I didn't know if he'd be able to forgive me a third death.
Tears stung my eyes, choking me, and Tybalt hadn't even answered yet.
"Gina said he was freaking out," Tybalt said. "Demanding to see your body for himself, that the photos weren't good enough. Aurora's words weren't enough. He's been threatening to kill Demetrius for touching you, snarling at every Watchtower Felia who gets near him."
"Fuck." I wanted to hit something really, really hard, and Tybalt wasn't saying something. "Spit it out, Leftie."
"He was losing control of his Lupa side, so Dr. Vansis sedated him."
Shitshitshitshitshit.
He needed me and I couldn't go to him. Some fucking mate I was, allowing him to believe I was dead and lose control, when he was still coming to understand his dual nature. I was a failure as a girlfriend and a failure as a mate—suddenly all of the positive things my fake death had reaped seemed small and insignificant next to Wyatt's pain.
"Can he be brought here?" I asked. "Wyatt needs to know the truth before it breaks him."
Tybalt squeezed my hand. "I'll call Gina and see what we can do. But Evy, don't forget. Vale still has the elf scroll and the vampire cure. If he suspects you backstabbed him, he might destroy them both before he tries to bargain with them."
Why did it always come down to a choice between my love life and my duty to the bigger picture? I was really starting to hate the fucking view. My head told me that Tybalt was right, but my heart decided to step up and tell logic to take a flying fuck. "I need him to see that I'm alive, Tybalt. It needs to happen today, before he does something he can't take back."
"Okay, I'll make the call."
I had him show me where the bathroom was before he made the call, because I had to pee and generally felt gross. The bathroom was functionally boring, just like the office had been—sink, toilet, paper towels, soap dispenser. I splashed some water on my face, then contemplated taking a look at the gash on my stomach. It itched like a son of a bitch, so I knew it was healing.
A grocery bag of items rested on the floor by the sink. I bent far enough to snag it with the tips of my fingers. Cheap toothbrushes, toothpaste, some generic soap and dry shampoo. Plastic comb. At the bottom of the bag was a second bag, and its contents surprised me—box of hair dye, black eyeliner, an eye shadow compact, burgundy lipstick, and a pair of scissors.
"Gina dropped off that stuff," Tybalt said from the doorway, which startled the shit out of me.
I held up the lipstick. "Tell her it isn't her color."
"For you, Stone."
"Me?"
"You're going to want to leave here and go after Vale. You figure now that you're dead, he won't be expecting you and you can use that to your advantage to find him and the vampire cure."
"How—?"
"We know you better than you think. Plus it's what me and Gina would have done in your place."
"So she wants me to hit the streets done up like a hooker?"
"I think she was going for emo goth."
"Fantastic. Wyatt?"
"He'll be unconscious for another hour yet, Gina said. Once he comes around, she'll try to get him here."
"Good, okay." I studied the box of dye. "You know, I've never actually done this before."
"Don't ask me."
"I wasn't. Just remarking on my lack of knowledge of a simple girl thing. Don't most girls dye their hair at least once by the time they're my age?"
"Which age?"
"Good point." Chalice had been about five years older than me when we died. I opened the box and began sorting the bizarre contents—instructions, gloves, bottle, plastic tip, another bottle—until Tybalt's continued presence dinged my discomfort meter. "Okay, out. This isn't a sideshow."
He snickered, but pulled the bathroom door shut when he left.
I removed the scissors from the other bag and ran my fingers down the cool metal blades. I had a love-hate relationship with my hair. The length and thickness had been so foreign at first, and now I saw me in the reflection, not just the face of another woman. I liked how soft and feminine this hair made me look, made me feel.
But if ever there was a reason for a change, sneaking up on Vale and pounding his ass into the pavement was as good a reason as any. I grabbed a hank of hair, angled the scissors to a length right above my shoulders, and cut.
Forty-five minutes later, the girl staring back at me was a strange amalgamation of the Evy who'd died in May and the Evy I'd been up until this morning. She had the same freckled nose and brown eyes and heart-shaped face. But this new Evy had shoulder-length hair, dyed a strange shade of blonde-brown that had been a pain in the ass to wash out.
Bending over a sink and ducking your head under a small, badly-angled faucet is not easy when you have a ten-inch healing cut on your belly.
The results were worth it though, especially combined with my attempts at applying heavy eye makeup that didn't cross the line from striking to trampy. Nothing I did could disguise my scent to a trained Therian nose, or hide the birthmark that all Gifted humans carried and I had thanks to my teleporting ability, but anyone looking for Chalice Frost would not see her in me.
I needed clothes, though. My previous day's outfit was cut up and blood-soaked, and no way was I running around the city in someone's oversized t-shirt. I opened the bathroom door, unsurprised to see Tybalt sitting in the hall opposite. His mouth fell open when he saw the new me.
"If you say anything, I will punch you," I said.
He snapped his jaw shut.
"I need clothes."
He pointed at the office.
I went inside and found another shopping bag, this one with jeans, a t-shirt, and a black hoodie. No underwear and no bra, which made me roll my eyes. Gina obviously hadn't bought these. The jeans were super-tight, a size too small, but the hoodie helped cover some of the second-skin way they fit over my ass. Under the cot, I found a pair of boots a size too large. Some paper towels stuffed into the toes kept them from clunking around too much. I didn't complain out loud, though, because the strange outfit played to the strengths of my disguise. I looked and felt like a completely different person.
"Evy, I have to go," Tybalt said from the doorway. His eyebrows winged up at the sight of me, but he didn't comment on the new look. "I need to drop Elder Dane off at a more comfortable location, and then the Watchtower is expecting me." He picked the urn up off the floor, then handed me a plastic package. "There's a pre-paid cell phone. I wrote mine and Gina's cell numbers on the box, so program them before you toss it. One of us will call you about Wyatt."
"So I'm supposed to hang out here until then?"
"If you want Wyatt to know you're alive, then yes. For an hour or two, okay? We'll keep you updated."
"Fine." I didn't like the idea of hanging around an empty crematorium, but if it meant seeing Wyatt in the very near future, I'd deal.
Tybalt's cell rang. He mouthed Gina's name at me before answering. His eyebrows winged up in shock almost immediately, which gave me a horrible feeling in the pit of my still-healing stomach. "How bad?" he asked. Nodded. "Yeah, you, too."
"Who's hurt?" I asked as soon as he was off the phone.
"Dr. Vansis."
Oh no.
"Wyatt woke up sooner than expected. When Vansis tried to dose him again, he attacked. Threw Vansis across the room and knocked him out before escaping."
"Escaping?"
"He left the Watchtower, Evy. No one knows where Wyatt is."
Chapter Sixteen
Having a grieving, half-Lupa ex-Handler on the loose certainly added an extra layer of fun to my already fantastic day. The good news: Vansis was fine, but pissed, and the Dane household was locked up tighter than the federal Mint, so Wyatt had no chance of getting his claws on Demetrius. The bad news: no one knew where Wyatt was, and he'd disappeared into the city. Not even the super-sniffers of some of our Therian friends could pick up on his scent.