by T. S. Snow
She believed seducing guys to do the dirty work for her was the answer, while I believed in kicking ass.
“There has to be another way,” Theo argued, not for the first time.
I’d sat down after we’d finished planning, and now I was just watching the back and forth between Logan and Theo, because honestly, they were just wasting time.
Theo thought the plan was shit and wanted a better one, but he couldn’t for the life of him think of something that would be better.
Logan was getting pissed at Theo for questioning him and his plan, when even he had already admitted it wasn’t the greatest one but the only one he’d been able to come up with.
And me? Well, I just wanted out of here.
For me, the most brilliant part of Logan’s idea was that it was so blatant, it might actually work. The one problem I found with it was being able to cast fast enough that I’d stun all those who showed up before they caught onto us and stopped us.
However, I wasn’t willing to put all my chips on Cara’s love of me being punished.
Which was why it was time for a counter proposal.
“How about,” I started, interrupting yet another round of bickering between Logan and Theo, “if I use my magic during the night to flood the floor outside a little, and then when they come here, the minute they open the door, I zap the floor, electrifying the hell out of them?” I batted my lashes at them, proving my superiority.
In all truth, I just wanted to show Cara that underestimating me had been a bitch move.
Logan and Theo just looked at me before they turned to each other and started arguing again.
I sighed, curling up with my back against the wall and tuning them out.
I fell asleep listening to Theo and Logan bickering, hoping that this would not be how my story ended.
“Charisma, wake up! Wake up, Charisma, please.” Logan’s words penetrated my panicked brain, and I opened my eyes to find his beautiful blue eyes insanely close to mine.
My cheeks were wet, and my eyes were heavy. “Wha…?” I tried to talk, but my throat felt like I’d swallowed a chainsaw. I cleared my throat and tried again, my words finally coming out clearly. “What’s wrong?”
“You were having a nightmare, kicking and whimpering in your sleep,” Logan replied, his voice uncharacteristically soft.
A shiver ran through my body, and not one of the good ones, either.
“Oh, uh, I’m sorry, did I wake you?” Embarrassed, I looked around the cell, only then realizing that sometime during my sleep, I’d gone from sitting to lying down. Theo was lying beside me, his face tilted towards me as if he’d fallen asleep while looking at me. That wasn’t creepy at all. It was easier to focus on Theo than on Logan when he was this close to me and had caught me at such a vulnerable time.
Heavy sleeper that Theo was, he hadn’t even twitched, even though I hadn’t lowered my voice when speaking to Logan, not realizing Theo was asleep.
Just because he’d hurt my feelings a few times didn’t mean I’d be a complete asshole to him while he was defenseless.
“No, it was my turn to keep watch,” Logan admitted, putting some distance between us.
Feeling restless and still haunted by the remnants of the nightmare, I got up and started to walk around the small area of the cell, doing my best to stay away from where Theo was lying so I wouldn’t wake him up. A sound sleeper he might’ve been, but even he would startle awake if I fell over him.
Probably.
“Oh, sorry. I… Why don’t you get some rest?” I asked Logan, keeping my voice as low as humanly possible.
For some reason, being “alone” with Logan made me feel more awkward than I’d expected it would, considering we’d been alone more than once before. Still, every time we’d met, I’d been in professional mode…ish. Now I was a hundred percent awkward mailbox opossum, and I had no idea how to deal with his personality change, especially when he’d been nice enough to wake me up from a damn nightmare.
I mean, from all the dreams I could’ve had, why did I have to have flashbacks about the time I’d been a magical guinea pig, rather than some sexy dreams about my first ever threesome?
Because you’ve been imprisoned, Charisma, and your death is near. Well, unless we get the fuck out of here. Which we will. Be cool, Charisma. Be cool.
Logan had stood up when I did and walked back to the opposite corner of the cell, where he sat with his back against a wall, facing the bars. He wouldn’t look at me, which should’ve helped me feel less…awkward, but it didn’t.
I…liked being the center of his attention, even if he seemed larger than life, was cocky as hell, and had this whole intimidating aura that left me feeling like less. When he looked at me, truly looked, it felt like I was all he saw.
“I’m fine. You go ahead and get some more rest. You must be exhausted.”
I stared at Logan, really taking him in, from the torn clothes, to the days’ worth of stubble on his chin, to the messy hair. He had bags under his eyes that told me about more than one sleepless night, and his posture was…off. He was slumping, pale, and defeated.
“I think you probably need more rest than I do,” I said at last. Okay, so maybe I sounded a bit concerned, but seriously, he looked like he was three seconds away from keeling over.
Dead would not be a good look on him.
Logan just shook his head. “Can’t sleep. I’ll be fine.”
Curious, I walked closer, sitting beside him. “Why can’t you sleep?”
Was I fishing? Yes. Did I care? Not really.
I’d never expected Logan freaking Nightshade to have a vulnerable side, and I was intrigued, to say the least.
Maybe he was just as human as the rest of us and not Superman.
Well, Batman. He had the dark looks and the money to be more of a Dark Knight than a beloved superhero.
Not that Batman wasn’t beloved, but…the difference was huge.
Anyway, I digressed. The point was, I wanted to know more about him. I wanted to know what made him…well, him.
Logan looked at me, like he was trying to decide whether or not he should answer my question. He opened his mouth, as if ready to tell me, then closed it again and went back to looking out of the cell.
“I don’t have too many nightmares anymore, but whenever I do, they’re usually flashbacks,” I confided, hoping it would help him feel more comfortable about opening up. “I think I was seven the first time my parents took me to the underground lab in the Silverstorm manor. There was an old mage there who swore he had a method for awakening a child’s magic. Apparently, my parents started to get desperate when Theo and the other mages my age came into their powers and I didn’t. After all, what would happen to the Silverstorm name if their daughter had no magic? Talk about scandal.” I took a deep breath, trying to center myself. I…I couldn’t remember the last time I’d talked about this stuff. The only reason Theo knew was because he’d been there, but nobody else knew. Not even Bast, and I told Bast everything. I pulled my legs closer to me, hugging them and putting my chin over my knee before I continued, “Anyway, in the end, he did manage to wake my magic, but it wasn’t without its toll on me, both mentally and physically. Still, it wasn’t enough for my parents, because my magic was weak. It wasn’t becoming of a Silverstorm.” I gave a humorless laugh. “For the next few years, they found mage after mage who claimed they could increase my magic, but they all failed.”
I still remembered the cold, sterile room in the basement. The pain. The intrusion. The despair. The feeling of not being enough. I remembered the faces of all the mages who’d tried to fix me, from the gentlest to the cruelest.
“I was twelve when they brought Cara into our home and started to groom her as a backup, in case I didn’t reach my full magical potential at sixteen. Everybody knew if at sixteen, I didn’t make it… Well, I probably should’ve resented Cara for coming in as a replacement, but honestly? I was relieved as fuck. With her to replace me, I wouldn
’t have to go back to that room anymore. I wouldn’t have to suffer.”
I was so lost in the memory, in the story, that I kind of forgot who I was telling it to and why, until he spoke again.
“Then what happened?” Logan asked, and I blinked, coming back to the present.
“My parents gave up on me about a year later, and I was mostly kept hidden or allowed to do my own thing, so long as I didn’t embarrass them. Cara started taking on more Silverstorm responsibilities, and I took an interest in technology, in METs. We both knew she’d be the heir, I just never thought my parents would completely shun me, forcing me to change my last name and everything. But well, shit happens, I guess. At least now I’m free. Free from them, I mean, obviously not free in the general sense of the word because here we are.”
The silence after my revelation was uncomfortable, stifling. I felt like I’d just bared my soul to Logan, and he was saying…nothing.
Yes, he’d asked more questions, but I guessed now that he had his answers, he didn’t really want to bond with me anymore.
I was just about ready to pretend to be asleep to avoid further embarrassing myself when Logan finally spoke, his voice no more than a murmur. “Her name was Zoey.”
He paused, and I thought that would be it, but he once again proved me wrong when he continued, “We grew up together, though she was younger than me. Closer to Marcella’s age than mine. Zoey was the daughter of one of our maids, and she was allowed in the house so my sister would have some company, a friend, even.”
Oh my Goddess. Logan Nightshade had a crush. A sweetheart. A first love.
I…did not know how to deal with that information.
“I…I was going to marry her. I didn’t care about how strong or weak her magic was, I didn’t care that she was the maid’s daughter. I was eighteen when I bought the ring. I worked my ass off for my father’s company so I could buy the ring with my own money. I wanted her to be proud of me. I figured, even if she was still underage, we could have a long engagement, then get married when we reached our twenties. If she were engaged to me, no matter how long, she’d have the protection of the Nightshades. She’d be untouchable.” His eyes shone while he talked about her, and I could feel the love he felt for her, even after all this time.
I was…a little jealous, honestly. Of the love he seemed to have for her. Of the way he spoke about her.
I hoped someday he’d meet another someone who’d bring that much love into his life, and a part of me kind of wanted that someone to be me.
“What happened?” I asked, unable to hide my curiosity or patiently wait until he felt like telling me the rest.
I mean, I kind of had a feeling about what happened, but it didn’t tell me how it happened. Or why.
Why wasn’t Logan married now? What the fuck had happened that he was still so in love with her but they weren’t together? Had he been a complete ass to her and driven her away? Somehow, I didn’t think that was it.
There was too much rage, too much darkness inside Logan for things to be that simple.
“Her father found out about her. Apparently, her relationship with me brought his attention to her, and he found out she existed and that she was his. Her mother had never told him about Zoey. He had her killed because he didn’t want anyone to find out he’d had an affair with someone from a different house or that his bastard daughter didn’t have the same branch of magic he did.”
Oh shit. This was big. This was huge.
“Wha…uh… Who was her father?” I asked, closing my eyes as if that would somehow make the answer easier.
I felt so extremely sorry for him. My chest ached for the pain he’d gone through. I couldn’t even imagine what that must have felt like.
But at the same time, I was reeling from the news. A whole TV show’s worth of drama had taken place in Logan’s life, and nobody knew about it. How the fuck had all of this escaped the Arcane gossip mill?
To have the love of his life murdered, by her own father…
I’d thought my parents were bad, but compared to this, my parents were basically saints.
Like, what the actual fuck?
I wanted to reach out to Logan, maybe to hug him. I wasn’t sure what, but I wanted to do something to offer him comfort. Though I had a feeling that would have the opposite effect. So I stayed put, hugging my knees and waiting for his answer with bated breath.
“Ricardo Illudere,” Logan admitted in the silence, the anger in his words almost a living thing.
Well, shit. The plot had just thickened big time.
6
Theo
This whole pretending to be asleep thing was starting to get old real fast, but I felt like I owed it to Char to at least give her what little privacy I could.
Unlike me, Logan hadn’t been a complete idiot. He’d answered Char’s questions and even opened up to her.
And what a fucking revelation. To think that they had someone that twisted in the Illudere house… I never would’ve guessed.
Not like you can say much, Theo, when your matriarch bound her own daughter and turned her into a puppet, I reminded myself.
At least it wasn’t murder. Somehow, I felt like while still horrible, my grandmother’s actions were a little less…hideous.
I watched through half-lidded eyes as Char slowly reached her hand and touched Logan’s arm. “I’m sorry, Logan. I can’t even imagine what that must have felt like.”
Logan looked at her and I didn’t like the tenderness I saw in his gaze, but I’d just officially screwed up all my chances with Charisma and I doubted there was any coming back from it.
Fuck. I should’ve listened to Annie. I should’ve just told Char why I’d been an asshole to her, and maybe I could be the one having a moment with her right now, not fucking Nightshade.
I’d committed to winning her back, and I had been ready to lay down my life for her if I needed to. I should’ve known it would never be that easy. I should’ve known the one thing she’d ask for would be what I could not give her.
I refused to jeopardize her safety, even for my sake.
I’d learn to accept her relationship with others, to be happy for her, even if it fucking killed me to do it.
Somehow. Some way, I’d learn to be a better person.
“Oh! I just remembered!” Char exclaimed suddenly, changing her position so she was no longer hugging herself. “Ricardo Illudere challenged Andres to a duel, and he lost. He’s been stripped of his title, and he was being led out of the city when he was kidnapped by the resistance. I mean, I know this won’t do you any good and it won’t bring your Zoey back, but at least it’s poetic justice, isn’t it?” she asked.
Logan froze. “Was he kidnapped or did he escape?” he asked firmly, almost desperately.
Char frowned. “We don’t know, but we do know the resistance was involved. I mean, I’d have said kidnapped up until I was, uh…escorted here and saw Cara. So who the fuck knows who is actually involved with the resistance and who isn’t?”
“Char, you don’t understand. Ricardo Illudere isn’t just a member of the resistance, he’s their fucking leader.”
Logan’s words resulted in a string of cursing from Charisma, and I was right there with her, though my cursing was internal. After all, I was still pretending to be asleep.
But if what Logan was saying was true, then things were far more complicated than I’d thought.
That motherfucker. I’d always known Ricardo was bad news, but I’d never actually checked his aura. Now I regretted it. Perhaps if I’d seen he was a murderer, I might’ve been able to do something to stop him long ago.
And to think he wasn’t just a murderer, but the leader of a bloodthirsty rebellion.
It made so much sense, though. Their actions, their attack pattern. The fact the Illuderes had never been targeted.
It all made so much more sense.
Why the fuck did Logan keep quiet about this? I was pretty freaking sure not even AMIA knew. I
f they had, Illudere could’ve been stopped long ago.
Annie could still be alive.
I wanted to get up, run to him, and force him to answer my questions. I wanted to kick Logan’s fucking ass for keeping this secret when he had no right to do so. He had no right to make decisions for our whole fucking society.
But I couldn’t rage. I couldn’t kill him.
I owed him my life, and it would be one hell of a fucked-up move to beat him up when he was probably the only reason I was still breathing.
Fucker.
“Ricardo Illudere is their leader?! But how? When? Why? How long have you known?!” Char asked the questions, rapid-fire, and I gave up all pretense of not listening, instead focusing completely on them, eyes wide open.
“I’ve had my suspicions, but it wasn’t until you mentioned his miraculous disappearance that they were confirmed. Actually, that, and some of the more recent reports I received from some of my…informants, right before we were taken. Mind you, I still don’t have the proof to back up my claim, which is why I can’t simply give AMIA the information. But ever since Zoey, I’ve been keeping an eye on Ricardo, and to say the man is deranged is an understatement.” Logan spoke calmly, almost coldly, but even his robotic voice couldn’t hide his disgust over Andres’ uncle. “Some of the reports I got on him were…” He trailed off, shaking his head. “Let’s just say Ricardo doesn’t take kindly to people who are lower than him or oppose him.”
I just stared at him, horrified. I had a feeling I did not want to know the information that was in his reports.
“I mean, yeah. He even tried to poison the current head. So I can’t really say I’m surprised to find out he’s rotten, but the resistance? Really? Isn’t that counterproductive?”
“Is it really counterproductive to have a group full of hate do the dirty work for him, and then once our society collapses, to play the hero and savior? He’s been playing the long game for decades,” Logan replied, and I was forced to agree with him.
