by Hettie Ivers
Alcaeus looked worried. And a little offended as he leaned down and said in a softer tone of voice to Lupe, “What are you doing? You can’t be here. I told you I’d handle it. You know I’d never let anything happen to Jussara.”
Lupe reached up on tiptoe, curling her hand around the back of Alcaeus’s neck and tugging until he bent closer, down to her height. “I know. But I got this round, old man.” She patted his cheek with her other hand and gave him her best imitation of his own wink before whispering, “Don’t worry; I’m about to own these assholes.”
More hushed words were rapidly exchanged between them as Alcaeus argued that he didn’t want her or Jussara anywhere near the Salvatellas and Lupe remained adamant that she speak with the brothers. She also insisted that Jussara be removed from the banquet hall, which Nuriel and Gabriel immediately shouted colorful objections to.
Alcaeus grudgingly acquiesced to Lupe’s wishes and walked her straight up to Nuriel and Gabriel, sticking close to her side and hovering over her like a mama bear. Alex ordered Jussara to the rear of the banquet hall, far enough away from the conversation to satisfy Lupe, but without further infuriating the Salvatella brothers, who seemed ready to declare war if Jussara was removed from their sight now.
I pressed my way as close to the action as my new shadow, Lessa, would allow.
Lupe didn’t bother to mince words or waste time with formalities as she announced, “My daughter’s not going anywhere with you. Not today. Not ever.”
“You’ve been living on borrowed time, Benedita,” Nuriel addressed Lupe. Benedita? “Delaying the inevitable. Nahuel’s soul has waited for you. All these years.” Nuriel’s upper lip curled into a distasteful sneer. “If you thought you could escape the mating bond by murdering our brother, you were dead wrong.”
Alcaeus shot Lupe a questioning look. “Benedita?”
She didn’t answer him. Her eyes never abandoned Nuriel. “I know.” Lupe gave Nuriel a curt nod. “A violet-eyed witch visited me in my dreams decades ago and told me so.”
Oh, no.
Gabriel’s brow arched.
“Said if I helped her,” Lupe continued, “she’d sever my mating bond with Nahuel.”
Shit.
“Right.” Nuriel’s responding laugh was mean. “That’s a parlor trick I’d pay to see.”
Fucking fuck. “Lupe, no!” I shouted.
I lunged forward, even as Alessandra attempted to pull me back, saying, “Al’s with her; she’s fine.”
“She’s not; she’s another Luiza!”
As I sprang toward Lupe, too many things went wrong at once to remember the exact sequence of events. Strangely, it would be the initial desolate look of realization dawning in Remy’s eyes at my “Luiza” outcry that would be forever branded in my memory of that moment—more so than the shock and devastation erupting over Alcaeus’s features, the sound of Alex calling my name, and the fear that flashed in Nuriel’s mismatched eyes as Lupe’s green ones shifted to bright violet-blue and she told him in a voice no longer her own, “When you vanquish a being from this world, best to remember to shut the fucking door, asshole.”
“Maribel?”
The faintly breathed question was the last that would ever fall from Nuriel Salvatella’s lips, as a moment later he was shrieking like a little girl. His body appeared to catch fire from within—and not from any type of flame I’d ever imagined in my worst of nightmares. Nuriel’s shrill cries were outmatched only by Bethany’s glass-shattering, slasher-flick scream as his body proceeded to incinerate—virtually melting before our very eyes.
My brother grabbed Bethany, yanking her out of Nuriel’s reach just as Nuriel’s arms flailed wildly in her direction. Tucking Bethany’s face to his chest, Raul shielded her eyes and muffled her screams, backing them both away from the horror show.
Alex and Lessa were flanking me within moments. Alex’s coloring was ashen, and as he stared at this latest ill-fated Luiza incident unfolding, I knew that he was seeing the memory of another scene in his mind’s eye. Lessa was absently murmuring “Maribel” over and over again. While she repeated the name like it was a question, it came out sounding more and more like a prayer.
Gabriel’s non-reaction to his own brother’s horrific death was perhaps most disturbing of all, as he stood observing Nuriel’s rapid disintegration with a sort of detached fascination.
I tracked Jussara’s movement as she edged toward Lupe, a confused, traumatized expression frozen on her face as she stared unblinkingly at her mother’s unnatural, glowing violet eyes. My body tensed, ready to intervene, but Remy reacted first.
And it was the fastest and most aggressive I’d ever witnessed Remy react before. He practically barreled into Jussara, hauling her off her feet and racing at a superhuman sprinter’s pace for the exit with her struggling form. He shouted over his shoulder, “Milena, get out of here!”
The forgotten machete at Nuriel’s melting feet began to shake and rattle against the polished marble floor as if it were alive then, and I didn’t need an empath to warn me who Maribel’s next target was.
Wrongly assuming that he would be the next target, Gabriel snapped into action as the machete on the floor suddenly lit up like a lightsaber—emitting the same silvery-violet glow that I’d seen in Maribel’s eyes. He shouted what sounded like attack orders in Spanish to the Salvatella guards before conveniently hightailing it out of sight via teleportation. Gutless indeed.
Alcaeus looked lost, his eyes dazed and hollow and yet still fiercely protective as he instinctively bared his teeth, moving to shield his beloved Lupe—who was at present clearly not his Lupe—from anyone in the room who might be dumb enough to dare attack her after she’d just melted a man from the inside. And as bewildered supernaturals from both packs alternately began fleeing from and rushing toward Lupe as she stood facing the melting spectacle of Nuriel, something inside of me shifted.
There was no escaping the inevitable now. This was happening. And there was a certain freedom from fear in that—a welcoming calm to be found in the knowledge that at least a part of my fate had already been sealed, certain immediate choices taken from me.
I took rapid stock of the remaining players that I had left on my side on the chessboard now that Maribel had made her first vicious moves. Kaleb was gone. Kai was missing from the board—busy attending to those whom Maribel had no doubt purposely wounded just to keep him away. Remy was absent now as well and was likely preoccupied keeping Jussara from reentering the melee. It was a loss for me, but I was glad for his sake and for Jussara’s. And I knew as surely as I was still breathing that Lupe would not have wanted Jussara to witness what was about to happen next.
Alcaeus was physically present and still standing, but his mind and emotions were a mess, making him an unstable and dangerous player, given the great breadth of power he was holding. If anyone in the room—living or dead—made a wrong move that hurt Lupe, all bets would be off.
Alex and Lessa appeared to be faring slightly—but not much—better than Alcaeus on the emotional stability front. They were both disoriented, clearly spooked by what had just happened.
Who could blame them? Their former dead pack mate, Maribel, had just attacked and killed their Salvatella enemy, Nuriel. But she’d callously used their human pack member, Lupe, to do it via a copycat Salvatella Luiza incident, thrusting Lupe’s present and future safety into certain peril. It was all too personal and likely too surreal for them to grasp, much less begin to discern where the next threat of danger might be coming from.
No, I was the only pawn still in play with any inkling as to what Maribel’s next move might be.
“Everyone calm down and stay away from her!” The command came out with a level of Alpha authority I’d never in a million years guessed myself capable of delivering. Bodies halted in place. I sensed Alex jolt from his temporary stupor next to me.
I swiveled my head from the glowing machete vibrating on the banquet hall floor to meet the startled onyx eyes I
’d come to love. “Get Alcaeus away from her. Get everyone away.”
Alex’s jaw dropped open at my command, and for a split second I thought he might argue with me, but then he nodded once in accord, before ordering me right back, “Stay here with Lessa.” His eyes cut to his sister next to me, and he confirmed the same to her. “Stay and protect Milena.”
Once he was beyond earshot and otherwise preoccupied, I turned and gripped Lessa by the shoulders. “You’re going to have to get Alex out of here. You’ll need to keep him away from me for as long as you can possibly hold him off. Do you understand?”
The vacant look that she gave me in response said that she didn’t. How could she? I barely understood it. But I spelled it out, as I knew it. “I’m about to die, Lessa. And if I have any chance of coming back, it’s really important that Alex doesn’t follow me.” God, but I hoped that French bitch hadn’t been lying about that part.
“What?” Her vacant expression morphed into one that was confused as well as bitchy—because who was I to tell her to disobey her baby brother Alex? If there was one thing I’d learned in the short time I’d known Lessa, it was that she never ever went against Alex’s wishes. Unless perhaps …
“Maribel told me so.”
Her eyes went wide. “Maribel?”
“Yes, she said that I have to die for few minutes or—or something … so she can take my blood curse. But if Alex follows me between worlds, then there’s a chance neither of us will come back.”
“Maribel told you this?” Her brow furrowed. She looked doubtful. “You actually saw Maribel, too?”
Oh, for bloody Christ, what was up with the denial cocktail everyone persisted in drinking when it came to that bitch? A room full of more than fifty werelocks and werewolves had just witnessed Maribel inhabit Lupe’s body and liquefy Nuriel Salvatella! Was she frickin’ kidding me?
“Yes! She also told me all about how you introduced her to Kai.” Among other TMI initial soul mate encounter memories. “And that you called him ‘the White King’ back then.”
Lessa’s hazel eyes shone with sudden tears, but they were lit with a fire of renewed purpose as well. I had her. One solid player on my side.
There was no time to celebrate my tiny victory, though, because Bethany screamed bloody murder, and I turned just in time to see the machete flying in my direction like a bolt of lightning.
I wish I could say that the blunt force of the enchanted machete as it speared straight through my heart and emerged out the back of my spine was the worst of the pain that I experienced that day.
But that was just the beginning.
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
Miley Cyrus’s smiling face was a torn, bloody mess.
I don’t know why I’d looked down to see. Maybe because I thought it’d be easier if I focused on the physical pain, the corporeal reality—as if assessing the situation in such simplistic terms could deter the visceral TNT response that had flared within me upon impact. Because trying to restrain the avalanche of violence connected to the heart of a revenge curse when directly attacked was like falling from 3000 feet and attempting to subvert gravity.
The chaos that unfolded all around me in the banquet hall faded to white noise as I focused all of my energy inward, fighting to stave off the inevitable.
So many emotions assaulted me. Wrath and vengeance were at the forefront, their rising maelstrom of fury intent on delivering punishment to any and all living creatures within reach. The scent of terror was so thick in the air, hitting me from all angles as everyone panicked, fearing for their lives—and with good reason.
I could barely feel my wolf now, just when I needed her calmness, her strength, more than ever. And I remembered Kaleb—how the wolf had died before the man.
I raised my eyes from the sight of my blood-soaked chest as Alex’s emotions pulled at me. I felt his great fear for me, coupled with his sense of helplessness in the face of this untenable predicament. Alex’s emotions might’ve quickly proved to be my undoing had Remy not chosen that moment to reenter the banquet hall and lend his emotional influence against the tsunami of bloodthirsty reckoning threatening to devour us all.
“Your heart is stronger than the heart of the blood curse, Milena.” I didn’t see him, but somehow Remy’s voice reached my ears, cutting through all of the background noise. “You wouldn’t have been chosen to hold it otherwise. You can control it. You were right to believe it before. You have to believe it now.”
Alex sped in my direction. Lessa ran forward and intercepted him before he was even halfway, though, delivering a blow that knocked her baby brother off his feet. The priceless look of confused disbelief on Alex’s face might’ve been hilarious to me had I not at that moment been suffering a machete wound to the heart and battling to restrain a revenge curse from annihilating an estate full of people.
The banquet hall was located on the second floor of the mansion, and lined with dramatic floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides. Before Alex had time to guess why his sister was attacking him, she’d thrown him through one of those big windows, then jumped out of it herself after him. W-o-w.
Just when I thought I might have a chance at a handle on things now that Alex’s emotions were distracted fighting Lessa and I had Remy’s calming influence to support my efforts, Lupe materialized directly in front of me—teleported by my least favorite undead Frenchwoman, no doubt. Her next cruel chess move.
As Lupe’s eyes changed from violet back to their normal shade of green, they instantly widened with panic at the sight of her own machete lodged in my heart. And the vibration of my blood curse kicked up about a thousand notches straight to warp speed with the need to attack.
“Shit!” Lupe shrieked. “Miles! This wasn’t supposed to happen.” She seemed to be referring to my fatal chest wound as she made the sign of the cross over herself.
Oh, Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! Not exactly what I wanted to hear right now. Convincing myself that this was at least part of that psycho’s master plan had been the only thing keeping me from freaking the fuck out.
“Focus, Milena!” Remy’s voice came again. He sounded closer. “You can do this. You’re better than that twisted legacy of Salvatella hate.”
“What?” I’d intended to shout the question at Lupe, but it only came out as a whisper in my present condition. “What … you mean? How … happen?” It was seriously hard to form a sentence while bleeding to death and trying to hold back a mystical tidal wave of retribution. But she got my meaning just the same.
“The violet-eyed witch said she’d use me to attack the Salvatellas,” Lupe explained. “Not attack you!” She seemed genuinely perplexed, beyond distraught at this development. “Oh, God, Miles, I’m sorry; I never imagined …”
Of course she hadn’t. Kaleb had called it. Lupe was the guilty innocent.
“No!” Alcaeus’s furious, heartrending roar at the sight of his precious Lupe standing so close to me—the deadly time bomb she’d just unwittingly activated—reverberated through the ginormous banquet hall. And this time, that tugging sensation in my chest—the odd swirling of magic that I’d felt a few times before rising up in reaction to Alcaeus’s stronger emotions—went absolutely berserk trying to tear its way out of me.
I squeezed my eyes shut and tried to block out everything else happening in order to hold onto the sentient wrathful energy ball within me that was now being pulled toward Alcaeus’s angry energy as if he were a magnet.
“Oh, no … no, no, no, no …” Remy murmured. I knew that he had felt it and that he had pieced together Maribel’s grand set-up as well. “Oh … bloody fuck …”
Remy had to have known, as did I, that no amount of calming mojo would be enough to subdue Alcaeus now. Maribel’s cryptic apology about Alcaeus suddenly made horrific sense: “I needed the perfect trifecta to draw out and pull apart the heart of the curse. Al agreed to be the guardian of Hector’s bloodline. With great responsibility comes great sacrifice.”
Lupe was go
ing to die. Ms. Perfect had fixed it so that it was an unavoidable conclusion.
I’d thought that if I held onto the ricochet until the bitter end that I could carry it with me to the other side to Maribel without harming Lupe or anyone else. But I’d never counted on having to fight against the connection that Alcaeus had to my Joaquin blood power to keep his anger response from drawing it out of me before I’d taken my final breath. Because if the boomerang-slash-defective-ricochet didn’t kill Lupe before I dropped dead off the chessboard, Alcaeus’s unstable emotions would do it when he pulled the ricochet out of me.
Oh, I fucking relished the thought of meeting up with Maribel on the other side now, if only to strangle the last vestiges of stolen life energy from her heartless, undead being. With great bitchiness would come the mother of all smackdowns if I had anything to do with it.
“Right then.” Remy cleared his throat. “I’ll … go handle Al,” he told me in a voice that sounded as doubtful as the emotions he was projecting. “Just … stay positive, Milena. You’re doing great.”
In other words, we were fucked. Eyes still closed, I decided it was time to pray for a miracle. Lupe had already begun some kind of chant, mumbling prayers aloud to herself. I’d stopped feeling the pain in my chest, and I was so cold—numbness was settling in throughout my body. The stench of my own blood was overwhelming me.
“Milena!”
My eyes snapped open at Alex’s call, and I caught sight of him teleporting back into the banquet hall, looking a disheveled mess. He’d barely made it a step in my direction before Lessa appeared and tackled him to the ground again.
“Alex! Lessa!” Remy called to them. “I need help.”
Apparently Alessandra took direction from Maribel seriously, because she really seemed to be throwing her all into keeping Alex away from me. Paying Remy no heed, Lessa delivered a roundhouse kick to Alex’s face before making a cheap grab for one of his kidneys. Jesus! She might accidentally kill him before I even had a chance to die at this rate.