by J. R. Ward
Never to be seen or heard from again.
“I’m getting really sick and tired of people who disappear into thin air,” she muttered to herself.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
Even though Butch was a tried-and-true Red Sox fan, he was mature enough to appreciate that there were certain things that came out of the enemy’s home state that were not all bad. Not that he was in a big hurry to admit this, even to himself—and yet, as the sun came up, he reflected how much difference a good USDA Prime New York strip steak could make in a man’s life. Just the ticket.
On that note, he leaned even further back in the French settee, and repositioned the piece of meat on his black eye. As he let out a groan of relief, someone sat down next to him.
“I’m sorry I had to do that, cop.”
Butch opened the lid that worked and looked at V. “S’okay. I woulda done the same thing.”
“How’s your head?”
“What’s that old expression? Kicking like a mule?”
He closed his eye again, and listened to the sounds of the Brotherhood, the Bastards, and the other fighters, filing into Wrath’s study. When everyone was accounted for and the meeting started, he would sit up, lose his cold pack, and pay attention, but right now, between the hangover and the damage from that right hook of his roommate’s, he had about all he wanted to handle.
“Can I get you some Motrin or some shit?” V asked.
“You really do feel bad, huh.”
“I didn’t enjoy that.”
“Because I wasn’t in a leather thong?”
V laughed in a crack. “If I light up, will it make you feel worse?”
“Short of you punching me in my other eye, I think I’ve hit rock bottom.”
There was a shcht, and then the familiar scent of V’s Turkish tobacco wafted over. When Butch felt up to it—okay, fine, he wasn’t up to shit, but he didn’t want to be antisocial—he pushed himself higher on the cushions and dropped the steak in his lap. Fritz, well familiar with the requirements of people who had swelling in places where it was unwelcome, had been thoughtful enough to slip a ziplock over the meat so there was no facial cleanup to worry about. Not that Butch would have worried about that.
Not that any of the males or females in the room would have worried about it, either.
And as for crowds gathering in common spaces? All in all, you could not get a more mismatched pairing than the decor of the French blue, French antique’d study, with its morning glory-colored walls and its Aubusson rug and its foal-legged furniture and frilly drapes… and the legion of hard-ass’d, hardheaded, heavy-bodied boneheads who somehow managed to repeatedly wedge themselves into the four-walls-and-a-ceiling without breaking anything.
Then again, they had been doing these little think tanks here about all things Lessening Society-related for over three years now, ever since the Black Dagger Brotherhood and the First Family had taken up res in this gray stone ark of a mansion. So at this point, it would have seemed strange not to be sitting delicately on all of these spindly love seats and socialite-worthy armchairs talking about life and/or death.
Proof positive that whatever you were used to was normal no matter how weird it might have been without the habit part.
“Where’s the big man?” Butch asked as he glanced over at Wrath’s vacant desk.
“He’s coming.” V took another drag and talked through the exhale, the smoke briefly obscuring his goateed face. “I think he’s stealing candy from a couple of babies to warm up for what he’s going to do to us, true?”
“Least he’s not kicking puppies.”
“They’re the only ones who get a pass.”
As Butch tested out his eyesight by focusing on Wrath’s desk, he thought that at least there was one set of furniture in the room that made sense. That old-school throne that the last purebred vampire on the planet took a load off in was exactly the kind of thing you’d expect the great Blind King, the leader of the species, to set his leather-covered ass on. Word had it that the carved oak heavy weight had been brought across the ocean from the Old Country by the Brotherhood, back in the days—nights, natch—when Wrath had refused to lead his kind.
There had always been the expectation, the hope, that the male would finally assume the mantle of his birthright—
The double doors, which had been shut after each entry—because there were children in the house now, and none of them needed to hear the cursing carnival that was small talk among the fighters—broke open, and not by a set of hands. They were willed apart.
As a hush fell over the room, Butch thought, Well, the race had gotten itself a leader and a half, hadn’t it.
“Be careful what you wish for,” he muttered dryly.
“Like anyone would order that out of a catalogue?” V shot back.
Standing between the broad jambs, Wrath, son of Wrath, sire of Wrath, was a seven-foot-tall scourge of non-human humanity in his stack-heeled shitkickers. With black hair that fell from a widow’s peak to his hips, and a face that looked like it belonged on a serial killer who happened to have a blue-blooded pedigree, he was the kind of thing who even fully armed brothers would cross the road to get out of the path of. Especially when he was in one of his moods.
Which was pretty much anytime he was conscious.
And especially after a night like tonight had been.
As he walked into the room, his face never changed position, his wraparound sunglasses straight ahead and not varying as he wound his way around the bodies who were standing, the people who were seated, the furniture, the everything. His ability to circumnavigate the space was not just the result of memorization. By his side, George, his golden retriever service dog, brushed against his outer calf, guiding him through a set of subtle cues invisible to those outside of the symbiotic relationship between owner and animal.
They were a hell of a pair. Like a sawed-off shotgun and a homemade quilt. But it worked—and you want to talk about true love? Sometimes that dog was the only thing that kept Wrath’s temper in check.
So yup. Everyone in the household was a huge fan of George’s.
The doors to the study closed in the same way they opened, without the benefit of a hand—and hey, at least they didn’t slam hard enough to rattle the hinges.
Although again, that was only because it would have scared the dog.
Over at the desk, Wrath lowered his three-hundred-pound, 0% body fat, mesomorphic bulk down on his throne, the old-growth timber bearing his weight with a tired groan. A lot of the time, George got picked up and settled in his lap. Not today.
Butch put the steak back in place and waited.
Three…
Two…
… and—
“What the fuck is going on out there,” Wrath yelled.
Boom!
In the silence that followed, Butch looked over at V. Who looked at Tohr. Who slowly shook his head back and forth.
“Am I sitting in here alone?” Wrath demanded. “Or did all of you check your cock and balls at the door.”
“You know, I wondered what that basket was for,” someone said.
“Mine are so big they wouldn’t fit in it—”
Wrath slammed his fist into the desk, making everyone, including the dog, jump. “Fine, I’ll fill in the blanks for you bunch of pussies. The Omega shows up in a back alley, and you—”
Butch closed his eyes and shrank into the settee as the wraparounds swung in his direction.
“—decide it’s a great idea to call an all clear even when you needed backup.” Wrath’s face then swung around in the opposite direction, at Syn. “And then you decide that tackling the evil is the right move.” Wrath then looked around the room. “After which all of you arrive on scene and circle jerk each other.”
Butch raised his hand even though no one was going to call on him. “I had a plan.”
The Oakleys of Death came back at him. “Oh, really. What was it? Getting killed? ’Cuz Jesus Christ you a
lmost pulled that off with room to spare—”
“Save the father at any cost.”
Wrath frowned. “What the fuck are you talking about?”
“Qhuinn.” Butch shifted himself on the petit point throw pillows, and decided that the last thing his aching head needed was that blind stare boring into him. So he shut his peepers and prayed like he was back in parochial school and one of the nuns had heard him cuss. “Save Qhuinn, that was my plan—and it worked. He had just taken down a slayer when I sensed the Omega coming in for a landing. I knew Qhuinn wasn’t going to leave me so I did what I had to to get him to go.” He kept quiet about his little bargain with the Omega. “You think you’re pissed off now? Imagine how you’d feel if we were having a mourning ceremony at the Tomb for Rhamp and Lyric’s dad instead of this thoroughly enjoyable little holler session in here.”
Over in the corner, Qhuinn rubbed his face. Next to him, his hellren, Blay, put a supportive hand on the brother’s shoulder.
“I’d do it again,” Butch said as he reopened his eyes. “So am I suspended or something? I mean, V was already talking like I was going to be put on lockdown, like I’m some kind of lightweight who can’t take care of myself. Is that where you’re heading with this? Or are you going to let me live up to the Prophecy bullshit? Huh? What’s it going to be?”
A looooooot of stares moved his way, everybody in the room giving him the hairy eyeball with a combination of respect and oh-boy-this-was-going-to-hurt.
Wrath stared at him for a long moment, during which Butch figured he was probably going to need a lot more strip steaks.
“Now I know what she meant,” the King muttered.
“I’m sorry?” Butch asked. “What?”
“You and the fucking questions. I always wondered why the Scribe Virgin refused to let us ask questions of her. Now I know.” Before Butch could throw out another one, in the form of a “why,” Wrath answered the unspoken. “Because it’s fucking annoying, that’s why.”
* * *
Standing off to the side, with Balthazar next to him like the bastard was holding the leash of a hungry bear, Syn wondered why he was at the meeting. It wasn’t that he didn’t care about the ass kicking Wrath was warming up to. He kind of liked it when the leader of the vampires got all riled up. It made Syn feel like he was working with someone he could understand and respect.
After all, he’d grown up around a male with a temper. He was familiar with the ranting and the raving, and in a sick way, he was comfortable with it—although in Wrath’s case, the hellfire was backed up with a formidable intelligence and a strong sense of right and wrong. Sure, the Blind King had a tongue like a sword, and had been very, very aptly named, but Wrath was a true North, the kind of thing you could bet on to be fair even when he was furious.
“I’m not staying indoors like some kind of little bitch,” Butch said from over on a dollhouse-sized sofa. “I’m not going to do that.”
The Brother had clearly been in a fistfight since Syn had faded out from the alley where the shit with the Omega had gone down. Butch’s left eye was the color of one of Rhage’s grape Tootsie Pops, and that piece of beef in a plastic bag he kept putting on the bruise seemed like excellent first aid. Plus, hello, you could cook it up and eat it once the cool had faded to room temperature—and who could say that about commercial-grade ice packs.
“And the lockdown is not even necessary,” the Brother said.
“Bullshit,” Wrath shot back from over on the throne. “And I’ve got four centuries of fighting with the Omega under my belt to prove you wrong.”
“The evil is not what it used to be.” Butch sat forward. “And I’ve had the close-ups under my belt to prove you wrong. Unless I need to remind you about how you and I came to know we’re related.”
“He’s right.”
As the eyes in the room reoriented in Syn’s direction, he was surprised to find that the two words had come out of his mouth.
Shrugging, he muttered, “I should have been incinerated or blown into chunks when I tackled the fucker.”
“Which brings me to my next agenda item,” Wrath said dryly. “What in the hell were you thinking?”
“I wasn’t. I came on scene and I was ready to fight. That’s it.”
“So you picked the evil on a just-’cuz? Ambitious—or self-destructive, depending on how you look at it.”
“Both.”
“At least you’re honest.”
Butch spoke up. “I’m going back into the field at sunset, and I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing. We’re so close—” The Brother made a pinchie with his thumb and forefinger“—and that’s why it’s safe for me to go out there.”
“I will tell you what you can and can’t do,” Wrath cut in. “Unless you think this big-ass chair is a prop?”
“This is our shot.” Butch looked around the room. “And I’m not going to be the one who blows it.”
“But you need to be protected,” V gritted.
As arguments popped up in all corners, Syn let the various debates recede into the background. He already knew what the outcome was going to be. Butch was going to be allowed to go out into the field—because he was right. They were getting close to the end and the King knew that. No one wanted to put somebody as mission critical as the fucking Dhestroyer at risk. On the other hand, how the fuck was the cop going to be able to fulfill the prophecy if he were cooling his heels at home like he was made of cut glass?
The meeting broke up sometime later. Maybe it was five minutes. Maybe it was an hour. Syn didn’t care. And guess what. Butch was free to do his job, even though V looked like he wanted to file a protest to that royal decree with a dagger.
Syn never waited for anyone, and with his position close to the double doors, he was the first out.
As he headed to his room to crash, the footfalls in his wake stuck with him as he passed through the second-story sitting room—and were still hanging tough when he entered the corridor that led down to his suite.
“Syn.”
He just shook his head and grabbed for his door.
“Syn,” his cousin said, “we gotta talk.”
“Nope. We don’t.”
As he went to slam the panel shut, Balthazar caught it. “Yeah, we do.”
Syn gave up fighting over entry control and headed for his bathroom, shedding clothes as he went, letting them fall on the floor. “I think the meeting was self-explanatory. I didn’t take notes if you’re looking for a review of it—”
“Who’s the female.”
Syn stopped in front of the dual sinks. Lifting his eyes to the mirror, he looked at his cousin. Balthazar was standing just inside the bath, his jet-black clothes loose and comfortable, his flexible, non-heeled shoes the kind of thing you could climb up the outside of a building with. Syn recognized the uniform instantly.
Guess the thief been working a little side hustle of his own at the end of the night.
“Been brushing up on your perishable skills, cousin?” Syn drawled.
“Who’s the female.”
“What did you steal?”
“Don’t play games with me.”
“If I ask you to empty your pockets, what’s in them? Necklaces of the diamond variety? Cash? A couple of expensive watches?”
When Balz just stared at his reflection, Syn recognized the steady-Eddie expression for what it was: evidence that the goddamn bastard was prepared to spend as much time as it took to get what he wanted. The tenacious fucker.
Syn started the water running in the sink and soaped up his hands like he was a surgeon about to amputate a leg. Or maybe that was just wishful thinking on his part.
“I don’t recall,” he said, “there having been any discussion about a female at the meeting. Then again, I wasn’t really paying attention.”
“Back in that alley earlier. Who is this female you want me to get ahold of in the event of your death.”
Syn looked down at his soapy hands. Because, hell
o, cleanliness was next to godliness, and who wanted to be a dirty bird. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, you do.”
“I was delirious.”
“You can’t be trusted with females, Syn. Not like you are right now.”
“I’m naked.” He indicated his body. “So they’re perfectly safe. Unless you think my… difficulties… have resolved themselves. Which I assure you they have not.”
Shit, that thing with Jo. He hadn’t wanted it to end like it had.
“We’re coming down to the end of the war, Syn. We don’t need your kind of complications right now.”
“And again, I say unto you, I dinnae know what you’re talking about.”
Balthazar stared at him. “There are limits to what I can clean up, Syn.”
“Then don’t play doggen for me. Pretty simple solution there, burglar mine.”
When the male cursed and walked off, Syn met his own eyes in the mirror. As his cousin’s words rebounded in his head, his thoughts went back to the past—and though he tried to fight it, the memories were stronger than his resolve to deny them.
* * *
’Twas three nights following the death of his sire and the onset of his transition that Syn stood in the hut that had been the only home he had ever known. As he looked at the pallet where his sire had slept, and the remains of his mahmen, and the pathetic valuables that were nothing more than containers for rope and fur, and bladders for mead, he knew what he had to do.
“You’re leaving?”
He pivoted to the heavy tarp flap. Balthazar was standing just inside the doorway, the male’s pre-transition face grown up in spite of the immaturity of the features.
“I dinnae hear you come in, cousin,” Syn said.
“You know me. I’m very quiet.”
Outside the cave, the cold wind howled, a harbinger of autumn. Summer was indeed over, and Syn felt in his bones that it would never come again.
Not that it had ever been there for him, no matter how warm any night was.