Adrian Phoenix - In the Blood

Wells managed a rueful chuckle. “I planned for the SB, I planned for a coup d’etat from Alexander, but I never planned on our daughter.”

Leather creaked as Wells twisted his wrists once more, testing for any hint of slack. And, as with each prior attempt, he found none. How long since Athena and the other woman— a killer, an assassin, but one who hadn’t pulled the trigger…yet —had left the room? An hour, perhaps.

“Bob?”

“I’m listening, honey.”

“Alexander probably instructed Athena. This is his coup d’etat.”

Wells frowned. That made no sense. “No,” he said. “Alexander would wait until after he’d learned how to wield S. He’d want to look in my eyes as he twisted the knife. No. Athena acted on her own.”

“Alexander the Great had his father assassinated.”

A familiar argument. Even now, with Gloria dying in one bed and himself strapped to another, they still disagreed on one point of history. Wells sighed. “He had nothing to do with King Philip’s death. It would be complete foolishness for Alexander, our Alexander, to kill me before I’ve passed on my knowledge. It’d be—”

“Insane,” Gloria finished flatly. “Didn’t I warn you to put the twins down the moment Athena started slipping? Her madness is Alexander’s madness. I warned you, sweetheart, I warned you.”

“You did. But I still think Alexander had nothing to do with this.”

Beeping and blipping. The creak of the straps. His wife’s fretful silence.

“Is the syringe still under your pillow?” Wells asked. Neither Athena nor the assassin would be expecting an attack from Gloria.

“Yes.”

“Get it. Keep it in your hand.” Wells watched as his wife weakly fumbled a hand beneath her pillow. “Careful.” She pulled her hand free, the syringe clutched in her palm. She offered her husband a faint smile.

Wells smiled back. “Good. Keep strong.”

Gloria tugged the cap from the needle’s end and angled the syringe toward the inside of her arm. The syringe slipped from her grasp and her fingers frantically patted the blankets, searching for it.

Wells stared at her, mute and motionless. Cold iced him from the heart out, rimed his soul. “No,” he whispered finally. “Not for you …”

“Your heart is and always will be your undoing,” Gloria said, her voice tender.

“Alexander will bring S. The boy can heal! He can remake you—”

“Bobby, please. I’m so tired. Let me go.”

Gloria’s searching fingers discovered the syringe and closed around it. She looked at Wells, a relieved smile on her lips, lips that had once known his own so well.

S could save Gloria, he knew it; felt it bone deep.

A soft sound breezed into the room, snaking around all the beeping and blipping, a sound like the wind in the trees.

“Welcometohellwelcometohellwelcometohellwelcometohell welcometohell…”

Wells’s heart thundered in his chest. Gloria’s eyes widened and she yanked up the syringe, but it flew from her shaking fingers and bounced onto the carpet.

“No,” she moaned. She grabbed the bed railing and pulled herself over to the side of the bed. Teeth gritted, sweat already beading her forehead, she reached a trembling hand to the floor.

“Welcometohellwelcometohell.” Athena stepped into the room, spear in hand.

Gloria’s fingers scrabbled for the syringe, but it was just out of her reach.

“Athena,” Wells said, struggling to keep his voice calm, hoping to distract his smiling daughter, “has your brother called? Does he know what you’re doing?”

Athena ignored him. She stepped between the beds, bent and picked up the syringe. “Drop something?” Straightening, she fixed her wild, Aegean gaze on Gloria.

“Athena, sweetie, listen to me—”

“Shut up, Daddy.”

Gloria hauled herself back up and sank into the pillows, gasping. Athena sauntered to the chair beside the door and propped the spear against it. Wells breathed a little easier with the weapon out of his deranged daughter’s grasp.

“Athena, child, Father never helped you, but I will,” Gloria said, her voice breathless, but steady. “I’ve always fought for you. You’ve always been my favorite.”

Yes, Wells thought, that approach might work. Bad parent–good parent.

“Call me Hades,” Athena said, turning around to face her mother again. Her smile vanished and her eyes darkened. She dropped the syringe into her lab-coat pocket. Returning to the bed, she yanked one of the pillows out from under Gloria’s head. Pressed it over her mother’s face.

“Welcome to hell,” Athena whispered.

Wells screamed.

Seattle, WA

March 23/24

VON CARRIED DANTE INTO Heather’s room and eased him onto the bed. Dante never stirred. “Are you sure he’s okay?” Heather asked, dropping Dante’s travel-worn duffel bag on the floor beside the bed.

“Yeah,” Von replied, brushing Dante’s hair back from his face. “Pretty sure.”

“Pretty sure? What does that mean?”

The nomad shrugged, leather jacket creaking. “We just pumped him full of morphine, doll. He’s as good as the need to do that implies.”

Heather bit her lip, then nodded. “Gotcha.”

Von bent, his fingers working the straps on Dante’s boots.

“I’ll do that,” Heather said. “You go get the guys settled. There are blankets and towels in the hall closet. And there’s a sleeping bag on the bottom shelf, too. You can help yourselves to the food in the kitchen.”

A smile flashed across the nomad’s lips as he straightened. “You got it, doll.” He headed for the door, then paused. Bracing a hand against the threshold, he looked at her from over his shoulder. “For what it’s worth, you’re good for him,” he said.

Heather looked up at him, surprised.

Von’s green gaze held hers. “Family,” he said. “It all comes down to who has your back when your tires are running down a strange road and who’ll stop to help you patch a flat when that road turns nasty. Family.” He paused, his hand tapping the threshold once, twice, as though he was considering saying something more, or maybe something else, then he walked away.

Von’s words played over and over in Heather’s mind as she sat down on the bed and set her fingers to work unstrapping Dante’s boots. Tugging off one boot, then the other, she dropped them on the floor. She looked at Dante. You’re good for him . She hoped that was true. She was having a hard time imagining her life without him. And she still didn’t know if that was good or bad.

She pulled his socks from his feet and tucked them into his boots. She thought of the music that’d rippled between them at the show and in her kitchen—wild and dark and restless. Joining them somehow, defining them.

Scooting to the head of the bed, Heather peeled Dante’s T-shirt off, followed by the long-sleeved mesh shirt underneath. Flat belly, hard chest, lean muscles, his white skin gleamed under the low lamplight; and his scent, burning leaves and dark earth, dizzied her.

Anytime you want, I’m yours .

I want .

But she drew in a deep breath and slowed her racing pulse. She was a grown woman and she would not take advantage of him when he was drugged and sleeping. The thought of all the people who’d walked down into the Prejean basement and had taken advantage of him was all the cold water she needed.