And then he was just gone. He left me in his office, chained to his desk. I wasn’t sure how long I raged and pushed and kicked, but at some point in all that madness, my head did begin to clear. Sanity returned, bringing with it a most unwelcome guest: shame. My body burned, and it wasn’t from desire this time. Mortified, I looked around the room, rocking slowly as I tried not to watch the memory replay looping inside of my head. About this time, Ivy and Drake walked through the open door, their eyes wide.

“Wow,” Drake said, laughter overcoming his shock. “When we noticed you were gone, we went looking for you. We heard your curses all the way down the hall. We definitely didn’t expect this.” His eyes flickered to my handcuffed hands.

My eyes dropped too—and that’s when I noticed the series of releases on the handcuffs. Why hadn’t I seen that earlier? Oh, because I’d been crazy with Nectar-induced lust, that’s why.

“What happened here?” Ivy asked as I freed my hands.

“It isn’t what it looks like,” I said quickly, jumping off the desk.

She held up my panties, her lips trembling with barely-contained laughter. “Oh really? Because it looks to me like it was a good thing you wore the lacy red panties.”

The fire in my cheeks could have forged steel, but my embarrassment was nothing compared to my rage. I was angry at Nero. And at myself. And at the stupid Nectar. Why did I have to have such a strong reaction to it?

“Left you high and dry, did he?” she asked, giving my shoulder a sympathetic pat.

High but not dry. I snatched my underwear from her hand. It was time to put on my big girl panties. I stormed toward the door.

“Where are you going?” Ivy asked.

“I’m going to give that angel a piece of my mind,” I told her.

9

A Foundation of Witchcraft

Fury carried me up the hundreds of stairs to Nero’s floor—fury and the sugar rush from all those brownies I’d snarfed down. I marched down the corridor and banged on Nero’s door. And then I waited.

None of the doors on the floor opened, even though my knock had been loud enough to wake the dead. Everyone must have still been at the party downstairs. At least I hoped they were. What I was about to do was madness. You didn’t just run up to an angel and… And what? What was I going to do?

Before I could contemplate that unhappy dilemma further, Nero’s door opened. As soon as I saw him standing there, as soon as I looked into those cool assessing eyes, my anger melted into embarrassment. I remembered everything I’d said in his office—and, worse yet, done. Dear gods, this wasn’t good. Maybe if I pretended nothing had happened, this whole thing would just go away.

“I’m ready. Uh, for work,” I added quickly in case he thought I was talking about something else. “To receive my mission work.” Not to receive him. Oh shit. This wasn’t going well.

Amusement flickered across his face before it was swallowed by the cool abyss. “Come in.”

“Can’t I stay out here?”

“I have a few things to give you. Now stop hugging my doorframe and come inside.”

I followed him inside his apartment. He waved his hand at the door, and it closed with a definitive click behind me. Nero was already walking toward his dining room table. There was no food or wine waiting on it tonight, just a stack of papers.

“Here are the blueprints of the five buildings that make up the New York University of Witchcraft,” he said, handing me the first bundle of papers. “Memorize the layouts. While the rest of us are in session in the assembly hall, you will look for any evidence of the witches’ involvement in the attack on the Brick Palace two days ago. To accomplish that, you’ll need to navigate the school quickly and methodically.”

I took the folder without a word. Not talking was probably the best plan right now. He hadn’t yet mentioned what had happened in his office, and as the reality of the situation set in, I realized that I didn’t want to either.

“I’ve prepared a reading list for you,” he said, handing me a list of books ten pages long. Front and back. “You will find these titles in the Legion library on the fourth floor. They should give you a good foundation in witchcraft. You will need that in your investigation.”

I could only gawk at the list. Could that many books even fit inside of a single library?

“Now that you have received the gods’ second gift, you have the ability to put magic into potions,” he said in response to my very attractive deer-in-headlights expression. “You can do anything a witch can.”

“I don’t feel very witchy.”

“It will come.”

“So it’s just like the last time? I just have to push my way through it until I get it?”

“Basically, yes,” he said. “Though mastering Witch’s Cauldron is a mental battle, not a physical one like Vampire’s Kiss.”

Mental battle, right. I could do that. I could be brainy.

That confidence lasted about two seconds, crashing and burning when Nero handed me a second list. “Here is some extra reading material if you get through the first list.”

I mutely took it from him. I might be able to finish reading all those books if I did nothing else for the next twenty years. Who needed sleep anyway? It was totally overrated—kind of like having free time.

“It might be difficult in the beginning, but you will find that the longer you keep at it, the easier it becomes for you to absorb the knowledge,” he told me. “The gods have given you a powerful gift. You just need to unlock it.”