“Why not? She doesn’t have enough to go around? You guys can’t afford it?” He made a show of surveying the room. “Neither one looks true to me.”
Aiden shook his head. “She has too much. But she won’t let us have any right now.” He leaned forward, his tone and new body language portraying a “see, she doesn’t want to hurt us!” assertion that Gage didn’t buy for a minute.
“Because it’s dangerous,” Gage said. “Because it can not only make you both power hungry and power mad but because it will carve you into nothing from the inside out.”
“It’s not dangerous.” Aiden got up and went to a glass bar against one wall. He lifted the cut-crystal stopper from a decanter and poured two glasses. “It’s just energy. It won’t hurt anyone.” He came back and handed one of the rocks glasses to Gage.
Whiskey fumes burned his nostrils as he accepted the drink. He had to stop Aiden from taking flux, and honesty was the only way to do that. “It’s affecting mental capacity, Aid. You can’t take it. Brandon Williams almost murdered someone because of the flux.” The exaggeration was acceptable given the stakes.
“I heard about that.” Aiden put on a regretful expression and swirled his whiskey. “But the flux didn’t have anything to do with his decision. It was simple revenge.”
“What if it wasn’t?” Gage set his glass on the table. His hand was so tight he was afraid he’d shatter the glass. “What if the flux made him sick? Or what if he had problems already, lying dormant until the flux triggered them?”
Aiden’s jaw tensed, and his eyes darted from one side of the room to the other, as if he was holding himself back from lashing out.
Gage would circle back around to that. “What’s your business model? Is there a membership fee to be a Deimon or something?”
“To start with. Then they have to pay a tribute. But it gets bigger. Much bigger.” Now that he’d started, he seemed to forget he hadn’t wanted to talk. “Tonight, we have ten people meeting who had their second dosage last month. They’ve all profited from their abilities. These guys are the good ones. The ones smart enough to stay off your whor—goddess’s radar. They’ve just boosted their natural abilities, increased business, gotten promotions. They owe us a percentage of whatever they’ve gained.”
“And then they get more flux?”
“Yep. Once a month from here on, with commissions paid as long as they’re profiting. Each dose is a new transaction, so it compounds. Brilliant, right?” He grinned, looking like his old self for a moment.
Gage wanted to tell him it was the opposite of brilliant. They might be compounding their income potential, but they were also compounding their risk. What happened when their clients got so powerful they decided they didn’t need to pay anymore? Or Marley’s big fear, that they’d get tired of being restricted and decide to take it from another source? And that was without degradation. Maybe the stronger the Numina bloodline, the lower the side effects. Pettle and Vanrose seemed okay so far, at least publicly, but the addicts were a whole different story.
Gage had to play it cool. He couldn’t be responsible for starting a leeching epidemic if they weren’t yet thinking in that direction, and he was afraid once he brought up the addicts, the conversation would be over.
“So you, what, hop back and forth across the country with these rituals and stuff? How long before that gets old?”
Aiden grimaced. “That’s not our long-term plan. Chris and Tony started it, and…” He made a face at Gage that was full of wry resignation and exasperation. “Some of the things they set up are pretty stupid. But it fit the clientele. As we expand and move up the ladder, we’ll refine those processes.”
Move up the ladder. Which sounded as if they planned to approach older, more established Numina. Such as those who’d fallen from grace recently? Who’d formed splinter groups outside of the normal structure?
The next item in the list of escalating reasons to stop Cressida Lahr.
“Is that why you weren’t at the barn? You don’t approve?”
“I’m more focused on setting up the next stage.”
Gage wondered if Aiden really didn’t see the flaw in his master plan. “What have you calculated your plateau at?”
Aiden stammered a little and shifted on his chair, glancing around. Gage had seen the reaction many times in boardrooms and on-location meetings. If Aiden had papers, he’d be shuffling them right now. He obviously didn’t see the flaw.
Maybe Gage could use this. If he could convince Aiden it would be a lot of hard work for a poor final result, there might be a chance to break the seal. Give Aiden an excuse to cut ties with this whole thing, or even to let it die.
“She can only give power to Numina, right?”
“Riiight.” Aiden frowned.
Gage swallowed. So Aiden didn’t know sons of goddesses were candidates, too. That was good. “Not all Numina are going to be good candidates. Some won’t have any need or desire for the product.”
“Well, sure.” He laughed. “Can you see Dad taking this stuff?”
Gage coughed. “Or any of the leadership.”
“Well, obviously, our main client base is younger, less established. The guys with dreams they haven’t fulfilled yet.”
The ones who wanted shortcuts.
“How many of them do you think there are?” It was a tricky question. Numina didn’t hand out a roster. That was too much of a threat to their secrecy. Their leadership was appointed, not elected, and one family was in charge of keeping all the ancient texts. One of the texts held names of known Numina from that time, but there were few unbroken lines under those names. Wars and disasters and emigration caused changes. Sometimes no males were born in a generation—that was almost inconceivably rare but it happened.
Most Numina did participate in a massive, extremely well-protected digital collective, but the bottom line was that no one could just pull up a spreadsheet and say “There are X Numina in the United States.” Never mind pinpoint how many of those fit Aiden’s target demographic.
His brother shrugged. “It doesn’t matter.”
Gage thought Aiden was just trying to hide his lack of knowledge, but when he raised his glass to sip, he smirked behind it. The kind of smirk someone gives when they know something big.
“No business can last if it doesn’t have growth,” Gage tried.
“We have plenty of room for growth.”
He had to be talking about the third group, the addicts. “Yeah, about that. How did you find those guys, anyway?”
Aiden jerked his head around. His whiskey sloshed. “What guys?”
“The ones in the meeting room in Pritchard. You…know about that, don’t you?” Angered now at his brother’s lackadaisical attitude about people’s lives, he couldn’t mask his sarcasm. “They were discovered. Marley nullified them all, and the cops took them out.”
“What?” His brother shot to his feet. “What have you done?”
Gage followed. “What have you done?” He took a step, towered over his younger brother. “Where did you find them?”
“She needs them, Gage. That’s the whole foundation—” He palmed the back of his head and spun, took a step, then came back. “Don’t you realize that when your goddess takes the flux, they can’t get any more? What will Cress do? She needs that outlet!”
“I thought you had plenty of room for growth.”
“Because of them!” He flung out his hand, pleading now. “I found the list in Dad’s walk-in safe, buried in centuries of old texts. He was hiding it. They’ve always kept track of anyone with the merest drop of Numina blood, no matter how far from the original lines they spread. When I learned about Cress’s illness, I knew I had to find a way to help her forever. This was it! And you’re…” He squeezed his glass, stared at it, and carefully set it on the bar. “She needs those men,” he repeated. “They’re not easy to track down. We’re always locating more, but…” He trailed off, staring out the window. Then he shook his head abr
uptly. “I’ll do it. She can use me. I’d do anything for her.”
Gage had stood still while his brother raged, trying to wrap his head around what Aiden had done, about the things his father had never told him. But when Aiden said he’d take their place, it jolted Gage into action.
“No!” He hauled Aiden around by the shoulders. “You can’t. You are the last person who should ever let her give you power.”
“You’re crazy.” He knocked one of Gage’s hands away, but Gage grabbed him tighter and shook him.
“No, that’s what you’ll be. Remember Mom, Aiden. What if mental illness runs in our family? If you take that flux, it could drive you insane.”
It was the exactly wrong thing to say. Aiden slammed his hands into Gage’s chest. He stumbled, almost falling when the coffee table hit him behind the knees.
“I am so fucking sick of you and Dad telling me that! You have suffocated me my whole life, blamed me for her suicide.”
Gage gaped at him. “No, we didn’t. It was—”
“He pretended he was protecting me, but it was really all about him. Saving face. Not failing. Not having a flawed son.”
“You’re wrong, Aid.” Gage remembered, all too clearly, the way their father had sobbed in the months after their mom had died, clutching tiny Aiden to his chest, his arm around Gage to pin him to his side. “He loves us. He loves you.”
“Then why was it only ever me being tested? Being watched like I was always about to do something depressed or manic?”
“It wasn’t. I was, too.” But not to the same extent—Aiden was right. “It’s because you were—are—so much like her.”
“Fuck you, Gage. And fuck him.”
Aiden shoved Gage toward the door, yanked it open, and pushed him through. It slammed behind him, putting much more than a door between the two brothers.
He couldn’t have done that worse. He’d not only failed to coax Aiden out of harm’s way, failed to learn anything that would help them stop Cressida, but he’d given Aiden reason to make the worst possible decision. Every terrible scenario they’d discussed over the past several days was coming to pass.
And it was his fault.
…
Marley shoved her smoothie across the table, wishing she could shove herself away from this whole conversation. But she needed to know. “How did you find out about Numina?”
An unholy light shone in Cressida’s eyes now. She waved at the server and lifted her empty cup, signaling that she wanted another. She spoke faster, hands flashing in the air, punctuating the words. “Ancient texts, modern records. The fact of their secrecy is a miracle in our news-obsessed world, but little bits leak out. People know. And then I knew. And I believed that if sons of goddesses could take power, maybe sons of gods could take more. They can. And what’s better—there are more of them.”
The sun burst out again, uncovered, and Cressida relaxed into her chair. She held one hand out into a sunbeam, rotating it, and the sharpness slowly faded away from her body language, her voice, and her expression.
“I started with Darren Pettle. He was a college running back from a mid- to high-level Numina family who desperately wanted to make the NFL. I told him I might be able to help. We could experiment, and if he made it big, he could pay me then. It was an investment—something Numina understands.” She shrugged. “And there was rent to be paid, groceries to buy. The arrangement served many purposes.”
Marley cleared her throat and asked the waiter delivering Cressida’s second smoothie for a glass of water.
“The relief was incredible,” Cressida crooned. “And Darren’s success, as well. He introduced me to friends, who introduced me to friends. Their younger siblings learned of it and formed a little club.” Her mouth formed a moue of affection. “They became phase two.”
Marley pressed her fingers to her temples. She knew what phase three had to be—the addicts, the fringe of Numina, sons of daughters of daughters or whatever, with bloodlines diluted to barely detectable levels. How had she found them?
“What’s the catch?”
Tears filled Cressida’s eyes. “It’s not enough. It’s never enough. I have temporary relief but can’t end the inflow, and my tolerance grows. So I have to find more clients. Word of mouth can make things happen slowly. So when I met Chris and Tony…”
“They started pimping for you.”
The light in her eyes changed. The sun had gone behind another bigger, darker cloud. “They have given me freedom. Freedom that you are threatening.”
Fear skittered across Marley’s skin for the first time since she’d sat down. She shifted and braced her feet under her, ready to defend herself. “Did they start phase three for you, too?”
Cressida stood, her chair scraping loudly across the concrete. “Phase three is secret. How do you know about my receptacles?”
Marley rose too, gagging. “Receptacles? They’re people! You’re destroying them. And every one of them you give power to is a danger to others.”
“Oh, please. Like who?” The elastic around her ponytail snapped. Her hair fell around her shoulders and then fluttered back, as if blown by a breeze. But there was no air movement around them at all.
Marley’s hands tightened around the edge of the table. No one passed on the sidewalk near them, and the last other customers at the bistro had left a few minutes ago.
The magnetic pull that had caught Marley’s attention when Cressida first knocked the chair in her path appeared again, growing stronger, tugging on her awareness. It bore a trace of the blue shine of flux, the yellow glow of the energy Cressida had poured into Anson, and Marley understood. She was drawing power. Not just soaking in the sun but actively using it to collect energy.
She was going to attack.
“Cressida, please, just think about this.” Marley raced to reconnect with the lucid part of the goddess before it was gone completely. She might not have a chance in hell of changing anything, but she had to try. “Most of those men in the Pritchard Building were dying. Anson died. Some of the Deimons do not have good intentions for the power you’re giving them, and there are members of Numina who would use your power to leech other goddesses. You—”
“Let them!” Cressida’s eyes glowed furiously. “They cast me out, blamed me for things I had no control over. Every self-righteous bitch who turned her back on me should suffer.”
“Then why did you come here?” The air around them was no longer still. Across the street a flag hung limply from a storefront stand, but wind kicked up from Marley’s feet and tossed her hair into her face. A smoothie cup tipped over and clattered to the ground. “Why warn me to stop? You don’t care if I go insane.”
“I care if you take my outlets!” Cressida yelled into the increasing wind.
A few people approaching on the sidewalk had stopped to stare. A couple turned and hurried in the other direction, but others came closer, watching avidly.
“When you take my power from them, they can no longer accept more. I am not responsible for damage they may do, Marley Canton, you are.”
She flung her hands up, energy pulsing out of them. Marley dodged, and the wave hit the table, which skidded several inches before tipping, rolling onto its side, and taking out two chairs on its way to the ground.
“That’s why you told me your story.” Marley stepped around the table, slowly approaching Cressida. “You wanted me to be sympathetic so I’d leave you alone.” She tried to sound as if it had worked so the goddess would let her come closer.
Cressida’s hands lowered, hovering at waist height. “I’m not harming anyone,” she said. “I’m not a parent or teacher. It’s not up to me what they do with the power I give them. All I want is to be able to live without the agony.”
“I understand.” God, this was stupid. Marley took another step as though she were approaching a growling dog. “I want to help you find a way. And I think I have one.” She didn’t. She knew she couldn’t remove energy unless it didn’t belon
g to the person. She’d touched her sister and Riley with no effect. She’d even touched Cressida at Chris’s apartment.
But maybe she could make the goddess hesitate, stop to consider it, just long enough for Marley to take her down. If she could knock her out before Cressida could act…
She lunged the last few feet and clamped her hand over Cress’s wrist. In rapid succession she yanked the woman off balance, kicked one leg out from under her, and swung one of the heavy iron chairs at her head.
It almost worked. Cressida went down on one knee and the chair came within an inch of her temple before it halted in midair and tumbled harmlessly to the sidewalk.
Cressida rose and wrapped her free hand around Marley’s arm, her teeth bared. “There is no easy solution, you stupid bitch. Nullifying? Leeching? You delude yourself. My way works, and you will no longer interfere!” She sent a pulse of energy through their clasped arms and into Marley.
She gasped when the pulse hit her body and spread, sinking in heavily, a wave of pleasure tingling in its wake. Was this what the Deimons felt? The addicts? Tears gathered in her eyes, and she clamped her teeth together to keep herself from begging. She didn’t know what she would be begging for—another dose or for her to stop. Because hard on the heels of the pleasure came a roil of green clouds across the sky, a dull roar in her ears that may or may not have been real.
Cressida cackled and did it again. This pulse was bigger, and it burned before it died. Marley’s nerve endings shuddered in tiny orgasmic spasms, and seconds later, screeching green bats swarmed around them. She was on her knees, head bowed, no longer holding Cressida’s arm, but her own was raised over her head, gripped by the goddess, who bent to hiss in her ear.
“I tried to appeal to your common sense, your self-preservation, your compassion. Your refusal will have consequences you can’t even imagine. Your sister, her lover, your friends, their children—every goddess, every Numina, they are all mine now. You feel my power, my strength?”
Another pulse. Marley convulsed, her jaw locking. She could barely feel the despair generated by Cressida’s words, so caught was she in the throes of taking in so much delicious…hateful, horrible energy, inert as it may have been.
Sunroper (Goddesses Rising) Page 24