotten a table by the time I pulled up in the battered truck. It limped into the parking lot and died as I put it into park. I’d be lucky if it survived the winter. I’d been up since dawn and went straight to the restaurant so the glorious couch gravity wouldn’t grab me and suck me in, so I felt pretty rough as I dragged myself into the restaurant and sat down across from him. I hadn’t sampled any of the blood Dragomir dropped off, but I’d been sorely tempted.
He stood when I walked up and even pulled out my chair. Strictly a professional courtesy, I imagined. I checked the room for his team or anyone else who looked like a law-and-order outsider, and suspected Isidro hunkered down in a booth near the kitchen. So he didn’t trust me all the way. I could live with that.
The waitress arrived to take the drink order, so I got to wait a few seconds before I had to come up with something else to say. What came out wasn’t exactly what I’d planned, but it needed to be said. “So how pissed are you?”
He took a deep breath and I braced for something devastating. Instead, he shrugged. “You did what you thought was right because you want to protect your brother. I really can’t fault you for that, even if I know you don’t really understand who and what you’re dealing with, or how badly this will all go wrong.”
I leaned back and pretended to read the menu, even though I’d had it memorized since the second time my family visited the place. It hadn’t changed once in the previous fifteen years. “No righteous indignation? A few cautionary tales about how you’ve seen things go bad before and you don’t want me to get hurt?”
“I don’t want you to get hurt,” he said. He sipped his wine and rattled off a lasagna order when the waitress reappeared. Once she’d written down my chicken parmesan order, Archer went on in a lowered voice. “I really don’t, Ada, but I can’t wrap you up in bubble wrap and lock you away somewhere safe. You’re an adult and at least two times smarter than me.”
“Closer to three, I’d wager.” I smiled, though, and since he smiled back, maybe his ego wasn’t as bruised as I feared. “Still, though. I appreciate you were willing to listen.”
“Well, you threatened me,” he said. “And you’ve got us all over a barrel, it seems. I’m guessing you’re still prepared to use the nuclear option if this doesn’t turn out how you want?”
“Oh yes.” I held up my cell phone and waggled it at him. “Major news outlets on speed dial, the best evidence I collected uploaded in an auto-send email, and an airhorn app to deafen and distract you so I can run away.”
Archer nodded and leaned back, arms folded over his chest. “But you’d take the phone with you, so wouldn’t you just deafen yourself?”
Hmm. He had a point. “Okay, maybe I’m just two times smarter than you.”
He started to smile, the scars buckling across his cheek. “Very magnanimous of you. How have you been feeling otherwise?”
“A little stressed, but still waiting for a vampire or werewolf to land on my porch.” I leaned out of the way as the waitress brought soup and bread sticks. Funny how she was so much more responsive and helpful when Archer made the requests instead of me. I studied him, though, and wished things were different.
Instead, I felt off-balance all the time, waiting for the other shoe to drop and a flaming asteroid to crash through my roof. I woke up in a cold sweat almost every night, usually chased by dreams of Dragomir biting my neck and me biting his. I dragged my attention back to the much more pleasant distraction in front of me. “How are you? No permanent damage?”
“No more so than normal.” He rubbed the back of his neck, then gestured at his side. “I still feel it in my ribs sometimes, and I had a hell of a headache for a couple of days, but after tussling with a vampire and a pack of werewolves, I’m grateful we survived with all of our limbs intact.”
I nodded, toying with my spoon. “I’m glad you all survived. Even Giselle.”
“I’ll make sure she knows,” Archer said. He hesitated before asking, “Have you heard from — him? And — them?”
“You don’t have to do the dramatic pauses.” I broke a breadstick into pieces and dropped them into the soup to buy a little time. “I haven’t. I know Jamie has been around, but Dragomir hasn’t reached out. He’s probably still pouting.”
Archer shook his head. “It’s hard to picture one of those creatures pouting.”
“Maybe we should have a rule where we don’t describe our mutual acquaintances as ‘creatures,” I said. “Or at all, maybe.”
He took a deep breath and hesitated as the waitress brought out our meals. Even after she’d gone, he didn’t speak. I waited for something, for anything, to break the silence, but he pondered his lasagna and moved it around with a fork. Archer finally frowned at me until my heart beat faster. “Maybe we don’t talk about work at all. Just to keep the peace.”
“I agree. I think that’s a good plan.” Although that raised an important question: what the hell did normal people talk about all the time?
“Of course, if you ever want to kill them all....” He leaned on the back legs of his chair, starting to grin. “I’d be happy to help.”
“I’m sure you would be.” I shook my head and drank more wine, trying to hide my smile in the glass. I couldn’t encourage that kind of behavior, otherwise he’d just keep flirt-joking every time we were in the same room. Eventually someone would take him seriously. “But let’s keep the death threats to a minimum, hmm? And why did you want to meet up, anyway?”
“To buy you dinner?” When I gave him a stern look, Archer chuckled. “Okay, okay. A couple of reasons. First, to see how you’re doing and make sure you’re still alive and can still walk in the sunlight.”
I didn’t bother hiding my smile. He was just serious enough I knew he really had worried about Dragomir either killing or biting me, which warmed my heart. “I’m fine, and yes, I’ll start working on my tan when the temperature goes above freezing. If only we had a tanning salon around here.”
“Noted.” Archer demolished most of his lasagna and eyed my chicken. “The second reason is to find out what the hell kind of dog you have that clotheslined me in front of your house.”
I bit the inside of my cheek and looked away. “He’s unique.”
His eyes sparkled again, bluer even than I remembered. “Right. I might need some samples for documentation purposes.”
“If you get anywhere near Hopper,” I said, pointing my fork at him. “I will hunt you down and murder you.”
“Hopper?”
“Don’t even try to distract me. What’s the third reason?” I mentally crossed my fingers that it was to declare his undying love and sweep me off my feet to Nepal.
“To fulfill the contract. Since we actually filmed enough for a couple of episodes, I wanted to settle up before we start work on the next segment.”
“What are you talking about?” In the chaos of finding Jamie and surviving a vampire attack, I’d almost forgotten how all of it started, with that stupid reality TV show.
His dimple reappeared under the beard. Archer handed me a white bank envelope fat with cash. “Turns out the whole monster-hunter thing actually works really well for our research and tracking. Headquarters knows… some of what went down, but budgets are pretty tight and having a successful reality TV pilot really paid off. We got offers for early footage for a cryptid hunting show, and a wolf documentary. Starring you, of course.”
“Seriously?” I laughed and used a breadstick to sop up the remaining lasagna-y goodness. “I don’t think I’m ready to star in anything.”
“You might be surprised,” he said. “The proposal hit a different demographic for them, and they want to build up some really crazy, over-dramatic episodes. Maybe bring in some of your living, normal friends. And it gives us a reason to wander around and keep up with everyone else you’re blackmailing.”
“I prefer ‘enforcing détente,’ thank you.” I peeked into the envelope and dropped it into the marina. I fished it out with as much dignity as possible as Archer laughed at me. There had to be at least twenty thousand dollars in there, just waiting to be spent. New truck, new cameras, new testing supplies to replace all the stuff the team ruined when they raided my house.
I gazed at him, then past him, then out the window at the trees beyond. The forest was always close. Maybe Jamie lingered nearby, waiting for me to reappear and head home so he wouldn’t spend all day worried. I thought I was done with the reality show and had moved on to blend in more with the regular folks in town while I searched for solutions to that fragile truce. “I don’t know if I’m up for it.”
That envelope of cash would get me through the winter, and I’d considered calling Anders up for a position in his lab or as a teaching assistant. There was no reason to put myself out there for more ridicule.
Archer’s eyebrows arched as he watched me; his eyes twinkled just a bit, like he could tell where I was going with my denial. And he just waited, a challenge clear in his expression.
I pointed another breadstick at him and lost a chunk on the tablecloth. “I have to enforce a tenuous truce between these three assholes I know. I don’t know if I should spend all winter running around in the woods looking for even more assholes.”
He waved a folded set of papers at me. “This contract comes with a clothing allowance. So you don’t lose your little toesies to frostbite.”
“You’re kidding.”
Archer shook his head and unfolded the contract to hand over before it ended up consumed by the flickering candles. “Nope. Clothing allowance, use of a new truck, at least eight more episodes.”
I choked on a sip of wine and snatched the papers out of his hand. “How many?”
He laughed and started talking number. By the time we ordered tiramisu, Archer and I had a plan for at least another two seasons. I only hoped Dragomir or some other evil being stayed out of the way.