Shadow of Thorns (Midnight's Crown Book 2)

by Ripley Proserpina

  “They’re hunting,” Marcus said, picking up her backpack where it sat by the door. “Are you ready?”

  Briar nodded. “You don’t need to go with them?”

  “No,” he answered, frowning. His face cleared when he saw her concern. “I’m good, Briar. I took care of it a few days ago. Don’t forget your hat.”

  She settled it on her head and pulled on her gloves. Her phone would chirp reminders to her to keep her gloves and hat on, just in case she took them off in class and forgot to put them on before she left. Usually, she was very careful, but there were times when life overwhelmed her and she did stupid things.

  Marcus opened the door, and for the first time, Briar got a look at the weather. Heavy, gray clouds and a wintry breeze made it the perfect day for her.

  Together, she and Marcus walked silently to the curb. He stayed with her, one hand on her elbow, while he juggled her bag, his bag, and keys. Somehow, he managed all of it gracefully, even while opening the door for her. A gentleman to the bone, and despite her repeated attempts in the past to carry her own bag, Marcus insisted upon it.

  She slid into the front seat, watching as he jogged past the front of the car to the driver’s side. As he passed the bumper, he glanced at her and gifted her with a smile. His green eyes sparkled, and butterflies went to fluttering.

  He jumped into the car and immediately turned on the heater, holding his hands in front of the vents to feel the air. Briar shivered and pulled the collar of her jacket over her neck. “Why don’t you wait until the car warms up before you turn on the heat?” she asked.

  Marcus flashed a grin. “You’ve been talking to Hudson, haven’t you? Did he tell you to ask that?”

  Slouching in the seat, she rolled her eyes. She’d been had. The last time she’d driven with Hudson, they’d been halfway to BC before he turned on the heat, and she’d remarked on it. Comparing what he did to Marcus. Hudson’s answer had been a cheeky grin and the words, “Ask Marcus why.” She should have smelled a rat.

  “I’m not going to be the innocent victim in this game of who’s right,” she said but leaned over to give him a quick smack of a kiss on his cheek. “You two are incorrigible.”

  Marcus threw his head back and laughed, the smooth brown column of his throat drew her eye. Her fingers wanted to trace his skin, touch the angle of his jaw, but she curled them into her lap. She couldn’t hang all over them, as much as she may want to.

  Marcus glanced at her and then away as they turned off of Beacon Street. He merged into traffic effortlessly, but his hands gripped the steering wheel tighter. His knuckles turned white, and the leather creaked beneath his hands.

  “So.” He cleared his throat. “About this morning. I wanted to talk to you.”

  She knew something was coming, but this wasn’t what she expected. Rapidly, she went over the events in her mind. “What happened this morning?” she asked, giving up.

  “You weren’t feeling well, and we were all on you about it. About taking care of yourself.”

  Briar waved aside the concern. “I know you care about me, and you outnumber me, like you said. It doesn’t bother me. I like that you look out for me.”

  “No.” He peered at her before shaking his head. “No. That’s not what I meant. I meant the part about boyfriends.”

  “Oh!” Briar curled her leg beneath her, angling her body toward him completely. This was what she’d wondered about. She wanted to hear what he had to say and didn’t want to miss it. What would he call himself?

  “I didn’t want you to think, because I couldn’t define what we were, that you weren’t important to me. I’ll call myself whatever you want.” Honesty rang in every word he uttered.

  Barely containing her groan, Briar dropped her head in her hands. “I was hoping you would define it,” she mumbled. “Boyfriend doesn’t sound right. I wondered how you thought of me.”

  Marcus smiled. She looked up at him from beneath her eyelashes. He didn’t seem upset, but amused. “I know,” he replied. “It doesn’t sound big enough.”

  “Suitor?” she asked. “Consort? Beau?”

  “Your beau?” he asked. “You want to call me your beau?”

  “I am from the south,” she answered, laying her accent on thick. “But in this case, wouldn’t it be beaux? Beau-zes? Beau-i? I’m just joking. I know the plural.”

  The car rolled to a stop, and he faced her. In front of them, the red lights of a traffic jam lit up for as far as she could make out. They were going to be here a while.

  “Briar. I know everything got really tense for a while. And we let you down—” Briar opened her mouth to interrupt, but he ducked his chin, smile disappearing. “We did, Briar. We lost control of ourselves to Asher, and we nearly attacked you. For the rest of my life, I’ll never forget the smell of your terror. I’ll never forget how hard it was not to hurt you.”

  “Marcus.” She said his name on a breath. Reaching across the console, she took the hand resting on the gearshift in both of hers. “Marcus. I saw how hard you tried. I saw you fight his control. Do you want to know what I remember?”

  As if he couldn’t meet her eyes, he stared at the brake lights of the car in front of them, but he laced his fingers with hers and held on.

  “Marcus. I remember you telling me not to move. I remember the flashes in your eyes, in Hudson’s eyes, that showed me you were in there. I remember Valen throwing himself against the wall to keep himself from me. And Sylvain breaking the door handle off as he tried to stay away. No one fought harder than you all did that day.”

  He shook his head, and his eyes grew bright. But still, he didn’t meet her gaze. At a loss, she brought his hand to her lips and kissed his knuckles. “Forgive yourself, Marcus. I have. Long ago.”

  “But what if it happens again? What if he hurts you again and I can’t stop him? What if I have no idea he’s controlling me?”

  Briar froze. It was as if his words nudged something in her subconscious. She could feel it, like a sliver, but the more she prodded, the deeper the feeling hid. No idea. Have no idea. No idea. The words echoed in her brain, building toward something, but she just couldn’t get to it.

  “What is it?” Marcus said, sucking her back to the present.

  “Nothing.” She shook her head. “I thought of something, but then I lost it.” Marcus narrowed his eyes, watching her, but she shrugged. “It’s nothing,” she assured him. “It’ll come to me if it’s important.”

  From a distance, sirens wailed. They came closer, and soon the cars in front of them were pulling to one side, trying to make room for the ambulance and fire trucks maneuvering through the bumper-to-bumper cars. “We’re going to be here a while,” Marcus said, and lifted his lips in a half smile. “Sorry.”

  Briar pulled her phone from the front pouch on her backpack. She had plenty of time. The heat was blowing full force now, and she kicked off her boots to keep her feet from sweating. A day spent in wet socks was not something she felt like experiencing. Again.

  She was still working out New England weather.

  Feet curled beneath her, Briar leaned her arm on the armrest next to Marcus. His coat was soft beneath her cheek when she laid her head against him. The skin on her neck no longer pulled uncomfortably with such movements.

  Marcus adjusted his arm, sliding it behind her neck and around her shoulders. “What are you looking forward to the most today?” he asked.

  “Hmm.” It would be a cop-out to say everything, but that was the truth. As exhausted as she felt, and as overwhelmed as her schedule made her, she loved school. Her days were packed. She took graduate level classes with professors whose research intrigued her and undergraduate classes for subjects that caught her interest, like art history. But the best part of her day was probably… “Hudson’s lab,” she said.

  Marcus belted out a laugh. “I should have known. You’re going every day now?”

  Briar hummed. “Mmhmm. I shadow him, but mostly, I’m correlating data.”
r />   “Data correlation,” Marcus drolled. “Fascinating.”

  She patted his hand where it touched her shoulder. “Stop. It’s a necessary part of research. I don’t mind it.”

  “If you were in my lab…” Marcus began, causing Briar to giggle. This was a constant source of contention with Marcus. He wanted her to transfer to Harvard—like it was that easy—and join his research team.

  The month before, every single day for a week, she’d find Marcus had left small gifts on her bed. Most of them in Harvard crimson. Sweatshirts, a bumper sticker, a pin. Scarf.

  He was relentless.

  She’d come downstairs wearing the sweatshirt once. The following week, Hudson engaged in the competition. Boston College’s maroon and gold hat, mittens, hoodie, and scarf all appeared.

  So now she wore a Harvard sweatshirt with a BC hat, and everyone was happy. Or no one was happy. Either way, no one was left out.

  “It’s not that I don’t find your research as interesting as Hudson’s,” Briar said, leaning her head against him. “But what if, while I’m working with Hudson, we find a cure for EPP? Or we find a solution to my genetic mutation and I’m able to be exposed to sunlight.” As she spoke, she got more excited, her voice rising higher. “Or what if you don’t need shots every six months, instead you’re able to go years without the medicine he makes?”

  “What if,” Marcus said quietly, a counter to her excitement, “I discover a way for us to stay alive without blood and you never needed to worry about us attacking you again.”

  “I don’t worry about it now,” she answered immediately.

  A muscle jumped near his jaw when he clenched his teeth, and he narrowed his eyes.

  “Marcus—” Briar nudged him again. “You can’t beat yourself up for this forever. Please. If you didn’t bring it up, I wouldn’t have spent more than a moment on the memory of what happened.”

  Traffic moved slowly, and Marcus released the brake to trail close behind the car in front of him. He cut a glance to her and then gave his attention back to the road.

  Forgiveness. For all her emphasis on forgiving himself, Briar understood it wasn’t as easy as she made it out to be. There were times when she was busy, writing a report or making dinner for herself, and she’d think about a thoughtless phrase she’d made and groan aloud.

  When she’d first met Valen, she’d hollered at him for hovering and he’d taken off, only to return with her breakfast. She thought of that event at least twice a day, and it didn’t fail to make her feel awful.

  She waylaid Valen with hugs when she thought of what she’d done, and he probably had no idea what prompted it. And if she told him, he’d wave it aside and assure her he’d long ago forgiven her. He’d tell her, don’t worry about it.

  So she got what Marcus was dealing with. It wasn’t an easy thing.

  Marcus passed Fenway Park, and Briar craned her neck. “I wish I’d gotten to a game this year,” she said. “I want to see The Green Monster.”

  “I’ll let Sylvain and Valen take you. Fifteen innings of spitting and kiss-cams. I’ll pass.”

  Briar giggled. “I don’t think they last fifteen innings, Marcus.”

  “Feels like it,” he said, doing a spot-on, if unintentional, impression of Sylvain.

  “So you’d pass up the kiss-cam?” Briar teased. She side-eyed him. Cars were traveling at a fast clip now, the accident from earlier cleaned up. Marcus kept his gaze on the road, but the corner of his mouth lifted.

  “Who’d I be kissing?” he asked, his voice lower than usual.

  Briar’s face heated, but she managed to get out, “Me. Obviously.”

  “Fifteen innings of bat swinging, here I come. But what if the camera doesn’t land on us?” he asked, smile growing so his eyes crinkled at the sides.

  “Well…” Briar pretended to think about it. “In that case, I’d have pity on you and kiss you just because.”

  “How about for a ride to school?” he asked.

  “Kiss you for taking me to school?” Briar asked. “Seems pretty steep for a seven mile ride.”

  Releasing the steering wheel, he reached for her, but she jerked toward the door. Strong fingers tickled her. She twitched like she’d stuck her fingers in an electrical socket. “Marcus!” she cried. “Stop!” But as with his Harvard campaign, he was relentless, and soon she was gasping for breath while she swatted at him.

  “All right,” he soothed and gripped her shoulder. “Truce.”

  He dragged his hand up through her hair, and Briar closed her eyes, letting her chin fall to her chest. All of her tension drained away, just like that, beneath his hands.

  Rain splattered against the windshield. Clouds. Rain. Cold weather. And Marcus’s hands on her.

  Things were better than good. They were perfect.

  Chapter Two

  Hudson

  Hudson dashed past his brothers. Sylvain and Valen liked to think they were the toughest, the best warriors, but he’d been fighting long before they’d been a glimmer in their father’s eye.

  It was time to remind them he was more than a professor. He was a general. A war-maker.

  Hudson had tracked his brothers past Bunker Hill and across the Chelsea River before he let them know he was there.

  A steel girder, rusted and holed, sat half in, half out of the water. Hudson hefted it into his arms, throwing it like a javelin to land in front of Sylvain. His brother spun, low to the ground, fingers curled into claws, but when he saw who it was, Sylvain straightened.

  “Damn it, Hud!” he yelled. “What the fuck was that?”

  “I’m glad not all your instincts have dulled. A ten foot long weapon still gets your attention.” Hudson crossed his arms. This was going to be more work than he’d thought. To keep himself from taking out his frustration, however well placed, on his brother, Hudson picked up a stone and crushed it in his hand. “I’ve been trailing you since you Back Bay, and you didn’t look back once.”

  Valen frowned and shook his head. “Unacceptable.”

  At least Valen got it; that was something.

  “For fuck’s sake,” Sylvain argued. “We’re in the middle of Boston.”

  “Exactly.” Hudson approached them. “We’re at war, and we’re acting as if we have no enemies. Asher attacked us twice. He had no qualms waylaying Briar on Commonwealth Ave. The only thing standing between Briar and Asher is us.”

  “Asher won’t come after us in the open,” Sylvain replied angrily, yanking the girder from where it’d embedded itself in the ground. He tested the weight in his hand and eyed Hudson speculatively.

  “Then you’re a fool. He’s already come after Briar three times. And he’s been silent for a month. What does that tell you?”

  “He’s either planning, or he’s been at work and we haven’t seen it,” Valen replied. He strode to Sylvain and grasped his arms. “We’ve become complacent. There’s no shame in admitting it. But now we move forward. Cautiously. Aware.” The same words from Hudson meant nothing, and they would only enrage Sylvain. Hudson knew, and didn’t resent, that criticism sounded different coming from Valen. His brother could couch things in ways that Sylvain would actually hear.

  “We’ve never fought a war like the one Asher is threatening.” Hudson pointed to a bridge in the distance. “Humans are everywhere. Cameras. At any time we risk exposure.”

  Sylvain flung the steel away from him. It splashed into the water, raining freezing cold droplets over them. He dropped his hands to his hips and stared up at the sky. Chest heaving, he reached for his hair, raking his hands through it roughly. “Fuck!” he yelled and spun around. Fist cocked, he slammed it into the giant metal dumpster. The crack reverberated through the air along with his cry. “Fuck! Fuck! Fuck! Doesn’t matter. If the choice is exposure or Briar, I’ll choose her.”

  “Of course,” Valen soothed. Hudson would have given Sylvain space, but not his brother. He caught Sylvain in a bear hug and then released him as Sylvain calmed. “But
he’ll count on us hesitating. Because it’s instinctive now. Hudson threw a fucking girder at you, Sylvain, and what did we do? Hiss at him?”

  “Terrifying.” Hudson curled his lip.

  “This whole time.” Sylvain pushed away from Valen to round on Hudson. “This whole time I’ve been going about thinking I was protecting her, and you were what, Hudson? Watching? Fucking judging? Leaving her at risk?”

  Hudson squared his shoulders and lifted his chin. Part of him wondered at how easy it was to take up the mantle of leadership again after so long, but a larger part of him smothered the thought. He didn’t have the luxury of considering the ease with which he morphed from professor to general. But neither could he consider his brothers’ feelings right now.

  They had work to do.

  “I don’t need to explain myself to you,” Hudson replied, making his voice as hard as possible. “But understand this: I never left Briar unprotected. Now we train.”

  In a flash, Hudson grabbed the dagger he’d concealed under his jacket and flung it, end over end, at Valen.

  Sylvain moved faster than Valen. Quicker than it took for a human to blink, he stepped aside and plucked the dagger from the air.

  And whipped it back toward Hudson.

  It took merely a shift of his shoulders to avoid the weapon, which landed with a dull thunk in the pavement. Hudson hid the smile he felt threatening. Good. They hadn’t forgotten everything.

  Behind them, a warehouse sat at the edge of the ruined parking lot. It was abandoned, with broken windows and crumbling walls. It was perfect for the destruction Hudson had planned.

  Valen turned, narrowing his eyes at their surroundings. As Hudson watched, his brother’s countenance changed, becoming thoughtful. There we go. Buried deep was the warrior Valen had been. It would take a while to bring him back to the surface, but Hudson would do it.