He wasn’t alone.
A short black-haired woman was behind him, a small hand curled around his biceps as she stared down at the table and her brown eyes flecked with green grew wide.
She was human, but he was an Arum.
His eyes, a blue so pale it was almost as if all color had been leached from them, flickered around the room, coasting over me, and then snapping back to where I stood.
This was the first time I’d been able to feel an Arum. There was no doubt in my mind that was why it felt like I’d been drenched in ice, but was he what I sensed that felt different? I wasn’t sure, but I couldn’t shake the crawling sensation of awareness that tasted like heated asphalt in the summer. His head tilted to the side in a movement as fluid as water and so snakelike it reminded me of the Arum I’d met outside of Foretoken. The one called Lore.
The one who’d asked what I was.
He’d sensed the Arum DNA in me, and it was obvious this one did, too. His nostrils flared, and then he took a step toward me, pulling free from the human woman’s grip.
“Serena,” he said, his voice so deep it spoke of dreams and nightmares, and somehow manage to rise above Spencer’s screams of pain. “I want you to get out of this house. Now.”
“What?” Confusion filled the woman’s voice.
The Arum never took his eyes off me, but I saw, along my periphery, Grayson remove the Blow Pop from his mouth. “Because you’ve already seen too much horror to last a lifetime, and I don’t want you to watch as I kill this thing standing in front of me.”
23
I should’ve felt fear—more like pure terror. This Arum looked like he could cash that check his mouth was writing. And I should’ve been thinking about grabbing that rocket launcher, because the edges of his body suddenly looked like they were shaded in charcoal. The blurred effect started to spread, causing his features to lose their clarity as deep shadows bloomed under thinning skin. The woman called Serena was backing up, reaching around to her back.
Spencer went quiet, all the stiffness seeping from his body. He was still, and I had no idea if he lived or breathed …
And something colder and other was waking from the cavern of my chest, and it slithered up, mingling with my thoughts, tracking not only his every breath and the slightest movement but also the human woman’s, through my eyes.
This was not like the night of the nightmare, nor was it anything like what I’d felt when I’d been training. It reminded me of the woods, of the fight with April, when something other than me whispered through my veins, seizing control and erasing me in the process.
This was the Source—the kind of power that wasn’t used to just move objects or to speak telepathically with Luc.
And it was not afraid.
It wasn’t even slightly concerned that it somehow knew the woman was reaching for a gun.
The Source had simply sensed a threat, like it had done in the woods, like I suspected it had done with April. But this was also vastly different.
Because I still had control.
I would have to overanalyze all of this later, along with the whole Nadia thing. Right now, when an Arum wanted to straight up murder me, was not the time for any of that.
I met the Arum’s gaze head-on, and his lips peeled back in a snarl as smoke and shadows stirred around him.
“Hunter.” Luc’s voice was calm in the way that sent a shiver of warning down my spine. “I like Serena, and I like you, so I’d hate to have to kill you in front of your wife.”
Hunter.
What an accurate name, because I felt hunted, but I was not prey.
That was what the Source was feeding me as my chin tilted back a notch.
Grayson threw his Blow Pop in a small plastic trash bin. “I was told you were out meeting with Lore and Sin.”
“I just got back,” Hunter replied, and I swore the temperature dropped twenty degrees. I bet he and his wife had no problem in the hot, humid Texas summer.
Evie, I want you to move to stand on the other side of the table, but move slowly.
I heard Luc, but I didn’t move. I didn’t need to.
Half of Hunter’s body became nearly transparent. “If you know what that thing is and you’re thinking to protect it, we’ve got a problem, Luc.”
“I know exactly who I’m protecting.” Heat pressed against my back. “And I also know what will happen if you take one more step toward her. You will become nothing more than a pile of ashes. She is not responsible for what happened, and man, I’m sorry to know that went down. He was good. Better than you. He didn’t deserve that.”
I had absolutely no freaking clue what Luc was talking about, but I figured he was picking up the Arum’s thoughts. I tried to hear something, but there was nothing coming from the Arum.
“Get out of my head, Luc,” the Arum snarled.
“Someone’s got to be in there,” Luc said. “She is not what you think she is.”
But I am exactly what he thinks I am, the Source whispered back to Luc.
Heat flared, pulsing against the corners of my vision. Evie?
I blinked. I don’t know where that came from. A lie. But I’m still here.
You have control?
Yes? No. Maybe? I decided yes.
The shadows intensified around Hunter, and I didn’t think he was going to listen to Luc.
My hands slipped off Spencer’s arms as Eaton stepped back from the table, grabbing ahold of Jeremy and hauling him aside. The young man had gone as still as a statue.
“What in the hell is going on here?” the old man demanded, and there was no answer.
“Hunter.” Serena stayed a foot behind him, to his side, where she had me in sight in case she decided to use that gun I knew she was now palming. The fact I even knew that almost disturbed me, but at this point, I figured it was another Source-fueled instinct. “We trust Luc. Maybe we should listen to him.”
“We do not trust Luc.”
“Now you’re just hurting my feelings on purpose.” Luc’s tone was light, but I knew it would be a poor life choice if one judged his mood on his words.
Hunter’s pale eyes flared. “One of those things killed my brother.”
“Which one?” Grayson asked, his posture lax, but when he threw away his Blow Pop, something I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him do, he meant business.
“Lore.” Hunter dropped the name like a bomb of pain and heartache. I jolted in recognition. He’d been alive on Halloween. How could he be gone?
But Kent had been alive that night. So had Clyde and Chas.
So had my mom.
“Damn,” Grayson murmured.
“I am really sorry to hear that,” Luc repeated. “Lore was one of the good ones. He really was, but she had nothing to do with your brother’s death.”
“She is not natural,” seethed Hunter.
“Neither am I.” All pretenses were gone from Luc’s voice. “And I clearly recall you realizing not all that long ago that I could kick your ass into the next galaxy, and buddy, you were not wrong with that estimation. This conversation is getting old, and I’m starting to become bored. Do you want to know what happens when I become bored?”
Serena’s arm moved—
“She has a gun,” I warned, and I wasn’t sure who I was warning. Everyone in the room or the woman herself. The hairs all over my body started to stand up.
“I know, Peaches, but she’s not going to use it.” Luc paused. “Are you, Serena?”
Hunter blinked at the nickname, and Serena said, “I don’t want to.”
“Then don’t.”
“I would strongly advise that you didn’t,” Grayson chimed in, finally adding something of value. “If you’re alive later, I’ll tell you what happened to the last group of men who pulled a gun on her. They were kind of all over the place by the time she was done with them.”
I wanted to smile, which felt all kinds of wrong, so I managed not to.
“Things are getting a wee bit
tense here,” murmured Jeremy.
“I don’t know what is going on here, and I don’t care. You all need to take it elsewhere,” Viv barked out, returning with an IV bag full of the blood in one hand and one of those manual bag valve masks. She tossed the latter to Jeremy. “I’m trying to save Spencer’s life, in case anyone cares.”
“I care,” Jeremy confirmed.
“As do I. My wife is in this house, tending to the girls Spencer brought in,” the old man said, and I distinctively heard a shotgun cocking. “And those girls are already scared as jackrabbits hunted by wolves. They don’t need to get caught up in this.”
Spencer murmured something under his breath, but all I could make out was “them,” and the rest was too weak.
Viv was at his side, sliding the needle into his arm and then lifting the bag of blood. “It’s okay, Spencer. Everything is okay. I’m going to look at your chest while these overly aggressive aliens take their beef outside. Isn’t that right?” she asked, and I knew without seeing her that she was staring at Hunter and Luc. “Or at least take it to another room.”
“What do you say, Hunter?” Luc’s voice was closer, his energy tickling over my skin. “Kitchen? Outside?” Then he was in front of me, his entire body humming with power. “Or option C?”
“What is option C?” Hunter’s lower half solidified.
White lightning crackled across Luc’s knuckles. “Option C is me ending this before you even realize it’s started.”
Shadows and smoke pulsed around Hunter, snapping out against the threshold of the doorway. Where the inky substance touched, a scorched mark was left behind. What Hunter wielded was the darker and equally dangerous form of the Source.
Fully expecting Hunter to strike out, every muscle in my body tensed. I would not allow Luc to come to harm.
“Let’s hope it doesn’t come to that,” Luc murmured, having picked up on my thoughts.
I was hoping it didn’t, because I had no idea if I really tapped into the Source, I could control it, but in that moment, I realized I would risk it to protect Luc. I didn’t care how crazy or wrong that was.
“My brother is dead, and something like her killed him.” Raw pain turned Hunter’s voice to chips of ice.
“I’m sorry,” I said, and his gaze shot to mine. The hatred and grief was hard to see. “I met your brother briefly, outside Luc’s club. He was … he wasn’t mean to me.” Couldn’t exactly say he was nice, but he hadn’t wanted to kill me, so there was that. “I really am sorry to hear that he’s dead, but I’m not like whatever killed him.”
“And I’m just supposed to believe that because you claim so?” Hunter demanded.
“Or because I’ve spent the last however many minutes of my life telling you just that,” Luc replied.
Several tense moments passed. “What are you?”
“I’m not quite sure,” I answered. It was a shock to realize how true that was. It finally struck me that I really wasn’t like other Trojans.
“Luc,” Viv called, urgent. “I need you. He’s sprung another leak.”
Luc didn’t budge. “I need to know I can trust you, Hunter.”
“I’m okay,” I said. “Help them.”
Hunter solidified, the wisps of shadows and black fire fading into nothingness. “Help the human. We’ll be waiting outside.”
Luc turned back to Spencer only when Hunter had stalked into the kitchen, arm wrapped around his wife. Grayson caught Luc’s eye, and with a nod, he pivoted, following them out.
I stood there for several moments and then stated the obvious. “She’s human.”
“They love each other.” The white glow appeared around Luc’s hands as he placed them just above Spencer’s chest. “Obviously, Serena doesn’t have the greatest taste.”
“Is that common?” I asked while Eaton took over holding the bag of blood and Viv rolled out a leather satchel. Medical instruments gleamed in the light.
“Not particularly.”
“How can I help?” I looked around, seeing that Eaton had established another IV and Jeremy had his fingers on Spencer’s wrist.
“Stay right where you are.” Luc’s brows furrowed in concentration. “It’s not that I don’t think you can handle yourself, but I’m going to worry nonetheless, and then I’ll get distracted.”
Every muscle in my body twitched. I wanted to go outside and talk to Hunter so I could find out as much as I could about this other Trojan and what had happened, but Luc being, well, Luc, he would worry. Right now, he needed to be 100 percent focused on Spencer.
“You can help me,” Viv offered, glancing up from Spencer’s chest as she worked alongside Luc to close the wounds. “I’ve got a bag over here by Georgie’s feet,” she said, and I was assuming the older man was Georgie. “In there, you’re going to find a lot of stuff. I need you to find the clear pouch. It’ll be full of needles.”
Hurrying to the zippered tote, I knelt and quickly peeled it open. She wasn’t lying about there being a lot of things in there. Stacked boxes and rolls of gauze among other medical-looking thingamabobs. Rooting around, I quickly found the zippered pouch, and boy, was that a trigger for anyone scared of needles.
“Got it,” I said.
“Perfect. Open it and you’re going to see that those needles are labeled. Grab me one labeled morphine,” she instructed. “Don’t worry. They’re capped. Put it on the buffet table behind you.”
Relieved to hear that, I pulled out the needle. The thing was massive. Turning, I went to set it down but got hung up in staring at the framed photos I hadn’t noticed until then. Pictures of Georgie and a silver-haired woman I guessed was the wife cluttered the surface. From young, skin unlined, to laugh lines and more, the pictures chronicled the decades they’d been together.
“Don’t mind the pictures, sweetheart. Doris will straighten up anything knocked over,” Georgie said.
Still, I carefully placed the capped needle beside a picture of them when they were in their twenties, perched on the tailgate of a pickup truck. And as I turned back around, my skin was still crawling with the odd, thick awareness.
“Viv,” Luc murmured, and my heart dropped. I knew that tone. It carried a different kind of softness, a heavy one.
“I know. I know,” she clipped. “Not giving up. Evie, there’s another needle in there, labeled epinephrine. Grab that and uncap it—carefully.”
That was another massive needle. I uncapped it, waiting for further instruction.
“What’s his pulse, Jeremy?” Viv asked.
“Viv,” Luc repeated.
Sweat dotted Jeremy’s brow. “It’s fast. Like, I don’t think I’m counting right.”
“What did you count?”
“It’s over three hundred,” he whispered.
“Shit,” muttered Eaton.
“Ventricular fibrillation,” Viv spat. “Eaton, get the blood pressure cuff. Check it.”
Eaton did just that, pumping up the manual cuff, cursing as he watched the little red needle. He said a number, one that sounded entirely too low.
The white glow receded from Luc’s blood-soaked hands. “Viv.”
“I know!” she shouted, shoving white gauze into one of the wounds. “Evie, hand the epinephrine to Eaton. He knows what to do with it.”
Eaton took it and then asked for the cap. Handing it over, I watched him place it back on the needle. Georgie was shaking his head.
“What are you doing?” Viv demanded, a lock of hair falling across her face. “I need you to be ready to use it when his heart stops.”
“You know we need to shock him, Viv. We don’t have that here,” Eaton replied. “No point in wasting this when we could surely use it later.”
I folded my arms over my waist.
“That doesn’t mean we don’t try.”
“That shot is just going to cause spontaneous circulation. You know that,” Luc said quietly. “It’s not going to do anything else.”
“No. We can still try.” Viv�
��s eyes flew to his just as blood soaked through the bandages. “We need to try to save his life—”
“We have been, but Georgie is breathing for him. There is no way we can replace that amount of blood,” Eaton argued. “His heart is about to stop, and even if we get ‘hit the lottery’ kind of luck and we manage to restart it, we can’t keep doing that.”
“Yes, we can,” the doctor argued. “Luc can keep healing the—”
“I can’t.”
Those two words silenced everyone in the room. All eyes turned to him.
“I can keep stitching up the tears and eventually they’ll stop ripping open, but there isn’t anything in there,” Luc explained, wiping his forearm along his brow. “There’s massive damage in his brain. They look like lesions.”
“Lesions?” Viv whispered, and when Luc nodded, she returned to packing the wounds with more bandages. “It could be a watershed stroke. Spencer is young. He—”
“Let him go, sweetheart.” Georgie had stopped squeezing the bag and placed his hand on Viv’s shoulder. “You’ve done all that you can. We all know that. Spencer knows that. Time to let God do the rest.”
Jeremy’s eyes closed, and slowly, he lifted his fingers off the young man’s wrist as Viv looked up to the older man. “He shouldn’t die like this,” she whispered.
“Ain’t nobody out there that should die like this.” Georgie squeezed her shoulder.
Evie? Come?
Quietly, I stepped back and then joined Luc. I followed him out of the room and to the kitchen, where he walked up to an old, scratched farmhouse sink. There was a pitcher of water there, and I grabbed the bottle of hand wash, pumping the lemony-scented foam into his hands. Soapy red splattered the basin, quickly circling the drain.
The Brightest Night Page 29