Gypsy Freak (All The Pretty Monsters #2)(5)

I can tell by the way he hesitates to answer that Marta likely did say something to him, and I’m assuming this must be Violet’s father she’s speaking to.

Violet stares blankly at the wall when he takes too long to answer.

“Shit, sweetie. I don’t think so, but I’ve got to go. One of my guys just sawed his damn thumb off,” he tells her.

I strain, definitely hearing someone shouting in the background, but I can’t make it out enough to know if he’s lying, stalling, or simply telling the truth. I could be mistaking hesitation for distraction.

“Fine. I’ll call you—”

The phone goes dead, and she gives a sad smile as she finishes her sentence. “—Tuesday to check in. Bye, Dad. Love you.”

The look on her face is more dejected than bitter, as she tosses her phone aside. Then she curls into a small ball on her bed with her back to me, as the ghosts chatter from somewhere beyond the door.

I’m curious if he even has a clue that her world has just exploded with all the scary or unknown things that go bump in the night.

I wonder what Vance will do to me if I beat her father to a state of apology as payment for the mirror.

Armed with a plan, I decide to go see if he’s finished fucking up Arion’s face yet.

Dropping to the ground, I move quickly, shielding myself with an illusion to make myself invisible.

Vance’s car is gone from Arion’s house when I reach the front, and the massive front door has been left in shambles on the front steps.

Some of Arion’s lackies are cleaning it up, and I stay invisible as I move through the rubble and quickly change direction to the Van Helsing home. It doesn’t take me too long to race across the town.

Margie answers the door, and I edge by her as she peers around to see who just rang the doorbell.

She huffs out a breath before muttering, “Damn kids.”

I quickly shuffle up the stairs to where I can smell the Van Helsing’s blood.

When I push open the door and turn visible, Vance peers up at me, while sitting on the bench at the end of his bed. He’s holding an ice pack against the side of his face, and I glance over his shirt, seeing multiple stabs and nicks as blood pours from his many wounds.

“This is the part where you say something about how I should see the other guy,” I tell him, eyebrows up in shock.

I mean, he likes that shirt, and he’s bleeding all over it. And it has rips in it. How is he not having a tantrum?

“The other guy looks a lot better than me,” he bites out as he makes a pained sound and pushes to his feet.

“Since when is a vampire able to kick a Van Helsing’s ass after being underground for a century?” I ask, not really believing what I’m seeing as he hobbles toward some sort of silver container on his dresser.

“It’s like he knew every move I was going to make before I made it—”

“That’s more your thing than his, normally,” I decide to point out.

He glares over at me with the one eye he has that isn’t swollen shut, as he puts the ice pack down.

Shit, his face looks like hell.

He opens the silver container, and an incredible scent wafts through the room. When a perfectly round, reddish tinted orange is picked up and tossed to me, I scramble to catch it, juggling it, worried it’s about to turn to mush in my hands.

But it doesn’t. It’s firm and…perfect.

“Where the hell did you find this?” I ask him as I stare down in awe at the impossibly perfect Portocale orange.

“Arion tossed it to me like a prize after he threw me out of his house and told me to return with more gypsy respect. Then he said things were changing,” he grinds out.

He spits blood out of his mouth, and I consider stealing his orange. He’s had his ass thoroughly beaten, so it’s not like he’ll—

“Take the orange,” he tells me dismissively like he can read my head.

“I can’t be in debt to you,” I immediately growl.

“You’d be in debt to Arion. Not me.”

“Then hell no,” I say on a reluctant sigh as I toss the orange back to him.

“Or you can put yourself more in debt to the Portocale after you return it to her and ask her to gift it back,” he says as he tosses it back to me.

I pocket the orange with that, replaying the conversation about the oranges I had with Violet before coming here.

That secretive little gypsy.

“Violet mentioned prideless gypsies being drawn to those with their pride still intact, with the intent of making them fall.”

His gaze swings over to me as he shrugs. “Sounds like a Portocale.”

“She only knows what her mother told her,” I go on. “Her mother apparently never told her that the prideless are drawn to the prideful when the prideful have dirty little secrets.”

“This is not news. She’s packed full of secrets, one being the oranges,” he growls. “Arion is a much bigger concern at the moment, don’t you think?”

The note of sarcasm in his tone makes me think he believes that’s a rhetorical question.

“Arion is a Van Helsing problem. Not mine,” I remind him before vanishing from his sight.

“Don’t tell Emit he’s back yet. Leave that to me,” he says, looking around the room like he’s searching for a sign I’m still in here.