Logan slams him over the shoulder with his palm. “You piece of shit. You can’t keep it in your pants one freaking week out of respect for Skyla?”
Gage scoffs. “Like you would.”
“I wouldn’t have to,” Logan seethes. “I would never have gotten myself into this mess to begin with.”
“That’s what you think.” He blows past the two of us. “Stay out of that room.”
“That’s what you think?” I whisper to Logan, shaking my head at the lunacy of it all. “Let’s get back to bed and pretend this never happened.”
Logan wraps his arms around me from behind as we navigate back to the boys’ bedroom. “I wish a lot of things weren’t happening.”
I know it’s true. I know this kills Logan as much as it does me. If only there were some way we could team up and kill Gage.
If only.
In the morning, after I’ve showered, changed, fed the boys, and got them ready for the day, Logan helps haul them into his truck and straps them into their car seats.
“I forgot their diaper bag.” I offer Logan’s cheek a quick kiss as I bolt back into the house. Chloe and Gage have been persona non grata this morning. And believe me, that’s the way I like it.
I head on up and note the door to the master bedroom is ajar. I can’t help but peer in and spot Chloe sitting up in bed, her hand in the air as she flips through channels on the television set Gage and I put in. I thought it would be heaven to sit in bed and watch whatever we wanted while Gage lounged by my side, and now Chloe gets to live out every last one of my fantasies. My feet carry me in that direction as if they were possessed and I’m relieved when I don’t see Gage anywhere near that mattress. Although I fully expect him to step out of the master bath, naked and ready to pleasure his bride yet again.
My stomach does a hard roll. It’s been a vat of boiling oil all morning.
“What do you want, Skyla?” Chloe gravels it out in annoyance without bothering to look my way. “I see you there, spying on me in my bedroom.”
“It’s my bedroom, Chloe. You’re just playing dress-up with my life.” I head into the boys’ room and snatch the diaper bag off the floor before heading back to the mouth of the bedroom I once shared with Gage. “Too tired to get out of bed after your butterfly room tryst last night?” Not sure why I wanted her to know that I knew what they had done, but some petty part of me demanded I do it.
Chloe glares at me a moment. “I don’t know what the hell you’re talking about. But for your information, Gage and I keep all of our dalliances relegated to the bedroom.”
There’s a quip begging to escape me, something along the lines of how woefully vanilla their love life sounds, sure to be followed by the fact Gage took me in every room of this house at some point in time, but I’m too thrown by her lie. Chloe should know more than anyone that the butterfly room is sacred to me. Why would she pass up an opportunity to stab me in the heart?
“You know what they say—a pregnant brain is a very real thing, and you’ve got it Chloe,” I say as I head on out.
“Where are you going? I thought we’d discuss the landscaping in the backyard today!”
“Only if it concerns installing a Bishop cemetery plot. Otherwise, I’m not interested. We’ll never be best friends, Chloe. Deal with it.” I head down the stairs just as Gage heads my way from the kitchen and he grabs me by the waist and twirls me until my back is against the wall, soft and elegant as if we were ballroom dancing.
Those cobalt eyes press into mine. “I want to apologize about last night. And I want to tell you that—I know.” He gives a slight nod, his eyes burning through mine, but there’s a softness to him.
“You know what? That Chloe and I will never be friends? That’s Paragon 101, Gage. Now, get out of my way.” I try to make a break for it, but he places his hand against the wall, effectively caging me in with his body. His minty breath washes over me just the way it did last night.
He nods once again. “I know.”
I study this strangely familiar, yet sadly unknowable version of the man I once loved.
“Gage, I question everything you think you know, and if you’re still in there at all, you will, too.” I shake my head. “I’m not keeping anything from you, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
His mouth opens as if he’s about to say something, but his eyes quickly run up and down my body instead.
“You should see Ezrina,” he whispers.
“Funny you should say that. We were just headed to Whitehorse. Any other orders you’d like to bark out at me?” I free myself from his grasp. “Should I tell Logan I bumped into a wall on my way out?” I lift a brow as I throw those spirited words he uttered to Chloe last night right back at him.
A dull laugh pumps from him as he closes his eyes a moment. “Did you hear what I said before that? When I was speaking to you?”
I gasp. “You did that?” I slap his chest until he takes a step back. “I knew it. Don’t you ever enter my dreams again and drag me into your nightmare with Chloe. I will not be secondhand screwed, and I will not tolerate seeing the two of you together firsthand. How dare you desecrate my mind that way.” I push my way past him and he reels me back in by the wrist.
“That’s not what happened,” he growls it out like a rabid beast and I can’t get away fast enough. I bolt out the door and into Logan’s waiting truck and we speed off to Whitehorse, to our true home, as far away from this hellscape as possible.
Good Lord, it’s a horrific feeling to look around at what was once familiar and not recognize the landscape of your life. How frightful to think life can change on a dime.
How horrific to think that it did.
I shared that misadventure with Logan as soon as the truck pulled out of the driveway, and I can tell that whatever Gage claims to know, it’s troubling Logan. The boys run wild as soon as we let them into the house, but Logan and I herd them down through the hidden stairwell in the kitchen, down to the Wonderground where Ezrina’s lair sits brightly lit, and somewhere down here reside—
“Nat,” I say, surprised to see her in an oversized room just before you get to the lab. She’s seated behind a table covered with what looks like bottles of red and green glitter, at least a dozen skeins of yarn and a plethora of other art supplies. “What’s going on?” I ask as Nathan kicks himself free from my arms and he and Barron take off laughing and screaming.
“Just getting ready for Christmas. I figure if I want to have a ton of crap to sell at the next craft fair, I’ll have to start early.”
“Geez, I’ll say. It’s nine months away.”
“Michelle and Lex are doing it, too. They took a break from The Enchanted Closet to pick up supplies and they bitched at each other the entire time we were at the store.”
“Where are they now?”
“Lex said she felt like kicking Miller’s ass, and Michelle said let’s take it outside.”
“And you didn’t want to watch?” I’m almost amused, but regardless, I need to find those two stat because Nat may not be interested, but I sure as hell am.
“Nah, I’ve seen it all before. Michelle might be knocked up, so Lex will probably go easy on her.”
“Geez. I would hope so.”
Logan nods over to me from the entrance to the lab and I excuse myself from Nat.
“Dudley’s here.” Logan’s expression sours. “Along with a couple of unexpected guests.”
I take a step inside the gargantuan space and freeze when I see an all too familiar couple seated at an elongated examination table.
“Oh my God”—I speed over, choosing to momentarily ignore Marshall, Ezrina, and Nev as I circle the front to get a better look at the usually feathered pair—“Holden Kragger and Serena! Are you nuts? No wonder I haven’t seen you in ages. What are you doing here in your earthen forms? My mother has a hand in this, doesn’t she?”
Ezrina chuckles without smiling, and it’s an unnerving sight.
“Ms. Messenger”
—Marshall takes a step forward, his tall frame unusually pin straight, his chest wide and expansive as if he were about to have a confrontation—“I may have pulled a supernatural string or two.”
“You?” I gasp. “You had my mother do this? Why in God’s name?” And then it hits me like a ton of DNA-covered bricks. “Oh my God!” I turn to Ezrina and Nev because, let’s face it, he’s just as culpable at this point. “None of you have my permission to do any of this. Holden—Serena, please tell me you haven’t been poked, pricked, or prodded.”
Serena is a blonde goddess, pale skin and eyes with almost no color. When she’s in feathered form, she’s white as snow. She and Holden have an entire brood of feathered children. She’s one of us, who just happened to be trapped in the body of a stark white raven long ago just the way Nev once was.
“Skyla, we want to.” Serena averts her eyes as if this were an obvious decision. “Others will be tested, of course, but we’re the first line of defense. If anything goes wrong, Ezrina was instructed to immediately return us to our precious state and we’ll be right as rain. Your mother said so.”
“I knew I smelled a supernatural minx at the helm,” I grunt as I continue to survey the scene. Marshall has a fiendish look on his far too handsome face as if it pleased him to be in on this potentially deadly secret.
My eyes jet to that glass box sitting on the table with Gage Oliver’s old head floating in a vat of blue keeping solution. Those blue eyes I once worshipped stare back at me, vacant and soulless. How I miss the way they would lovingly gaze into mine. And ironically, the new unimproved version of my ex-husband is also vacant and soulless.
“Gage said I should come and see you,” I whisper, forcing myself to look back at Ezrina.
It’s as if Gage’s primal apex has the power to hypnotize me whenever I’m around. Without thinking, I take off my jacket and toss it over the glass box. I don’t want my boys seeing their father like this. If they’ve noticed it before they haven’t said a word, but I’m taking Gage’s power to terrorize my children away from him while they’re around.
Ezrina and Nev exchange a look just as the boys run in with little Alice, her fiery red hair neatly set in twin French braids. The sound of women arguing grows stronger as Michelle and Lexy head this way.
“Logan?” Lex howls his name like a reprimand before the two of them barrel into the room. Lex’s short copper hair looks mused, her shirt askew. Michelle looks red with rage. “Tell this stupid bitch you really did love me.”
Michelle scoffs. “Don’t bother, Logan. Everyone knows you’ve only ever had eyes for Skyla.” She turns to Lex with rage emanating from her bloodshot eyes. “They’re together now in the event you haven’t gotten the memo. Oh, that’s right. You did. That’s exactly why you’re going after my husband!”
Lex gets right in Michelle’s face, and both Nev and Logan inch forward in the event things get physical. “Then why was your husband shoving his tongue down my throat last night?”
Michelle digs her claws into Lexy’s hair, and Nev and Logan quickly break up the impromptu salon session.
Michelle takes off screaming up the stairs, and Lex shouts something about closing up the shop tonight when she’s done throwing a fit. I take it there might be some regret between the two of them that they ever went into business together.
“Let go, Logan.” Lex shakes herself free as she turns his way, panting. “You could have at least stood up for me. You know what we had was special! When Skyla wouldn’t even give you the time of day, I was there for you!”
I rack my brain trying to remember an instant when I wouldn’t give Logan the time of day—all I can gather is that there were moments when I was angry toward Logan. But by and large we’ve stuck together through thick and thin, and we’re together now and that’s all that matters.
Logan raises his hands as if he were a common street criminal. “I’m sorry, Lex. You know I wish you nothing but happiness.”
“Ugh. This shit again?” a familiar whorish voice grunts from behind and we turn to find Gage and Chloe staining the entry.
“I think I’m the one who should be saying that.” I glower at the unhappy couple. “What do you want?”
Chloe smirks as she pets her protruding belly. “Gage insisted we come to see your reaction.”
Gage shakes his head, his eyes widening with horror. “That’s not what I said.”
I can’t help but roll my eyes. “But that’s what you meant.” I look to the monster beside him. “I believe you, Chloe. Because you don’t mix words. You have an unpleasant way of cutting right to the chase.”
I’m pretty sure pigs are flying because I just took Chloe’s side over that of Gage Oliver’s. Even though they’re both basically my enemy. Ironic. My two biggest nemeses have united to form a super-nemesis if you will. And, in the mother of all ironies, I need to live under the same roof as them in order to see my children.
Chloe strides over and shoves Lex on the shoulder as she walks on by. “Stop trying to sleep with Liam. Don’t be a skank.” She heads over to Holden and Serena and freezes solid, her hand clutching at her throat. Her face turns purple, her tongue protrudes from her teeth, fat and anaphylactic looking.
“Finally, some action,” I mutter to myself.
“Holden?” Gage barks and Holden takes Serena by the hand before they ditch farther into the labyrinth underneath Whitehorse.
“Nice,” I muse. “I see you’ve threatened Holden sufficiently to free your bride of any discomfort.” Actually, it was me he threatened with the custody of the boys.
Chloe continues to gag and Nev is generous to offer her a bottle of water.
Marshall steps up and glowers at Gage—come to think of it, it’s the look he always gave Gage, but today it seems particularly menacing.
“What gives you the right to be here?” Marshall growls.
The right? Why do I get the feeling Marshall and Gage are on the same page?
I look to Logan and shake my head. “What’s going on?” I step over to my favorite secretive Sector. “Chloe mentioned they came to see my reaction. What exactly am I going to be reacting to?”
A sly grin glides up his cheek, just one side, and it makes him look that much more devious.
His demeanor shifts on a dime as he looks to Logan. “You,” he growls it out with something just this side of ferocity. “Stand next to the woman you love.” His jaw clenches, those molten red eyes of his look as if they’re about to boil over.
“Marshall?” I do a quick survey of the room. Michelle is back, Lex is glowering my way, Nat’s even staggered in, the boys, and Alice are busy digging through a toybox in the corner, while Nev and Ezrina have wrapped their arms around one another—a move I have yet been privy to witness and I can’t help but think they look as if they’re bracing themselves.
“What’s happening?” My heart thumps wildly as Logan shakes his head at me just enough to let me know he’s equally as confused. He wraps an arm around my waist and pulls me in close and we stand as a united front as we look expectantly to the Sector before us.
Marshall takes a step forward; his demeanor softens just a notch as his eyes flit from me to Logan. He glances briefly to his right and nods as if he were responding to someone who isn’t there.
“Skyla, Logan”—he refocuses his attention solely on us, and it feels intimate as if we’re the only two people in the room with him—“usually I would allow nature to take its course, perhaps Ezrina to guide you into the knowledge which shall soon be revealed—”
I turn to look at Gage. That’s what he suggested. Whatever this is, as he stated earlier, he knows.
I swallow hard as I look back to Marshall. “Say it.” I nod. “Whatever it is, Logan and I can handle it. We’ll get through it together. We are a united front in every possible way.”
Marshall’s cheek flickers as if he thought it were laughable on some level and an underlying sense of rage starts to build in me.
“Yes, you are.
” He gives a slow blink as if acquiescing to the thought. “My dear angel, the great love of my life”—he quickly traces my brow with his finger and that feel-good vibration of his is back at full capacity and riding through me like a rush of magnificent adrenaline—“and you are, Skyla. You are my heart. You and I will have many magnificent adventures together, and together we, too, shall serve a purpose for the greater good of others. But for now, the time has come for you to unify yourself with another. And though he has chosen to forgo the chain of matrimonial command as laid out by the authorities that be, which the Master Himself has suggested you abide by”—he takes a moment to glower at Logan—“your time for one another has arrived in full.” He steps forward and lands a hand onto the top of my head and the other over Logan’s and a warm pulse of energy flows through him as if he were a conduit for love and light and all things good in the universe. And I truly believe he is.
Nat steps over. “What the hell?” She’s looking down at my torso and I follow her gaze, only to find my midsection glowing a brilliant shade of blue right through my jeans.
“Oh my God,” I bleat as I look to Logan. A million thoughts run through my mind at once. “The last time this happened I was pregnant with the boys.” Sage, too, I guess, but I can’t seem to get another word out. “Marshall, what’s happening? What’s wrong?” I look to him for help, but all he offers is a slow blink.
“Skyla?” Logan holds me at an arm’s length as he pulls back to get a better look at my body.
Chloe comes over and huffs at the two of us. “You’re knocked up, for shit’s sake.” She groans as if it pained her to say it. “I can’t believe I got dragged over here to witness this.”
“Oh my God.” I look to Logan once again. “We’re going to have a baby?”
He pulls me in with a violent force, and his body bucks against mine a moment, with laughter, with tears as he spins me around.
“I can’t believe this.” I laugh as he sets me back onto the ground.
Gage steps up, tears welling in his eyes as he looks from me to Logan. “I wanted to be here.” He shrugs. “I wanted to be a part of it. Congratulations.” He embraces both Logan and me at once, and it feels like the old Gage, the old us, the old version of the three of us together. He pulls back and gives Logan another pat on the back. “You’re going to be a great dad. You already are to the boys.” He looks to me and sighs, a heaviness in his eyes that words cannot describe as if this were the moment he lost me and not one second sooner. “And I already know you make a great mother. You are one. I mean that, Skyla.”
All Hail the King (Celestra Forever After Book 6) Page 33
