The fluorescent light in the fourth-floor hallway flickered, emitting a high-pitched, electric buzz that sounded like a dying mosquito. It smelled strongly of boiled cabbage and old damp wood.
Elara leaned heavily against the peeling wallpaper, her left knee throbbing in a steady, agonizing rhythm. She fumbled with her keyring. It had four different, cheap brass keys.
Behind her, Julian Thorne was taking up entirely too much space.
His broad shoulders practically touched both sides of the narrow hallway. The ruined charcoal suit was covered in subway grime, and he was breathing through his mouth in a clear, desperate attempt to avoid smelling the building.
"Four flights," Julian rasped, staring at a water stain on the ceiling. "You live in a structural hazard. The fire escape outside the window is rusted through. I could smell the lead paint from the lobby."
"It's rent-controlled," Elara muttered around the keys she was holding in her teeth. She grabbed the third key, shoved it into the deadbolt, and twisted hard. It stuck. She jiggled it, kicked the bottom of the door with her good foot, and twisted again. Clack. "And lead paint is only dangerous if you eat it, Thorne. Don't eat the walls."
She pushed the door open.
Elara's apartment was exactly four hundred square feet of pure, unadulterated compromise. The kitchen was a counter attached to a radiator. The living room was a rug.
She limped inside, dropping her heavy leather briefcase onto a rickety IKEA dining chair. It groaned under the weight of the offshore tax records.
Julian stepped over the threshold.
He didn't just look out of place; he broke the physics of the room. He was too tall, too wide, and too dangerously predatory for a space this small. He instinctively stood up straight to assert dominance, and his immaculate hair immediately brushed the cheap glass dome of the ceiling light.
He froze, glaring up at the fixture like it had personally insulted his bloodline.
"Close the door," Elara said, kicking her sensible block heels off. They hit the linoleum with a dull thud. "And lock the deadbolt, the chain, and the slide-latch. The super's son steals Amazon packages."
Julian slowly pushed the door shut. He stared at the three cheap locks. A man who owned biometric vaults and private security armies, currently sliding a piece of flimsy stamped metal into a slot.
Elara limped into the tiny kitchenette. She turned on the faucet. The pipes shuddered, let out a loud, violent CLANG, and spat out water that was slightly brown for three seconds before turning clear.
Julian watched this process with absolute, undisguised horror.
"You drink that." It wasn't a question.
"I run it through a Brita filter," Elara said, popping two generic ibuprofen tablets from a foil blister pack. She swallowed them dry, chasing it with a gulp of tap water. The gritty, sandpaper feeling behind her eyelids was getting worse. She looked at the clock on the microwave. 2:14 AM. "Okay." Elara leaned against the cheap laminate counter, crossing her arms. She pointed a finger at the living room area. "That is the couch. I bought it on Craigslist for forty dollars. The previous owner said the stain on the left cushion is coffee. I choose to believe them."
Julian turned his head. He looked at the mustard-yellow, lumpy monstrosity sitting against the wall.
"No." His voice dropped an octave, the Alpha wolf vibrating with pure refusal. "Absolutely not. I am not sleeping on a biological hazard."
"Your assets are frozen, Julian. You literally do not exist in the financial system right now," Elara said, rubbing her temples. "Which means you can't book a hotel. And if you wander off into the street, Gideon is going to smite you, and I am going to inherit a thirty-two million dollar tax bill. So yes. You are sleeping on the coffee stain."
Julian's jaw clenched so tight the muscle jumped violently. His fangs pricked at his lower lip. He took a step toward her, the air pressure in the tiny kitchen instantly dropping.
"I am a Council member," he snarled, looming over her. The proximity made Elara's skin prickle with static electricity. "I will sleep in the bed."
Elara didn't back away. She just reached over, opened the drawer next to her thigh, and pulled out her red plastic pen.
She tapped it against his ruined charcoal chest. Tap. Tap. "My bed is a twin-size mattress on a metal frame," she said, her voice deadpan. "If you try to get into it, I will report you to the SCRS HR department for workplace sexual harassment, which carries a mandatory fine of fifty thousand dollars. A fine that will be added to our joint liability."
Julian stared down at the cheap plastic pen pushing against his chest. His golden eyes flickered. He opened his mouth to argue, but the sheer, mind-numbing bureaucracy of the threat completely short-circuited his predator instincts.
He let out a sound that was halfway between a growl and a heavy, defeated sigh.
He turned around. He walked over to the mustard-yellow sofa.
Julian Thorne, billionaire, apex predator, and Lord of the New York covens, slowly lowered his massive frame onto the cushions.
Craaaack. The cheap wooden frame of the sofa shrieked in protest under his weight. Julian went perfectly still, sitting rigidly upright, his knees practically at his chest because the seat was so shallow. He looked like a giant, extremely angry gargoyle forced into a dollhouse.
The radiator in the corner suddenly hissed, letting out a loud burst of steam.
Julian didn't even flinch. He just closed his glowing golden eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.
"I need a blood bag," he muttered to the empty room. "Or a lawyer. Preferably both."
"Fridge. Bottom crisper drawer," Elara called out, unbuttoning the cuffs of her dusty blazer. "Behind the leftover lo mein. Don't touch the lo mein, Thorne. It's my lunch for tomorrow."
Julian opened his eyes. He stared at her, genuinely trying to calculate if this human was actively trying to torture him, or if she was just this pragmatic.
"You keep AB-negative... next to Chinese takeout."
"I'm an auditor for the Supernatural Revenue Service," Elara said, turning off the kitchen light. "I get confiscated contraband sometimes. Drink it out of a mug. I don't want you dripping on the rug. It really ties the room together."