He never threatens. He never lies. He fixes the vending machine. And he is the most dangerous thing that has ever walked into her hospital.
Three weeks after deposing a vampire queen, ER nurse Catherine Anderson has eight bonds in her chest, a boyfriend older than the city of Chicago, and a supernatural underworld that keeps asking her to sign things.
Then the Unseelie Court arrives. They do not attack. They apply for a job.
Mr. Wendell Grieve presents himself at County General with impeccable credentials, a laminated badge, and a title: Director of Patient Experience. He is fae. He is technically Catherine's boss. On his first day he fixes a vending machine that has been stealing from the night shift since 2019, and by ten o'clock the whole department adores him.
Everything he offers is something Catherine actually wants. Protection for the people bonded to her. Legal standing for the shifters, who have never had any. Funding for an emergency room running on bake sales. He asks for nothing but the right to ask.
Every clause is true. Every clause is a hinge.
Because Grieve is the first person to correctly identify the thing everyone who loves Catherine already knows and nobody will say out loud: she cannot refuse anyone. She never could. And a man who only ever asks nicely does not need to take a single thing from a woman who has never once learned how to say no.
Code Black is the second book in the Coven General series, a paranormal romantic comedy with a found family of disastrous immortals, a grumpy vampire who is trying very hard to do this right, and a heroine whose greatest weakness is that she is kind. Closed door, guaranteed happily ever after, and the worst group chat in Chicago.
Let's see what's bleeding.
