It had been a long, difficult day. Samantha's struggles with running the burlesque had only increased by the humongous pile of paperwork that the other girls described as payroll. The one good thing about running the place was that often, she could get her work done in the morning and be out of there before the dancers arrived. She wasn't completely free of their judgmental gazes, but it was at least a start. Besides, she hardly enjoyed the rumors that spread about her appointment to manager. That she was sleeping with Nadya to get ahead â€" not true â€" or that she was sleeping with Nadya's brother to get ahead. The second was... not true, yet, though they had shared a bed on more than one occasion. So far, their advances hadn't gone further than innocent touches and sweet kisses on lips. While there may have been no merit to the nasty rumors spread about her, they certainly didn't make Samantha feel any more comfortable at her job. She would have loved to merely quit, but she'd promised Nadya that she would run the business the best she could. So she'd been locked up in her new office for the better part of the day attempting to understand how to do the payroll. It had taken her hours to complete the task, her head positively throbbing when she'd finally handed off the stack of checks to one of the faeries to distribute.

After that, she'd chosen that getting out of the burlesque for the rest of the day would be the best thing for herself. She'd stepped out of the brick building and into the sunlight, her fingers coming up to press into the bridge of her nose to settle herself. Even when the building wasn't in peak hours, the busyness of the crowd made her head ache, the weakness of her empath ability exploited by the sheer mass of employees. One day, she hoped, she would get used to her powers and the headaches would stop. For now, it was just a weakness. One that she tried, very desperately, to hide from the other girls in the hope that they wouldn't exploit it. It was bad enough that Aiden knew it, even if she knew he would never dare use it against her.

It wasn't a particularly long walk from the burlesque to the tiny apartment that she now shared with the ancient faerie boy who claimed to be the Crown Prince of Naples. In the tiny amount of time they'd lived together, Samantha had come to terms with the fact that his ancient status meant that there was no way he could be trusted to get a job any time soon. After all, the boy was still struggling to figure out how the shower worked. It made for amusing evenings in their tiny home, though the constant fight over which one of them should sleep on the small futon or the floor exhausted her. Since Nadya's efforts at destroying her furniture, Samantha had merely given up, taking her pillow and quilt and curling up on the floor. She'd lived on the streets before, anyway. It wasn't particularly comfortable, but it made Dorian shut up at least.

She'd just reached her apartment when the note hanging from the doorknob made her wince. What could it possibly be now? She paid her rent on time, they were mostly quiet. What had she done now that would add to the stress the young faerie girl surely felt today. Reluctantly, she reached out and took the paper, carefully unfolding it as she leaned against the wall outside her apartment. She wasn't sure exactly what she had been expecting. A notice of complaint? An eviction notice? But what she hadn't expected was the handwritten address, and instructions to come to the address at the first moment that she could. There was no signature, but there didn't need to be. The handwriting was distinctly Aiden's. It was easy for her to recognize, given that she'd seen it on notes he'd leave for her or paperwork she'd watched him do at the Ark. Samantha didn't bother letting Dorian â€" if he was back from one of those long walks he took in which he always ended up getting himself lost â€" know that she'd been at the apartment. Instead, she merely turned around, heading right back down the stairwell and toward the street.

It wasn't hard to find the address that Aiden had scrawled on the piece of paper, though Samantha was certainly confused when the address turned out to be an apartment building. Aiden lived at the Ark, as did the entirety of his pack, it made no sense for him to be here. Her eyebrows furrowed slightly, checking the address on the piece of paper to verify that she had it correct. Once she was positive that it was, in fact, correct, she opened the front door and headed to the specified apartment. The building was certainly nicer than her own, and for a moment she stood outside the door merely admiring the structure before finally, she raised her hand and knocked on the door.

Samantha Cassidy