Fangs, Fate & Other Bad Decisions novel Chapter 55

Chapter 55

By the time the late afternoon sunlight starts streaking across my office floor like golden blades, I’ve gone through three meetings, two double espresso shots, and precisely one murderous impulse per hour.

Griffin hovers near the window, his tablet in hand, and with his eyes flicking between his notes and me like I’m a ticking bomb. Which, to be fair, isn’t far off today.

He clears his throat and starts, “The press team’s requesting final approval on your keynote speech for the gala this Saturday. And I rescheduled your call with the European division to tomorrow, per your…”

“Griffin,” I interrupt him, and his head snaps towards me.

His brows lift innocently, before he asks, “Yes, sir?”

I lean forward, resting my elbows on my desk, and say, “You’ve been watching me like a man waiting

ing for a b

bear trap to snap shut.”

He doesn’t deny it. Only gives me a small, almost imperceptible smile and then taps something out on his tablet, without uttering a word.

“Anything I should know?” I ask, my voice dangerously low as my eyes narrow at him.

Griffin shrugs in that maddening way of his, before he deadpans, “Only that you’ve spent exactly thirteen minutes staring at your phone like it insulted your bloodline.”

“I was thinking,” I mutter, sitting back in my chair, lacing my fingers in my lap.

“Ah,” he says mildly. “Of course, sir. Pining g and brooding do look similar when you’re doing them.”

My jaw tics, before I ask through clenched teeth, “Pining?”

He hums noncommittally and changes the subject before I can respond–or snap the pen in my hand in half. “Also, sir, just a reminder that the charity gala guest list is locked in. Would you like me to…?”

Before he can finish whatever question he was about to ask that would inevitably have p

pissed me off to no end, I bark,”

“No.”

He

e pauses, and I swear there’s the faintest flicker of…something in his expression. Disappointment? Guilt?

“No problem, sir,” he says too lightly, adding fuel to my suspicions. “Just a heads–up, though–the event’s PR team alread

team already received your formal RSVP and confirmed your plus one.”

I sit up straighter. “What?”

Griffin taps on his tablet, before he answers as if he’s talking about the weather, “Odd, isn’t it? There must’ve b I’m looking into it, though,”

I narrow my eyes at him and growl, “Griffin.”

He looks up, blinking with false innocence. “Yes, sir?”

been a clerical error somewhere.

But before I can interrogate him further, my phone buzzes next to my laptop, the screen lighting up with a private number I haven’t seen in

My reaction must alert Griffin to the impending doom, so he saunters over and reads the screen, too, and the room goes unbearably still around

Griffin’s entire demeanor shifts into something alert and wary, while his spine snaps straight. He knows the number, too.

“Draven,” I say as I answer the phone.

There’s a faint pause before a calm, gravel–edged voice replies, “Thane. It’s Rask. We need to speak.”

Rask never calls unless something’s gone to hell.

“What is it?” I ask, standing slowly, every miscle in my body going on high alert.

“We don’t know yet. But the threat was specific. They used your fill name, your title, and referenced…n shift,” he says, my veins tuming to boiling lava with his every word.

exhale hard through my nose to find some semblance of calm and control. A shift. Someone’s been paying attention, it seems–too much and too close.

1 pace toward the window, my heart slamming against my ribs in a rhythm I haven’t felt in over a century, “What does the council want me to do?

“Stay sharp.” Rask says. “And above a

Then the call cuts off without any further words needing to he said.

1 turn back to find Griffin watching me from across the room, still and unreadable. “Something I should be aware of?” he asks.

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