by Anne Malcom
“What’s herpes?” she asked.
I smirked. Thorne, who had approached, obviously glared.
“It’s a sexually transmitted disease,” I explained. “That’s why you should always wear a condom. And don’t be easy. Unless they’re hot.”
“Isla,” Thorne snapped.
I gaped at him. “What? I’m trying to give bad advice here. I really can’t win today.” I let go of her backpack. “I may as well let her run forth and braid Stacy’s hair.”
“Do not do that, Lucille,” Thorne ordered, as the little thing looked like she was about to spring away.
She pouted and folded her arms. I really taught her well.
“Why did you kill her?” she asked, small voice too adult and too childlike at the same time.
“She was a traitor,” I said before Thorne could rush in and tell her not to worry about it. She was in the middle of this; it was better for her to survive with the ugly truth than die in blissful ignorance. “Plus, she’s the reason you keep sneaking out and going book shopping and demon hunting.”
“Book shopping?” Thorne repeated, voice low.
Oh yes, I was supposed to keep that a secret, her little book of prophecies and all things vampire.
Well, the cat was out of the bag, and now I’d shot it for good measure.
I sighed, too tired to lie to Thorne anymore. Wow, too tired to lie? I really needed a catnap if that was the case. “She snuck out—which wasn’t hard since our wretchedly departed wasn’t watching her, like at all—went to an occult bookshop and got a little light reading on vampires,” I said cheerfully. “It just happened to tell Ambrogio’s little tale.” I eyed Thorne’s accusing glare. “I know what you’re going to say. I should’ve said this earlier, blah, blah, blah.” I gave him a look. “And I’ve got one thing to say to that. Shoulda woulda coulda. What’s done is done.” I shrugged.
He did not like that.
But someone else was pissed at me, and though she was much smaller and much more ridiculous, she commanded my attention with a glare.
“Isla,” she accused, her little voice sad and hurt, like I’d betrayed some big secret of hers.
“What?” I snapped, not even looking her way, rather looking at Thorne glancing between the two of us with an appraising eye. I could tell he was deciding on whether to be pissed or amused.
“You promised you wouldn’t tell anyone,” she whined.
I rolled my eyes, not even flinching at the hurt in the little creature’s voice. “Well of course I did. You wouldn’t have told me otherwise.” I moved my eyes to hers, which were, like her voice, swimming with hurt. They glistened with unshed tears and that annoyed me. Not as much as the real tears would have, but still enough.
“Kid, you’ve got to let go of that pesky trust situation you’ve got going on if you’re actually going to live in this world,” I told her firmly. “Otherwise you’ll die in it. The fact that you haven’t already surprises me immensely, but I wouldn’t tempt fate by continuing to put your trust into anyone but those you share blood with.” I flicked my gaze to Thorne, and then my mind went to my own bloodline. “Even then, I wouldn’t recommend trusting them. Greek tragedies exist within families for a reason. Because they’re the ones who are easiest to murder. So don’t even trust him.” I nodded to Thorne. “Trust me.”
She blinked at me, her tears a memory. Children were able to banish sorrow in such a way that it might destroy them one minute and be nothing the next.
I used to be able to do that too.
It pissed me right off that I couldn’t.
“I can, though, right? Trust you? Even if I can’t trust Thorne?” She screwed her nose up in a teasing gesture.
He narrowed his eyes at me in a ‘look what you’ve done’ kind of stare. I winked at him, then turned my attention to the head of curls.
I smiled at her, showing fang. “Of course you can trust me.”
She smiled back, abruptly forgetting the touching rule and attaching herself to my leg. It seemed to be her habit, which I was hating.
“I knew I could,” she cried, her voice muffled.
I detached her with as much delicacy as I could muster. “Wrong,” I muttered in distaste, checking my outfit to make sure there were no sticky handprints marring it. Satisfied, I moved my glare. “You little nitwit. I’m the last person you should trust. Vampire, remember?” I pointed to my chest. “That was a test, and you failed.”
She beamed, not at all like the grin of a child standing mere feet away from a dead body. “But you’re Thorne’s vampire,” she clarified. “You guys are pretty much married. So that pretty much makes you my—”
“If you say the word ‘sister,’ I’m ripping those pom-poms from your head, with your hair still attached,” I hissed, my voice venom.
Her smile didn’t waver. Instead she winked at Thorne, who had his arms crossed and was deciding to be amused. Now was when I could’ve used the fury he’d roused for the dead body.
“When are you going to marry Isla?” she asked. “I think she would make a beautiful bride.”
“Of course I would,” I snapped before Thorne would have to answer and potentially make things awkward. “But I’m always beautiful. I don’t need a gown, a diamond and a cake to tell me that. In fact, I don’t need a wedding for a gown, diamond or cake. We’re all feminists here, squirt. We don’t have to be chained to patriarchy with weddings or having to be someone’s wife. If anything, be somebody’s murderer, not wife, okay?”
She was nodding enthusiastically as another body entered the clearing.
Thorne and I were both poised to attack. I shoved the little critter behind me just in case she got any ideas about fighting if the new arrival turned out to be foe. I relaxed when I recognized the form coming toward us.
Thorne did not. There was not a time when the dude was relaxed these days. Especially with the whole no-sex thing and then the whole ‘baby’ blowup. We were pretending things were okay, but I had the feeling they were not.
“Thorne, there you are. We’ve got a problem—” Chace jogged into the clearing, cutting himself off when he saw the body in the middle of it.
“No shit, we’ve got a problem,” Thorne thundered, cutting his eyes from Chace to me.
I looked down to the ground. “Can I not commit a murder in peace in this godforsaken wilderness?” I asked Hades.
Obviously, Hades was looking the other way, sleeping on the job.
Then I glanced up to Chance, who was gaping at Stacy’s body and then me. “You did this?”
“Who else did you expect?” I asked impatiently. “The man with the moral compass?” I nodded to Thorne. “Or the miniature human who is somehow still alive despite fatal stupidity?” I nodded to the small twit, who’d emerged from behind me now that there was no threat. She grinned at Chace. He winked at her.
Chace didn’t have any fury painting his face like I would’ve expected when he found out I’d murdered one of his gang. Then again, he liked me. People tended to overlook my shortcomings—like tendency to murder—when they liked me.
“Dude, what’d she do?” he asked, glancing from me to the corpse again. He folded his arms, smirking slightly. “Did she hit on Thorne?”
I laughed. “No, I wouldn’t kill her for that. Jealousy is an ugly emotion, Chace,” I tutted. “Plus, I’d hope if Thorne did cheat on me, it’d be with someone with much better hair.” I glanced over to the aforementioned bad hair, shuddering. “And if he did cheat on me, and the woman had great hair, I’d compliment him on his choice before cutting off his manhood and making him eat it.” I glanced down at Lucille. “That’s what you do with men who think they can betray you. Take notes.”
More nodding of pom-poms.
“She was working with the enemy,” Thorne clipped, obviously not liking the talk of cutting off manhood, or recommending his sister do it.
“No shit?” Chace asked, not seeming surprised in the least.
Thorne nodded once. �
��Scott found the information and gave it to Isla, who then took it upon herself to murder her without giving her a fair trial,” he explained, voice tight and yet again full of accusation.
“Have you still not gotten over that? It’s been like ten minutes,” I sighed, then rolled my eyes. “I was saving time. We’re in kind of a crunch at the moment, in case you hadn’t noticed?”
Thorne gritted his teeth. I was worried for his jaw with the amount of clenching and gritting it was doing. “Well, my team will notice Stacy’s absence, and I will say they won’t be happy to hear that you’ve murdered her,” he clipped.
I pouted. ”And I was expecting thank-you notes.”
Thorne looked like he was about to blow up again, but Chace cut in.
“Dude, we’ve got a bigger problem than that right now.” He paused. “And honestly, no one is really going to miss Stacy. She was kind of a bitch.”
I beamed at Chace. “I’m so glad I didn’t kill you when we first met.”
He flashed pearly whites back at me. “You and me both, vamp.”
“The bigger problem?” Thorne demanded.
Chace turned his attention back to his cranky leader. “Alexus is here,” he said. “They were attacked. And he’s pissed.”
I sighed. “No chance you’d let me murder him too?” I asked Thorne hopefully.
“I didn’t let you murder Stacy,” he bit out. “You did it without my knowledge, before I could stop you.”
I shrugged. “Well, can I murder Alexus before you can stop me without your knowledge?” I asked again, still hopefully.
Chace glanced to me uneasily. “He’s actually here to demand your death.”
I grinned. “Of course he is.”
“They decimated half our fucking faction!” Alexus yelled, cheeks red and eyeballs bulging as he paced the room we’d found him in.
We’d dropped off the twit with a more suitable guardian than the vampire who’d just killed her previous babysitter. Duncan’s kind-of girlfriend. She said she was going to teach her how to throw knives, using Duncan for practice. I was so jealous. And I think the female slayer was really starting to like me now. She didn’t even throw a knife at me. Progress.
And then we’d gone to the newly built meeting room—the slayers had a lot of unplanned renovations since the battle that took out a big chunk of their numbers. I was the reason it didn’t kill them all. I hadn’t gotten any thank-you notes for that either.
It was rather full with humans, most I recognized. They either smirked at me and gave me the odd fist bump, or glared and muttered insults under their breath. I smiled at everyone, because I was nice like that.
Thorne had glared in warning at every single human who’d insulted me. He’d made sure to rule with an iron fist in regard to my presence. It was a ‘like it or lump it’ type situation, which was actually working since no one had even attempted to kill me. Even No Neck.
And I’d cut his eye out.
Thorne was a pretty badass and scary leader.
There were a lot of unfamiliar slayers too, and every single one of them glared at me in hatred. They were the worse for wear, covered in cuts, bruises, broken bones.
Alexus was in the middle of it all, and Chace was correct, homie was pissed.
He hadn’t even said hello, just started screaming at me the moment I’d walked in. “This is all your fault! Filthy bloodsucking whore!”
Silver’d had to hold him back when he lunged at me.
“So nice to see you too,” I replied, sitting down casually at the head of the table in what was the working war room. I’d carved my name into the wood of the chair, and no one else ever sat in it. Half of them because they knew I’d break a leg for doing so, the other half because they hated me so much that they wouldn’t touch their butts to a space where my glorious ass had rested. Their loss.
I glanced at Alexus, who was struggling against Silver, his attire and general appearance decidedly more rumpled than the last time I’d seen him. “So what’s new?”
He hadn’t liked that. And Thorne hadn’t liked the ‘whore’ comment, nor the lunging at me part of the equation.
So of course, a lot of swearing and threats had ensued. It was wildly entertaining.
Alexus finally calmed down enough to be let go, shrugging out of Silver’s arms with a feral stare. Thorne was standing in front of him, eyes hard, body wired.
“You need to remember you’re in my place now,” Thorne gritted out. “You show me respect. Moreover, you show Isla some fucking respect. Or I’ll throw you the fuck out.”
Alexus’s eyes flared even wider than before. I wondered if they would pop out of his head. I wished I had popcorn.
“Respect the vampire who is responsible for me losing friends, brothers, sisters?” he hissed.
I held up my hands. “I was not anywhere near that,” I cut in, “so don’t even try to pin that on me. I’ve been kind of busy with the rebellion trying to enslave humanity. Plus, everyone knows I would never willingly go to Oklahoma, even to kill the man who is super rude to my boyfriend.” I narrowed my eyes in warning. “And of course they—even without knowing who ‘they’ are—decimated half your faction. It’d be like shooting fish in a barrel at that clusterfuck you call a compound,” I finished mildly.
His neck reddened even more, and his hate-filled gaze zeroed in on me. Silver tensed as if he were about to hold him back again. Thorne was in front of me in a second.
“You even think about going for her with that knife you’ve hidden in your boot, it’s the end of your entire bloodline,” he promised. “Sit the fuck down and explain the reason why you have disrespected me and my woman. I understand the explanation, I might be kind, let you walk out of here.” His voice was pure iron, a promise of extreme violence.
It was hot as fuck.
There was a tense moment as Alexus toyed with the idea of battle. I could taste it in the air. He’d brought enough men with him to make it fun, even injured as they were. And I was sure No Neck would flip like a crêpe if it came to that. He was smirking in the corner, watching it all go down with satisfaction. It was safe to say he had never been my biggest fan.
I was surprised he wasn’t the one Scott found to be the traitor. Though, there was still time. I mentally added a background check for No Neck to my to-do list.
The air lightened a fraction as Alexus swore and sat down, glaring at me, laying his hands flat on the table as if to show he wasn’t hiding any weapons.
Thorne continued to stand, eying him for a long moment before coming to stand behind me, hand grasping the nape of my neck in a clear gesture of possession. Normally I’d hate that kind of thing, but it was to make a very violent point, and I dug that. It also pissed off the slayer douche, which was also awesome.
“Start talking,” Thorne bit out.
Alexus gave me one more death stare before he sucked in a breath and did as he was told. “Vamps came in, took out half our men—precisely half—in less than ten minutes,” he gritted out, his cheeks reddening to the point of purple.
“That’s embarrassing,” I muttered.
Thorne squeezed my neck in warning.
I got another withering glare before Alexus continued. The men around him moved in agitation, but Chace and Silver rested their hands on the knives at their belts in warning. Ah, it was good to have friends willing to battle with members of their own ancient race for me.
“It was planned,” Alexus continued, voice rough and bulging with rage. Much like his neck. “Meticulously. There were too many to even wound, let alone win against. He was sending a message. Leaving half of us,” he spat. “Sent me here to relay it to you, in fact.” His eyes fastened on Thorne.
I heard Thorne’s swift intake of breath, tasted the way his emotions changed, how the air around him changed.
“Has this almighty he ever heard of a little thing called email?” I cut in, trying to chase away the incoming truth. “Works a treat, and it’s a lot less bloody.”
“He wants her,” Alexus hissed, jerking his eyes from Thorne to me. “Or he will wipe us off the face of the earth. And I don’t doubt he has the power, the intel to do that. He needed inside information to know the shit he knew to get inside.” His eyes zeroed in on me in accusation.
My heart had begun thundering against my chest as I put together the truth from Alexus’s hate-filled words. I could no longer chase it away with sarcasm. Not even a nuclear bomb would destroy this truth.
Thorne’s grip on my neck told me he was getting it too. He seemed to have forgotten that I was a pinch more delicate than previously, so the bones in my neck were beginning to protest at his grip. Not that I was going to say anything; I needed the pain to anchor me in that moment.
“‘Tell mon ange that she needs to come to me, or every single slayer will die the most horrible death, down to every child.’ That’s what he told me to tell you,” he spat at Thorne.
Razorblades cut at my stomach.
Jonathan.
How had I been so dense as to be carrying on like this wasn’t coming? I had known. Every day was tainted with the truth I’d been avoiding. Knowing he was going to come for me, for everyone I’d liked enough not to kill or maim. He was going to do it in the most cruel and underhanded of ways.
My mind went to the little girl with the backpack. The toothless smile. The fearlessness bordering on stupidity.
Down to every child.
He knew. He fucking knew about my attachment to her. He’d had Stacy for that precise reason. I didn’t know how he got to her, just knew that he did. And he was taunting me with what he could do.
My mother’s malice was tattooed all over this. Her old tactics on a grander scale. And now she didn’t need my brothers to carry out the threats. She had a whole fucking army. A senseless and fearless army that answered only to their ‘fathers’ and would literally die carrying out the simplest of orders.