I fought a grin. If only.
“We need sigils,” Miles said. “We’ve located a small rift in the veil, and a couple of gnomes got through. They’re digging up someone’s garden.”
I snorted. “Gnomes? Why do you need sigils for gnomes? They’re two feet tall.”
Shade squared his shoulders at me, fisting his hands to make his muscles flex. “They’re also hungry and venomous. Are you going to do your job, or should I contact the Higher Power and ask them to send us a real Ink Master?”
Chaos’s growl reverberated through my entire body, but if it was audible, the guys didn’t react. I straightened my spine, staring at Shade as I chose my words. The string of profanities I wanted to throw at him would only drag me down to his level.
“This is ridiculous.” Shade’s nostrils flared, and a wildness filled his eyes. “I can’t believe someone like you has such a high rank in the coven.” He swiped his arm across my desk, sending my coffee, lamp, and laptop crashing to the floor. As he stomped toward the closest bookcase, he jabbed his fingers into his hair and pulled at the roots.
“This setup is shit.” He knocked over a stack of books and kicked one across the room. “This coven doesn’t work.” He grabbed the bookcase and rocked it, trying to pull it down. It was too big, weighted more heavily at the bottom so it stayed upright.
“Ahhrrgh!” He went for the books, grabbing them two at a time and hurling them to the floor. He’d gone crazy. He was acting like total…
“Chaos…” I said through clenched teeth.
He growled in answer.
“Stop it right now,” I said to both the demon in my head and the man tearing apart my library. Neither obeyed.
I shot to my feet and screamed, “I said stop!”
Chaos grunted, and Shade froze, looking at the mess he’d made with confusion in his eyes.
“Are you finished with your temper tantrum?” Again, I spoke to them both.
“I…” Shade looked at his hands, his eyes widening as his gaze locked on my laptop covered in coffee.
“He deserved worse.”
I pressed my lips into a hard line. Chaos would get a reaming later, for sure. Right now, I needed to get these guys set and out of my building.
“Is everything okay?” Ginger stood in the doorway, alarm tightening her features. “What happened?”
Chaos happened, but I couldn’t let them know that. “Shade threw a hissy fit when his words didn’t cut me deep enough.”
He looked at his hands again. “I didn’t. I don’t…”
“The evidence suggests otherwise.” I put my things back on my desk and threw a stack of napkins onto the puddle of coffee.
“Are you okay?” Miles asked him, and he nodded. Of course Shade’s new little pet would only be concerned about his owner and not about the disaster he just caused.
“Come on.” I brushed past them. “Let’s get those sigils done before the gnomes eat all the cats in Salem.”
They followed me into the studio, and Ginger returned to the front of the shop. I put on my professional face and gifted the boys with thicker skin and resistance to venom. As I put the finishing touch on Miles’s tattoo, my sleeve slipped up, revealing a bit of Chaos’s symbol.
“What do you need a sigil for?” he asked.
I yanked my sleeve down and returned the tattoo machine to its stand. “Protection from bullshit.” I cut my gaze over to Shade, who still looked confused as hell. I knew the feeling.
Did he apologize for the mess he made? No. Did I expect him to? Not really, but it would’ve been nice. At any rate, he owed me a new laptop if the one he knocked off the desk was broken. Actually, Chaos owed me a new laptop.
“Thanks for your help,” Miles said. “Sorry about the mess.”
“Yeah. Thanks,” Shade muttered before shuffling out the door.
“Have fun fighting gnomes,” I called as they walked away.
With the guys out of my hair, I returned to the library to grab my bag. My jaw tightened at the disorder, but I would have to deal with it later. I locked up the stacks and the entrance to our apartment and slipped out the back door.
Brisk wind stung my still tender cheeks, and as I hung a right on Essex Street, I pressed my phone to my ear so I could gripe out Chaos without looking like a total whack job. “What the hell was that? I told you not to mess with him.”
“He disrespected you.”
“Shade always disrespects me. It’s nothing new.”
“He needs to learn his place.”
I rolled my eyes. “He knows his place. That’s why he acts the way he does. I bruised his fragile ego.”
“And he is determined to bruise yours.”
We passed a witchy shop and a monster museum. Dozens of tourists milled about, looking into store windows and chatting. The sun shone high in a cloudless sky, its heat helping tame the bitter wind.
“You can’t go around making people crazy, especially when I have explicitly told you to leave someone alone.” I stopped in front of a resale shop and sighed. Who knew what magical artifacts or books occupied the shelves in there, and it was my job to root them out. Yet another task that kept moving farther down on my to-do list.
“I won’t allow anyone to harm you.”
