Crown of Ashes

by Addison Moore

  “I’d better go.” Skyla wrinkles her nose before scooting to the rear yard.

  The smile dissipates from my nephew’s face as soon as Skyla hits the exit.

  “Sorry about that,” I offer. Gage steps in front of me, blocking my path, eating up the doorway with the wide girth of his shoulders.

  “Don’t be.” Gage closes those big blue eyes, and I’d swear on all that is holy the world just dimmed. “Logan,” he whispers my name as if he were in pain. “I love you. I need you to be here for my boys. If something should happen to me. If I turn into that monster.”

  “You won’t. Skyla is handling the feds beautifully. You’ve got Wes on a leash. The Videns should be thrilled you’ve got their boys off the streets.”

  His jaw hardens. “There’s this shadow.” His gaze drifts off to some unknowable place as his voice reduces to a whisper. “I see it wherever I go.”

  My gut clenches tight. “Talk to your dad about it.”

  “My dad?” He startles as if I’ve woken him from a dream.

  “Not Barron.” My heart breaks for him. “The other one.” I can’t say his name. Don’t want to. Both Barron and Angel laugh and tug at one another’s hair at the mention of his name.

  Barron begs to have his father hold him, and I’m quick to comply. “Come on.” I bump Gage as I lead him outside. “Let’s see what Emily Morgan has to say about this insanity we call life.”

  Ezrina and Nev cross paths with us just as we’re about to make our way to the crowd in the corner of the yard.

  “My prophecy.” She holds up a sheet of paper that looks like something that amounts to a child’s school project. Nobody ever said Em was cranking out Picassos.

  “What is it?” Gage takes it from her as we examine it.

  Nev leans in. “Don’t you see the blade?” He dots the point with his finger.

  “Ah. A very sharp knife is in your future,” I muse. Ezrina and Nev have a vast collection of antique cutlery. I’m sure the baby will love it.

  “This is Alice.” She frowns my way as if I should know better.

  Nev leans in. “It was her favorite knife, back in the day. It’s quite a prophecy.” He pats her belly as they make their way past us.

  “Sounds like Ezrina and Nev are going to have one sharp baby,” I say as we head outside. “I don’t know if we should be worried or thrilled.”

  “Both.” Gage chuckles as we head deep into a tangle of bodies.

  We find Emily seated at a round table with Skyla by her side and Bree and Chloe loosely hanging on like bookends while conducting a spirited conversation of their own.

  “I can’t get used to this,” Gage whispers as we pass them. “She doesn’t belong here. She’s dangerous.”

  “I couldn’t agree more. Have you and”—I nod to Skyla—“ever had that talk?”

  “No.” His brows furrow as if he’s just realized this.

  “That’s it?” Skyla holds up a piece of paper covered in crimson, and Gage and I head over.

  “That’s it, Messenger.” Em doesn’t bother with a smile. Emily Morgan always looks as if she’s just woke up from a decade long dirt nap. “Sorry about using the old-school name, but you have to admit it’s catchy.” She offers an indifferent shrug.

  I lean over Skyla’s shoulder, careful not to let Angel fly out of my arms, but all I see is red, literally. “What’s it mean?”

  Emily grunts up at Gage and me. “I got one for the two of you.” She whips out another piece of paper and douses it with that quickly diminishing red pastel in her hand. Her hand moves so quickly a pink powdered plume rises in its wake, covering Em’s face with an eerie crimson glow. Once she’s through, she simply whips out another piece of paper and replicates the effort. “One for each of you.” She hands one to Gage and me, and we stare down at Emily’s lack of creativity and wonder what the hell it all means.

  I’m pretty sure Skyla and Gage are thinking the same thing I am. Danger. Fire.

  “Fire?” I whisper. It’s what I essentially warned myself of this afternoon.

  “Danger?” Skyla whispers.

  “No.” Gage runs his finger down the chalky page and leaves a trail in its wake. “Blood.”

  Cooper and Laken show up, and the mood brightens as we abandon Emily’s finger paints for talk of post-graduation life and prospects of a mini-Cooper running around soon. They’re both starting graduate school at Host, and Coop has already accepted a coaching position at West.

  Laken laughs. “I’m content for now.” She holds her hands out to me, and I hand her my precious baby girl. “This is enough for me. My niece.” She winks at Skyla.

  Ezrina and Nev emerge from the woods and head on over.

  “Here she is.” I wrap my arms around the woman of the hour. “And you look amazing if I didn’t tell you the first time.”

  “Am.” She holds out her arms, exposing her painfully swollen belly. Ezrina hasn’t had the easiest ride with this pregnancy. Those nightly retching sessions shockingly echoed throughout the house. But I’m glad she’s at the finish line.

  “You’re going to make a great mother.” I land a kiss to her cheek.

  “Am a mother.” She nods to the back slider before darting in that direction.

  “Wesley’s here.” Nev takes in a depleted breath. “Rina considers Tobie every bit her own.” He gives a wistful shake of the head. “I hope she’s not setting herself up for heartbreak. Rina would be destroyed if he ever took that little girl out of her life. She’d do anything to keep her within arm’s reach.” He takes off for his glowing bride, and suddenly it all makes sense.

  Coop closes his eyes a moment. “And that’s why she did it.”

  Skyla spears both Cooper and Laken with a sharp look. “That makes sense. Ezrina’s body did produce a child—Tobie. But the greater mystery is why in the hell haven’t the two of you killed Wes yet?”

  Coop and Laken exchange a quick glance as if an execution were still on the table.

  “You know”—Skyla leans in—“rip him a new one. Tear out his jugular.” She shakes her head at the two of them because for the life of her, she doesn’t get their shared silence, and neither do I. “What’s going on?”

  Wes comes over and kills the party per usual, chasing both Coop and Laken into the house, and they take Angel right along with them.

  Wes smiles that eerie Gage Oliver knockoff grin. I glance to the patio and spot Ezrina and Nev bouncing Tobie between them. She’s beautiful, and innocent, and it’s easy for me not to put her in the same category as her demonic father.

  “The Kraggers are inside—just Emerson and Holden—his wife, too,” Wes announces as if this were news we actually wanted to hear.

  “That’s nice.” Skyla grunts as Chloe pops up by her side like a pit bull ready to defend its owner from a rogue beast. “How’s Kresley? Was she too tired to come? But then, knowing who she’s been rubbing up against, I bet she’s been coming quite frequently.”

  Chloe belts out a laugh and high-fives her new best friend. “We can always count on you for a solid one-liner.”

  Gage groans. “Skyla.” He wraps his arms around his wife as if holding her back from a fight. “Wes, we know.”

  “We know, and we’re confused as hell,” I offer. “Care to explain?”

  Wes hoods those stormy eyes of his in Ezrina’s direction. “There’s nothing to see here. Just an old flame willing to do whatever it takes to make me happy.” He reverts his attention to us and grins. “I suppose true love exists after all.”

  Gage shakes his head. “You don’t have that with Kres. You never will,” he says it tenderly as if talking a distraught man down from the ledge. “You love the deepest part of Laken—not just the shell.”

  Skyla’s chest bucks as if she were in tears. “You are killing Laken with all of your perversity. First, demanding that Chloe morph? Then using time travel as a sexual device by taking Laken over and over again?” She gives a hard sniff as if she’s trying to hold it toget
her. “And then bargaining with a desperate woman to transform into the likeness of the only woman you will ever pine for. How very sad for you both.” Skyla takes a step in close to him. “Laken told me all about Ephemeral. About those early days when she pined for you. I bet you’ve tried a thousand times to go back, to change your own heart. If only you took Laken into your arms when she wanted to be there, how easy this all would have been for you.” A tear falls down her cheek. “You had victory in your grasp, and you didn’t even know it. But you blew it so big. It must kill you each and every day to know that.”

  “It does.” Wes looks right through Skyla as he answers. Then, just like that, he awakens as if someone shook him. “But today it isn’t about me, is it?” He grins over at Gage as if they’re in on some private joke. “Dominique Winters has slapped the Barricade with a libel suit. She’s taken it to the Justice Alliance. It’s laughable. She’s taken the Retribution League there as well in the event your mother hasn’t filled you in on the news just yet. She says we’ve ruined their good name by having her daughter captured along with the mercenaries working for you. She’s made it clear that the Winters haven’t chosen sides in our little feud as she calls it.”

  Skyla flinches, and it’s evident she hasn’t heard. Not shocking, though. Candace isn’t nearly as attentive to Skyla as Demetri is to Wes.

  Dudley appears as if from thin air and wraps an arm around Skyla, completely dismissing the fact Gage still has her in a lock from behind, and Gage relents. That’s always been my nephew’s problem. He gives in too quickly. It’s the nice guy in him. I don’t know how Demetri ever plans on beating that out of him.

  “Is there an issue?” Dudley doesn’t bother with the niceties when it comes to Wesley, or anyone else for that matter.

  “No issue.” Wes steps in toward Skyla, uncomfortably close, showing off the size of his balls to all those around. “I love Laken. She is and always will be mine. I promise you, I will always protect her.”

  Skyla spits in his face, leaving a wake of white stretchy phlegm dangling from his eyebrows. “And you will always bed her under the guise of other people.”

  “Wrong.” He wipes Skyla’s precipitous affection away like tears. “I will have her again. I’ve had a vision. The Justice Alliance itself has affirmed this to me.” He stalks off toward the house.

  “What you saw was Kresley doing a poor imitation of her!” she shouts after him. “Bastard.” Skyla shivers from the confrontation.

  “You should go easy on him.” Gage carefully pulls her in, and Skyla all but hauls off and slaps him.

  “Go easy on him?” She jumps back just enough to slip out of his grasp.

  And that’s my cue. “Dudley”—I nod toward the corral in the rear of the property brimming with llamas and horses docile enough to be overgrown house cats—“you mind if I have a word with you?”

  We speed out of Gage and Skyla’s latest conflict and presumably into one of our own. Dudley and I seem to make a pattern out of not getting along. I’d like to end that eventually. Now would be nice.

  “What’s on your twisted mind?” He picks up a foot-long blade of grass and ties it in a knot before sending it sailing through the air. “Ms. Bishop has alerted me to the fact there’s a distinct possibility the two of you will be in need of my chambers this evening.”

  “Chloe is delusional.” I glance back at the party to find Chloe at Em’s table with a small crowd amassed around her. “And speaking of delusions, it seems I’ve had a few of my own. I keep seeing him.” I shake my head out at the beasts that roam the corral.

  “Keep seeing whom?”

  “Me. I keep seeing myself. It’s happened a few too many times this year, and each time his message is vaguer than it was before.”

  His gaze twitches into the woods as he considers this. “You’ve seen yourself,” he says it like a fact. “This must be important. What have you to say to yourself?”

  “I don’t know. The first time was that night of the boys’ christening. I passed out. I saw a vision of Gage on a throne. He turned into a dragon, and I said to myself that I was going to help stop him.”

  Dudley grunts. “And you need a road map for that one? What else?” He looks both bored and irritated at once.

  “I saw him just now. He was at the bowling alley. He said something about Dominique Winters.” I try to rack my brain for his wording. “Something about not keeping an eye on her? Not taking care of her? And then he said I should love Skyla and Gage—talk to them. He mentioned something about not running from trouble. Running into the fire.”

  “Fire?” Dudley’s head ticks back a notch as if I were alerting him to one.

  “Fire.” I shrug.

  Michelle Miller lets out a whistle that can wake the dead without Skyla’s magical ring, and both Dudley and I head in that direction. Ezrina and Nev sit center stage next to a pile of oversized presents all wrapped in pastel paper while almost all of the tables Dudley has set out are filled to the brim with guests.

  “What do you think it means?”

  Dudley smacks his lips together. “It means Shelly needs us to move this little gift grab along. Ezrina and Heathcliff will have your basement brimming with all the modern finery this material world offers. It seems children require a plethora of nonsensical items to survive and thrive these days. I suppose that’s something you’ve grown familiar with.”

  “You’re a smart ass. Yes, I’m familiar. And I happen to like all the paraphernalia a baby requires because it makes me happy to see it. What do you think it means that I’m stepping down from paradise?”

  “It means he’ll help you tame that dragon your nefarious nephew is about to transform into. It means you should have dealt with Mrs. Winters now that her daughter was caught in the government snare. I assume she’s furious and ready to point her legal pistols at whomever and whatever she pleases. It means care for Skyla. Don’t bed her. It means talk to that moronic nephew of yours before he falls off the face of this earth due to his own stupidity. And the next time you see flames—run straight in.” He sheds a shit-eating grin as he finds an empty seat near the back.

  “Run straight in.” I shake my head as I make my way to Skyla and Gage as he bounces Nathan in his arms contentedly, his miniature lookalike, and it warms me. Something about seeing him as a father makes it feel as if we’re winning the war on keeping him on the right side of the celestial law. I spot Laken off on the other end of the yard holding Angel safe in her arms. And I spot Chloe handing Tobie to Ellis and vice versa as if they were playing a game of hot potato. Kate sits on Skyla’s other side and offers me a quick wave. She has a slim white scarf wrapped around her neck to hide that jagged seam Ezrina gifted her. Ezrina both stitched and glued her back together. Lastly, I spot Wes off to the side talking to—Coop?

  “Shit,” I whisper, leaning in to Gage. “Wes and Coop alert to the left.” As far as I see it, Coop has no business simply talking to Wes. An ass kicking is long overdue.

  Skyla cranes her neck, and it’s then I notice the bulge under her shirt, a pair of tired feet dangling lifeless to the side. Skyla is beautiful all of the time, but when she’s nursing, it takes her beauty to a magnificent level. She holds the ethereal charm and calm of a princess, and she mesmerizes me.

  Gage flicks his finger over my thigh, painfully, the way we used to when we were kids. “My eyes are up here, sweetheart.”

  “Right.” A small laugh pushes through my nostrils before reverting back to Coop and Wes. “You think I should head over?”

  “No,” Skyla says without turning around. “It’s been quiet. They’re handling it. Speaking of quiet”—she spins around as much as the baby lying over her will allow—“have you noticed that Wes has been laying low as of late? You think he’s got some surprise attack on the horizon?” Her eyes flit from Gage to me.

  “I’ve thought the same thing.” I look to Gage, but he’s suspiciously quiet. There’s no way Gage would hold anything back from Skyla and me. Not yet a
nyway.

  The three of us sit and watch Ezrina glow as she opens box after box of every baby necessity under the sun, but it’s Nev who’s excited. Ezrina simply ogles each item with a morbid curiosity as if it were a piece that belonged in a museum.

  Ezrina opens something that has the entire crowd lost in oohs and ahhs, as if she had somehow produced the very baby she’s carrying. Skyla turns around, her teeth pinning her bottom lip.

  “Thank you,” she mouths.

  And then I realize Ezrina opened the gift from me. A year’s worth of diapers. The same gift I gave to Skyla and Gage. Yes, I’m still in it to win it. I pay Lizbeth to pick up the goods each time she heads out to Cost Club, and she does. I wouldn’t have a clue what to buy, and Gage is too proud to take my money. I don’t think I’ll stop after the first year. Heck, I know I won’t. It’s the least I could do. I love those boys as if they were my own.

  The whoop of a siren goes off near the rear of the gathering, and every head on the property cranes in that direction.

  Then I see them. I rise from my seat as if rising from my body, every last part of me numb with surprise.

  “Shit.” I hear Gage hiss behind me.

  An entire infantry of men in blue jackets, the letters CIA clearly marked on their lapels as they swarm over the property. They’ve come in number, spreading over the landscape like a stampede of buffalo. They are legion.

  One of them jumps on a chair and holds a megaphone to his lips. “Please remain seated. This is strictly precautionary. There is nothing to fear. The use of cell phones or other devices is prohibited from this moment on. You may not leave the premises. We have the property surrounded.”

  They bleed in from every orifice, cuffs in hand, angry-faced, solemn as shit. I glance to Dudley as a couple of men double-team him, sending his hands forcibly behind his back before shuffling him toward the gate.

  I glance to Wes. Same story.

  “Shit.” I look around at the bevy of stunned faces, almost all of them one of us, otherworldly beings by design, descendants of the Nephilim—and I don’t waste a moment. “Run!” I roar as I help Skyla up and send her into the woods with Gage. Kate jumps to her feet, startled, and I’m half-afraid her head will roll right off. “Go after them!” I help her hurdle the chair knocked over in their wake, and she bolts like hell. The entire damn party scatters like ants.