by J. R. Ward
In the center of the circular space, there was a tremendous round table, the marble top of which was ... a bit of a shock.
It was covered with open volumes.
Glancing up at the shelves, he saw slots in the endless lineup of tomes. About twenty of them.
As a warning sounded at the base of his skull, he kept his hands in his pockets and leaned in, tracing the verbiage that was exposed ...
"Oh, Jesus..."
Succession.
His father was researching the laws of succession.
Saxton lifted his head toward the voices. They were louder now that he was in this room, although still muffled by another set of closed doors across the way.
Whatever meeting was taking place was in his father's private study.
Highly unusual. The male never let anyone in there--didn't even permit clients to come to the house.
This was serious--and Saxton wasn't stupid. There was a cabal against Wrath in the glymera, and obviously, his father was involved.
No reason for anyone to care about the next generation of King if they weren't trying to target the current one.
He walked around the table, locking eyes on each open page. The more he saw, the more concerned he became.
"Oh ... shit," he muttered in a rare curse.
This was bad. Very bad--
The sound of a door opening in the study energized him. Jogging on the balls of his loafers, he scooted back into the ladies' parlor and reclosed the panels silently behind himself.
He was facing the John Singer Sargent over the fireplace when the butler called his name about two minutes later.
"He will see you now."
No reason to throw a thank-you out. He just followed in the wake of the doggen's disapproval--and braced himself for more of the same from his father.
Usually, he hated coming here.
But not tonight. No, tonight, he had a far greater purpose than thwarting what was no doubt going to be yet another of his father's attempts to shame him into going straight.
Purrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.
Trez frowned at the sound. Cracking one eye open, he found his brother standing over his bed, Boo the black cat in the male's arms, an expression of disapproval narrowing those icy eyes.
His brother's, not the cat's.
"Are you spending another night on your ass," iAm bit out.
Not a question, so why bother throwing out an answer.
Groaning as he sat up, Trez had to brace his arms to keep his torso vertical. Apparently, while he'd been out of it, the world had turned into a hula hoop and the planet was going around and around his neck.
Losing the fight, he flopped back down.
As his brother kept standing there, he knew that this was the siren call back to reality. And he wanted to answer it, he really did. His body, however, was out of gas.
"When was the last time you fed?" iAm demanded.
He shifted his eyes over and dodged the question. "Since when are you an animal lover?"
"I hate this goddamn cat."
"I can tell."
"Answer me."
The fact that he couldn't even think of when he'd ... nope, total blank.
"I'll send someone," iAm muttered. "And then you and I are going to talk."
"Let's talk now."
"Why, so you can pretend you didn't hear it right later?"
Well, there was a thought. "No."
"They're going after our father and mother."
Trez sat up again, and this time he didn't need any extra help. Shit. He should have expected this from the s'Hisbe, but ...
"How."
"How do you think?" His brother shifted his gentle scratching from the black cat's ears to under its chin. "They're going to start with her."
He rubbed his face. "Jesus Christ. I didn't expect the high priest would be so--"
"It wasn't him. Nah. He was the second person who came to see me last night."
"What time is it?" Although the fact that he could see out the windows into the night at least partially answered that one. "Why didn't you wake me up when you got home?"
"I tried. Three times. I was going to send for a crash cart if you didn't come around on this trip."
"So what did the high priest say?"
"s'Ex is the one we have to worry about."
Trez dropped his hands. Staring up at his brother, he knew he must have heard that wrong. "I'm sorry, who?"
"Not the kind of name I need to repeat, is it?"
"Oh, God." What the hell was the queen's enforcer doing paying a visit to his brother? Then again ... "They're really upping the ante, aren't they."
iAm sat on the edge of the bed, his weight causing the mattress to shift. "We are at the impasse, Trez. No more pretending, no more persuasion. They've used the carrot; now they're going to use the stick."
As Trez thought of his parents, he could barely picture their faces. The last time he'd seen them had been ... well, there was another thing he couldn't remember. What was crystal clear, though? The quarters they lived in. Marble everything. Gold fixtures. Silk rugs. Servants everywhere. Jewels hanging from lamps to create a sparkle effect.
They hadn't started out like that--and that was another thing he could picture: He'd been born in a modest two-bedroom flat in the far corner of court--nice enough by normal standards.
Nothing close to what they'd gotten when they'd sold his future.
And after that? While they'd upgraded to the best of the best? He'd been sent to be raised by the queen's staff, alone in a white room. It hadn't been until he'd refused to eat or drink for nights upon nights that iAm had been sent to him.
And that was how their dysfunction had started.
Ever since then? Somehow, iAm had become the one responsible for keeping him going.
"Do you remember when we saw them last?" he heard himself say.
"At that party. You know, for the queen."
"Oh ... that's right." Their parents had been sitting with the queen's Primaries, as they were called. Front and center. Smiling.
They hadn't acknowledged him or iAm when they'd come in, but that was not unusual. Once sold, he had become the queen's. And once drafted into service to smooth things over, iAm was no longer theirs, either.
"They never looked back, did they," Trez murmured. "I'm just a commodity to them. And, man, they got a good price."
iAm stayed silent, as was his way. He just sat there, stroking that cat.
"How much time do I have?" Trez asked.
"You have to go tonight." Dark eyes shifted over. "Like now."
"And if I don't..." There was no reason to answer that, and iAm didn't bother: If he didn't get out of bed and turn himself in, his parents were going to be slaughtered. Or worse.
Probably much worse.
"They're such a part of the system," he said. "Those two really got what they wanted."
"So you're not going."
Once he set foot back within the Territory, he was never going to see the outside world again. The queen's guard was going to shut him in that maze of corridors, lock him up so that he was the male equivalent of a harem, separate him even from his brother.
And meanwhile, his parents would live on, uncaring.
"She looked at me," he muttered. "That night of the party. Her eyes went to mine--and she gave me this secret little smile of superiority. Like she'd made all the right moves, and the added benefit had been that she hadn't had to deal with me. What the fuck kind of mother does that?"
"So you're going to let them die."
"No."
"So you're going back."
"No."
iAm shook his head. "It's binary, Trez. I know you're pissed off at them, at the queen, at a hundred thousand things. But we've reached the crossroads, and there are only two options. You've really got to understand that--and I'll go back with you."
"No, you'll stay here." As his muddled head tried to wrap itself around the variables,
his brain was all fizzle, no flash. "Besides, I'm not going."
Shit, he needed to feed before he tried to deal with this.
"Fuck, that human blood is for crap," he mumbled, rubbing his temples like maybe the friction could jump-start his IQ. "You know what? I really can't talk about this right now--and I'm not being an asshole. I literally can't think."
"I'll send someone." iAm got up and went to the door that separated their suites. "And then you need to make your mind up. You've got two hours."
"Will you hate me," he blurted.
"About them?"
"Yeah."
It was a long while before he got an answer. And the cat stopped purring, iAm's hand stilling at that throat.
"I don't know."
Trez nodded. "Fair enough."
The door was shut and his brother well on his way when Trez's brain coughed up a hey-wait.
"Not Selena," he called out. "iAm! Yo! Not Selena!"
He did not trust himself with her on a good night--the last thing he needed was to get close to her right now.
TWENTY-SEVEN
As Wrath knocked on the door in front of him, he didn't know what the fuck he was doing. Maybe he'd luck out and there'd be no answer.
He needed more time before doing something like this--
Denied. Things opened up and a deep voice said, "Hey. What's doing?"
As he tried to think of an answer to that, he closed his eyes behind his wraparounds. "Z..."
"Yeah. Hey." The brother cleared his throat. Which really drove home the silence thing. "Yeah. So. What's up?"
Abruptly, like the universe was sending him a shot in the nuts, a young's cry rippled out. "Ah, listen, I was just getting her up. You mind?"
Wrath dragged a hand through his hair. "No, no, yeah, it's cool."
"You want me to come to your office afterward?"
He wondered what the room looked like, and painted the space according to what his Beth had said was in it. Cluttered, he thought. Homey. Cheerful.
Pink.
Nothing that Z would have been caught dead in before he'd met Bella.
"Wrath? What's going on here?"
"You mind if I come in?"
"Ah ... sure. Yeah, I mean, Bella's working out so we've got some privacy. But you're going to want to--"
Chhheeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeep!
"--watch where you step."
Wrath lifted up his shitkicker and whatever toy he'd crushed reinflated with a wheeze. "Fuck, did I break it?"
"I think it's a dog toy, actually. Yeah, I'm pretty sure she picked it up from George downstairs. You want it back?"
"He's got plenty. She can have it."
As he shut the door, he was painfully aware that they were each talking about their young--only Wrath's had four paws and a tail.
Least he didn't have to worry about George succeeding him or being blind.
Z's voice came from deeper in the room. "You can sit on the foot of the bed if you go fifteen feet straight ahead of you."
"Thanks."
He didn't particularly want to park it, but if he stayed standing, he was going to want to pace and it wouldn't be long before he tripped over something that wasn't a toy.
Over in the corner, Z spoke softly to his daughter, the words rolling into some kind of rhythm like he was talking through a song. In reply, there were all kinds of cooing.
And then came something that sounded terrifyingly clear: "Dada."
Wrath winced behind his wraparounds, and figured he might as well get this over with. "Beth wants me to talk to you."
"About?"
As he imagined the Z he knew so well, he pictured the brother he'd been convinced was going to implode and take out half a dozen of them with him: skull trim, scarred face, eyes that had been black and opaque as a shark's until Bella had come. Then they had gone yellow--at least as long as he wasn't pissed off, and that didn't happen anymore unless he was out in the field.
Big turnaround.
"Are you holding her?" Wrath asked.
There was a pause. "As soon as I get this bow tied in the back--hold on, girlie. Okay, up you go. She's in a pink dress that Cormia made her by hand. I hate pink. I like it on her, though--but keep that to yourself."
Wrath flexed his hands. "What's it like?"
"Not totally hating pink? Pretty fuck--ehrm, frickin' emasculating."
"Yeah."
"Do not tell me Lassiter's been metrosexualizing even you. I heard he talked Manello into going for a pedicure with him--but I'm praying that's just gossip."
It was hard to ignore how easily the brother was talking. Like normal, really. Then again, he had his family, his shellan was safe, and he'd been disappearing into the basement with Mary on a regular basis for how long now?
Nobody knew precisely what they talked about down there. But everyone could guess.
"Actually, I don't know why I'm here," Wrath said roughly.
Liar.
Footfalls came forward, and then there was a regular creaking, like the male had taken a seat in a rocking chair and was going back and forth. Apparently, Nalla liked whatever positioning had occurred, the young doing more of that cooing.
A soft squeaking suggested Z had picked up another toy and was keeping her occupied.
"This about Beth spending time with Layla?"
"Am I the only person who didn't know?"
"You don't leave your office much."
"One more reason not to want to have a kid."
"So it's true."
Wrath bowed his head and wished his vision was working so he could pretend to inspect something. The bedspread. His boots. A watch.
"Yeah, Beth wants one." He shook his head. "I mean, how did you do it? Getting Bella pregnant--you must have been terrified at the idea."
"There was no planning involved. She went into her needing, and when push came to shrug ... I mean, I had the drugs. I begged her to let me take care of her that way. In the end, though, I did what a male does to see his female through it. The pregnancy was rough, but the birth scared me more than anything I've ever been through in my life."
And considering the guy had been a sex slave for how long? That was saying something.
"Afterward," Z said slowly, "I didn't sleep for a good forty-eight hours. It took that long for me to be convinced Bella wasn't going to bleed out and Nalla was alive and going to stay that way. Hell, maybe it was more like a week."
"Was it worth it?"
There was a long quiet, and Wrath was willing to bet his left nut the brother was staring at his daughter's face. "I can say yes because they both survived. If that hadn't been the case? My answer would be different--even as much as I love my daughter. Whatever, like all bonded males, Bella is the one I focus on before everything, even including my young."
Wrath popped the knuckles of one fist. Went to work on the other hand. "I think Beth was hoping you'd change my mind."
"I can't do that. No one can--it's the hard wiring of the bonded male. The one you really need to talk to is Tohr. I fell into this--and I am the luckiest bastard on the face of the planet that it happened to work. Tohr, on the other hand, he chose it. He somehow had the balls to roll the dice--even knowing the risks. And then his Wellsie died anyway."
Abruptly, Wrath remembered going down to the training center's office, looking for the fighter with all of the Brotherhood behind him. He had found Tohr sitting with John, a phone up to the brother's ear, an aura of desperation marking everything from his pale face to the grip he'd had on that receiver to the way his expression had frozen as he'd looked up to find them all there, in the doorway.
Jesus Christ, it was fresh as if it had happened yesterday. Even though in the intervening time, Tohr had mated Autumn and moved on, to the extent that any male would be able to.
Wrath shook his head. "I don't know if I can go there with the brother."
Cue another long stretch of quiet, as if maybe Z were thinking of that night, too. But then Zsadist said soft
ly, "He's your brother. If he'd do it for anyone ... it would be for you."
The minute Beth walked into the mansion's magnificent foyer, she stopped dead in her tracks.
At first, she couldn't put a name to the splintered pile of wood that was on its side under the billiard's room archway. But then the ragged green skin gave it away: It was the pool table. Looking like someone had had at it with a chain saw.
Going over, she peered in and felt her jaw unhinge.
Everything was trashed. From the sofas to the light fixtures, the TV to the bar.
"He's okay," a male voice said from behind her.
Wheeling around, she looked up into Z's yellow eyes. In the Brother's arms, Nalla was dressed in a darling pink dress with an empire waist and a flaring skirt she was going to grow into in a couple months. Talk about the cuteness. Little white Mary Janes flashed on her feet, and an off-center white bow tied back her multicolored curls.
Her eyes were yellow, just like her dad's, but her smile was all Bella, wide-open, trusting, and friendly.
God, it hurt to see them. Especially as she knew the cause of the destruction in that other room.
"He called me," she said.
"That why you came home?"
"I was going to anyway."
Z nodded. "Good. Last night was a thing."
"Clearly." She glanced over her shoulder. "How did he..."
"Stop? Lassiter darted him. He went down like a stone and had a good, long nap."
"That wasn't what I was going to ask, but ... yeah." She rubbed her cold hands together. "Ah, do you know where he is?"
"He told me you asked him to talk to me."
As she stared across at Z, she thought of meeting him for the first time. God, he'd been terrifying--and not just because of the scar. He'd had a glacial glare back then, as well as the kind of deadly focus that had gone straight into the center of her chest.
Now? He was like a brother to her ... except when it came to Wrath. Wrath would always come first for him.
It was true for all the Brothers. And considering what Wrath had done to the game room, that was not a bad thing.
"I thought maybe it would help." God, that seemed lame. "What I mean is--"
"He's gone to find Tohr."
Beth closed her eyes. After a moment, she said, "I don't want any of this, you know. Just so we're clear."
"I believe that. And I don't want this for the two of you, either."
"Maybe we'll figure it out." As she turned to the stairs, a wave of exhaustion hit her like a ton of bricks. "Listen, if you see him ... tell him I've gone up to have a shower. It was a long day for me, too."