by W. J. May
For better or worse, the adopted siblings had been raised beneath a cemetery by an evil mastermind. They’d been to hell and back. Had braved death, torture, and what could only be described as a routine ‘loss of soul,’ since they were first toddling around the catacombs. Whatever the assignment, the sacrifice, the trial…. they could handle it.
Surely they could handle Thanksgiving as well.
Then the lyrics of a long-forgotten Phil Collins song drifted in from the porch. Sung in the lilting voices of a high soprano, and a booming bass.
“’Cause you’ll be in my heart! You’ll BE IN my heart!”
The voices choked off in laugher, gasping and reprimanding each other before having at it once more. Rae and the others locked eyes across the room.
“From this day on! Now and forever—NO! Gabriel! That’s where the monkey grabs him!”
Rae sank down in her chair and covered her face with her hands.
Correction: if there was one thing Cromfield taught you, it was how to compartmentalize.
The door burst open and brother and sister stumbled inside. They were clinging to each other for balance. Skin flushed, and eyes over-bright with intoxication. A virtual cloud of whiskey and vodka followed them in, and not only were they completely oblivious to the somber atmosphere but they seemed constantly on the verge of laughing.
“Sweetie?” Julian said tentatively, rising to his feet. “Are you—”
“JULES!”
The second she saw him, Angel flung her body carelessly through the air. Unfortunately, she was equally oblivious to the glass coffee table that lay in between them.
“Whoa! I got you.” He literally snatched her out of the air at the last second, cradling her against his chest as she gazed up at him with those hypnotic sapphire eyes. The eyes momentarily derailed him, and his lips curved up in a tender smile. “Hey there,” he brushed strands of long white hair out of her face. “Did someone discover the local pub?”
“Jules, we planted a flag.”
Both siblings burst out laughing once again, and Gabriel half-fell into the chair next to Rae, seemingly unable to stay standing for a moment longer. “Seriously, man, thanks for that!”
Julian’s smile froze on his face. “Thanks? What do you…” He trailed off with an air of resignation as Angel fished his credit card out of her pocket and slapped it back into his hand. “Oh. Right.”
“I found it when I was pilfering your wallet,” she shrugged innocently. “Honest mistake.”
Devon bit his lip and stared at the ground, while Julian took a steadying breath.
“Well, that’s…great, honey. I’m glad you two had some fun.”
“SO much fun!” she exclaimed. “They gave us a lifetime ban!”
“They banned you?” Julian repeated incredulously. “What for?”
Her face lit up with excitement. “Well, it’s actually—”
“—it’s actually a really uninteresting story you promised to take to your grave,” Gabriel interjected smoothly, flashing his sister a threatening grin. His golden hair spilled messily into his eyes as he tilted his head back against the chair. “And don’t worry about the card, Decker. We only used it for absolute emergencies.”
Angel nodded seriously. “Like bail.”
“Wait…WHAT?!”
“Not important now, buddy.” Devon clapped him sympathetically on the shoulder, pushing him back into his chair at the same time. “We called you guys because we actually have a serious problem. And we’re trying to figure out what to do.”
He turned to Rae, who took over with a nervous nod.
“The day after tomorrow is Thanksgiving.”
Gabriel and Angel stared at her with twin expressions. Both coming up blank. Finally, after a moment’s pause, a flicker of recognition flashed across Angel’s face.
“Like…the holiday?”
Molly shook her head sanctimoniously. “…left in the cave too long…”
“Yes, like the holiday,” Rae snapped, bringing them back on point. She turned to Gabriel with an accusatory stare. “I told you about this a week ago. I sent an invitation to your flat.”
“You mailed me a card you printed out at four in the morning with a turkey on it,” Gabriel said without an ounce of humor. “I thought it was a joke.”
Rae crossed her arms over her chest, feeling defensive. “How would that have been a joke?”
“I didn’t say I thought it was a very good joke.”
“How is it that you never fail to be absolutely infur—”
“The point is,” Devon intervened once again, “Rae invited her mother and Luke’s father to celebrate. They’ll be here the day after tomorrow.”
Angel shrugged, the vodka haze clouding his implication. “Okay, well, we’ll be on our best behavior. Won’t blow anything up, or act remotely like ourselves.” She sat up a bit straighter, tossing back her sheet of iridescent hair with a touch of impatience. “And for the record, you guys don’t have to give us this speech every time—”
“They’re coming here,” Gabriel interrupted, catching on. “To the house?”
Rae nodded, fighting back the automatic wave of panic.
His eyes clouded as he exchanged a quick look with Angel.
“Wait, you said your mom? The day after tomorrow—”
“Yes,” Rae interrupted, “which means we have a few options. We can gag my father and barricade the door so that no one goes down there. We can have Angel freeze him, although that would mean she’d have to touch his skin.”
“Hang on,” Gabriel held up his hand, “Rae—”
“We can bring him back out to the boathouse—although there’s a risk that people will want to park their cars out there. Not that I know how my mom is getting from here to the airport yet.”
“Seriously, Rae, wait—”
“Come to think of it, I don’t even know when her flight is coming in.”
“RAE!”
“WHAT, Gabriel?!” she shouted, the panic finally spilling over. “I don’t have time to wait! I just found out that my father is actually ALIVE, I’m keeping him tied up in my BASEMENT, and my freakin’ MOTHER is going to land on English soil at any moment! So, WHAT IS IT?!”
There was a strangled gasp and Rae’s eyes jumped immediately to the front door.
Beth slumped against the doorway, her silver purse slipping from her hands. Rae stared in horror as Gabriel turned white as a sheet.
“I was going to tell you who gave us a ride home…”
Chapter 11
Everything happened a lot faster after Gabriel spoke—before Rae could stop them.
For half a second her mother slumped against the doorway, looking for all the world like she was about to faint. The second after, she was a towering column of ice blue flames tearing through the mansion like a lioness on the prowl.
As Rae stared after her, palsied with momentary shock, a random memory flashed through her mind: the day she had gone in to the relator’s office to sign the papers for the house. The fact that, as if wishing could make it so, she had neglected to purchase the renter’s insurance that came with it. Two little words floated to the surface of her mind. Fire damage.
Then there was a scream from the lower hallway, and the words were replaced by two others.
Simon Kerrigan.
Then the war room sprang into action—tearing after her, Rae and her cheetah tatù leading the way. Only Gabriel and Angel stayed behind. One, feeling too guilty at having been too drunk to speak up earlier. The other, passed out on the couch.
It was the strangest game of ‘follow the breadcrumbs’ Rae had ever played. Instead of tracking down little notes or trails of ribbons, she and her friends followed the heat. The scorching, unrelenting heat of her mother’s rage, manifested into the glowing flames that clung to her.
She had just reached the door to the basement when they caught up with her. By this point, even her hair was burning with flames. It had begun to float around
her like a fiery cloud, scorching all it touched.
“Mom!” Rae called, skidding to a stop on the wooden floor. She took a halting step forward, then stopped again, her face crumbling in misery. “Mom, I’m so sorry. I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you.”
Beth ignored her.
Clearly focusing only on the problem at hand. And by the looks of things, it was a problem she intended to fix on the spot.
“He’s down there? Tied up?”
The questions fired out like bullets, each more deadly than the last.
“We found him in the cells beneath the old factory.” Rae’s voice dropped to a guilty whisper, trying to get out as many facts as she could. Every second she reasoned with her mother was another second she kept her father alive. “Devon, me, and a contingent of guards. At first, none of us believed it. Everyone—the world was so certain he was dead…”
“As he should be,” Beth snapped.
The flames curling around her showed no signs of abating. Quite the contrary, the longer she stood there the hotter they seemed to burn. It got to the point where the gang had to start squinting just to keep her in focus, hands raised to shield their eyes as they winced against the heat.
Rae alone stepped forward, angling between the fire and the door. It was the last place in the world she wanted to be, but was the only one who could stand and not get burned.
“Cromfield took him prisoner,” she continued in the same, soft monotone. “Locked him in a cell for almost fifteen years. I only—”
“Then for almost fifteen years we were safe,” Beth spat. “For almost fifteen years, the world got the rest and peace it deserved after having endured a man like Simon Kerrigan. You say it like it’s so much time, Rae. It doesn’t even begin to scratch the surface! He deserves lifetimes of imprisonment. A life sentence for every life he stole.” Her face twisted with bitterness. “And I don’t just mean the people he murdered; I’m talking about the other lives as well. The ones he broke, the ones he buried and stole. The ones he ruined beyond repair.”
The world around Rae swam as she stared at the flames through eyes full of tears. Behind her, the others were frozen in similar states of shock. Suddenly, despite all their talent and years of experience, they looked very much their young age.
Only Gabriel, who had caught up with them by now, was staring at Beth like he got her. Like she alone was the only one making sense of this whole thing. Like she knew exactly the correct reaction to Simon Kerrigan being alive.
“Then there are people who’d say that mere imprisonment isn’t enough.” Beth’s own voice was dangerously quiet, sending chills up her daughter’s spine. “That Simon deserves to die for what he did. That the world would be a better place. That everyone in it… would be safer.” Her eyes rested on Rae for a briefest of moments, before hardening ice blue. “And I’m one of them.”
Rae stared, shocked and unable to respond.
Beth reached for the door without another second’s pause, ready to finish what a fire had started all those years ago. Ready to end the infamous legacy of Simon Kerrigan once and for all.
Rae shifted to move to block her mother. Another memory raced through Rae’s mind. She had seen something like this before. In the old kitchen, at her old house, almost fifteen years ago.
When Simon came home that day, he had been in a rage. He’d just found out that his own wife had been working for the Privy Council against him, and he was determined, one way or another, to escalate things to their violent end.
He’d tried everything he could to bait her. Threats, screams, insults. Nothing worked. Beth kept her cool, kept her head. Angry, but controlling it. Even then, at the bitter end, fighting for the things she loved—not against them.
It wasn’t until he mentioned Rae that all of that changed.
Rae remembered it like it had happened yesterday. Like peering through a looking glass, a crystal-clear image shimmered before her eyes.
Beth had turned on a dime. The second she heard her daughter’s name.
One minute, she was a frustrated wife. Aggressive, but defensive. Not willing to take things to that next step. Then in that next minute? She was an enraged mother. Protective beyond belief. Enraged beyond belief. Willing to go to the next step and beyond if it meant keeping her daughter safe.
It was those protective instincts that Rae needed to call upon now. As counter-intuitive as it seemed, perhaps there was a way out of this that didn’t end in bloodshed.
“I can’t see that again.” Her voice broke halfway through, shuddering even as she tried to keep it strong. “I’ve seen this fight before, Mom. I can’t go through it again.”
No. She couldn’t watch her parents battle each other once more. She couldn’t watch the two of them fight to the bitter end.
But even more than that, she couldn’t let her mother go through that either. Beth had already buried this husband. Already lost enough of herself in the process. Rae couldn’t stand by now and let her kill the first man she’d ever loved.
Simon Kerrigan had taken enough from her. Rae wasn’t going to let him take that, too.
For the first time since stepping into the house, Beth’s face softened. Only fractionally. Hardly enough to be encouraging. Her hands lowered just half an inch, and the ice blue flames whipping around her began to lighten back to white around the edges.
“Sweetheart,” she spoke with strained patience, “it’s not safe for him to be here. It isn’t safe for him to be anywhere, let alone in the same house as you. I simply won’t allow it.” Her eyes flickered briefly over to Devon before narrowing with a silent accusation. “I’m surprised it was allowed at all.”
He bowed his head to his chest, staring depressingly at the floor.
“Now, whether you see it is entirely up to you. You can go up to your room, you can stand there by the door. But one way or another, Simon Kerrigan is not leaving this place alive.”
A cascade of shivers ran down Rae’s arms, but she held firm. “Do you hear yourself?” she asked incredulously. “You’re ‘sending me up to my room’ so that you can murder my dad! This isn’t okay—”
“He’s not your DAD!”
The word echoed through the hallway, coming back louder and louder every time.
Rae paused a moment. Stunning. Not my dad? Impossible. The mark on her back, her ability—
Beth cut off her train of thought as she glared at the basement door and then back to Rae. “A dad is a man who loves you. Who takes care of you. Who pretends to like your terrible artwork and takes you to dance class on the weekends. Your dad is a man who’s always there for you. Who puts himself second, so that he can put you first. A man who would never, ever do anything that could cause you pain. Or harm you.” Beth’s face twisted with the blackest kind of rage. “Simon Kerrigan is not that man.”
There was a muffled gasp from several feet below, and Rae felt suddenly sure that Simon himself had heard them. How could he not? The love of his life was screaming from the top the stairs.
“He’s not capable of that kind of love,” Beth continued, her voice both hard and somehow gentle at the same time. “He’s not capable of love at all.”
She was right. Was she right? At this point, did it matter?
Rae’s head was spinning with so many questions, her body was heavy with so many emotions, she felt like she couldn’t stand for a second more. There was a faint rustling sound, and the next second Devon was standing tall behind her, holding her discreetly against his chest.
“Beth,” he said quietly, “no one here is disputing that. Not a word of it. You’re absolutely right about every single part. We’re just saying—”
“Andrew would be ashamed.”
The words cracked like a whip between them and Devon pulled in a quick breath, flinching as if they caused him actual pain.
“He worked his whole life trying to keep Rae safe. Trying to protect her from the continuing ripple-effect of what that man had done. The continuing horrors he i
nflicted. And now you invited this abomination of a man himself into your house. Into Rae’s house.”
For one of the first times in his life, Devon seemed completely unable to speak. He just stood there, his face shadowed with a look of heartbreaking sadness.
“Mrs. C,” Julian began gently, trying his best to intercede for his friend, “he was just trying to say that, whatever Simon’s guilty of, the punishment shouldn’t be—”
“And you.” Beth’s eyes cooled as they fell upon yet another boy she thought of as a surrogate son. “You didn’t see this coming? Or are you not doing that anymore?”
He flinched back, stung, and fell quiet.
Molly didn’t know what to say either, and Luke didn’t seem to feel it was his place.
In the end, it was only Gabriel who was left to speak.
Rae watched as he stared first at his incapacitated friends—each one of them reduced to nothing by just a few choice words said by exactly the right person. Crippled by guilt. Crippled by doubt. Crippled by the dark belief that maybe Beth was right. Maybe a murderer’s life should end today.
Then he turned his eyes to Rae standing in the middle of it all.
Despite all her strength he believed she had, he had clearly never seen her so lost. Never seen her so utterly gutted by the scene in front of her. She’d seen one father die. She’d grown up believing her mother was dead as well. Her grandparents had been murdered. She’d lost friends, mentors, people she was supposed to have been able to trust. Just weeks ago, she’d put on a black dress and lowered into the ground the one person who had been like a parent to her since coming to Guilder.
And now… she was about to go through all of it again.
His muscles tensed in protest, and Rae could almost see the internal battle waging behind those lovely eyes. The desire to protect warring with the desire to kill. The purest kind of love against the darkest kind of revenge.
Then, with a silent breath, he turned his eyes to Beth.