The Family Cross

by Gabrielle Ash

  There was no way around it. We had to take the stairs. I kicked off my heels by Tiffany’s desk. My Manolos had already proved ill fit for sneaking around in the dark.

  The cool tile against the soles of my feet grounded me as we moved across the lobby. Samson kept us close to the shadows, bouncing between desks and fake plants, until we made it to the back left stairwell.

  All his snooping around as a contractor paid off—he actually knew the building layout better than I did. I’d never even seen this stairwell.

  My heart dropped. Spoiled. So unbelievably spoiled.

  Samson curled his fingers around the door handle leading to the stairwell, and he pulled it open slowly. Just enough for him to slip inside. After a moment, he motioned me in with a jerk of his head. The landing must’ve been clear. The stairwell, lined with small lights on both the wall and the steps, proved to be much brighter than even the ground floor open to the windows.

  After he ensured the door closed quietly behind us, he held up a finger. His entire body was still. He held his breath. I didn’t know what he was doing until he tapped his ear.

  Listening.

  I closed my eyes and held my breath, trying to focus on the sounds instead of the weight of the pistol tucked between my palms.

  Nothing. Just the loud echo of silence.

  My hands shook when we took our first flight of stairs, and it only continued to get worse the higher we climbed. My brother likely sat in our father’s office, chair tilted back with his feet propped on the desk. His hands were probably folded behind his head. A smile on his face. All the while, we traversed a staircase with guns meaning to kill him.

  I stopped on the steps. My feet were impossibly heavy. I couldn’t move them even though I wanted to. I needed to.

  This wasn’t like the other times where we were attacked first and reacted. We weren’t victims right now. We were hunters, and he was prey. Samson and I sought him. We were actively trying to find him…maybe even shoot him.

  Sharp, painful breaths ripped through my lungs as the thought sank in. My shoulder ached, sending waves of pain into my chest and between my shoulder blades. Oh my God. If Hudson truly were up in the executive’s suite, he might die.

  Hudson might die. I had a gun in my hand.

  Could I shoot him? Could I shoot him if he just sat and stared at me? What would it take for me to pull the trigger against my own family?

  The next thing I knew was warmth around my jaw.

  Samson held my face in his hands, just as I did for him on the edge of the fountain in the hospital. His thumbs, rough and warm, rubbed beneath my eyes as rough breaths pressed through my lungs.

  You don’t have to do this.

  I stared at him, focusing on nothing but Samson’s eyes. The lights from the wall glinted inside them, faint yellow twisting with deep blue.

  Tilly, you don’t have to do this.

  I shook my head. He was right—I didn’t have to do this. I didn’t have to see Hudson at all. This was the exact thing I hired Samson to do. But I needed to do this, if for no other reason than not making Samson do it alone.

  Go home. A pause. I’ll be there soon.

  I shook my head again. If Samson died alone in this building, I’d never forgive myself. If Hudson survived and did this to someone else, I’d never forgive myself.

  In that regard, there wasn’t a choice to make.

  My breaths slowed. Samson continued to rub beneath my eyes, and I squeezed my pistol tighter, focusing on nothing but the grooves carved in the grip and his rough calluses against my skin.

  Hudson might die tonight, but even as I told myself he deserved it, I didn’t want to believe it.

  Thirty-Nine

  After standing in the stairwell for what felt like an eternity, we pressed on. While Samson could be accused of many things tonight, impatience wasn’t one of them. He’d kept his hands on my face until my breaths slowed. He’d stared at me, never taking his gaze from mine. Like I was the only person he’d ever laid eyes on, and maybe the last person he’d ever see again. Had anyone given him the same courtesy when he started living this way? Somehow, I doubted it, and maybe that’s why he took the time.

  When we broke the twentieth floor, my brain kicked into a different gear altogether: analyzing the potential battlefield.

  If we were coming up in the back left of the forty-sixth floor, we’d pop out beside a conference room: the big one with the really nice leather chairs my father used for meetings with the board. There would be a hall, the conference room usually used by Edgar Jones when he held meetings, and then the floor lobby with Blair’s old desk. My father’s office and Edgar Jones’s office would be beyond that.

  Where would Rolf be lurking?

  If I was right and Hudson and Rolf were here, things were going to get ugly quickly. No one would be coming to interrupt this time. No police or fire department. Not my father or Gerard.

  The air in the stairwell, heavy with heat, crushed my already dismantled confidence. Every breath burned. Every step ached in more places than my legs. Hair stuck to my neck and temples. Blood continued to leak from my shoulder. I’d definitely have to get my stitches redone after this.

  The thirtieth floor. Only sixteen to go.

  I bit my lip and leaned forward a bit, just enough to snag Samson’s fingers in mine.

  “What’s wrong?” he asked in a whisper.

  What wasn’t wrong, really? But the obvious aside, there were some things that didn’t make sense. Some things that made this evening brawl all the more suspect.

  “Sam,” I whispered as we stopped on the landing for the thirty-first floor. “I’ve been thinking.”

  He turned to face me, pulling his hand from mine. “About?”

  “Vee said that my life was inconvenient to one of his investors, and that was why Frank pulled out all the stops and hired fae.” The hand holding the gun felt all the more heavy. “Hudson doesn’t invest, and since he doesn’t have the company, he doesn’t have the kind of money I think Frank would be interested in.”

  Samson scratched the side of his head. “Maybe Hudson has investments you don’t know about.”

  “Maybe, but I doubt it.” There was something I was missing. It lingered on the edge of my subconscious, a partial thought that hadn’t put the pieces together.

  “That dude Rolf impersonated at the party…who was that?”

  Right. Edgar. I’d forgotten about him. “Edgar Jones. He’s the CFO.”

  “Well, if Edgar hired Rolf and put out your contract, it wouldn’t make sense for Rolf to eat him.” Samson shrugged. “Frank and Rolf wouldn’t get paid if the buyer died.”

  Samson was right. It wouldn’t make sense, and he’d been a big supporter of my relationship with Richard. He wouldn’t want his son to marry someone he planned on killing.

  “Rolf has impersonated, and presumably eaten, both Blair and Edgar.” My teeth pierced the soft flesh of my mouth, and blood pooled along my tongue. “Do you think Hudson tried to tie up loose ends or something?”

  “I don’t know.” Samson nodded toward the flight of stairs heading up. “But what I do know is Hudson tried to have Rolf kill us both at the party.”

  That was undeniable.

  “Let’s go take care of him and worry about the rest later.”

  My feet, heavy like the gun in my hand, moved slowly up the steps. One. Two. Three. Four. One foot in front of the other.

  I’d never marched into a fight knowingly before, and my nerves jumped in anticipation as the unknown bore down on us from above. Beyond the stairs would be my brother, and one of us might not be walking out of the building.

  I hadn’t expected the final flight of stairs to be so long. The exit to the forty-sixth floor loomed above us, and a part of me hoped we’d never reach it.

  Samson stopped halfway up the flight before we could see through the long, skinny window in the center of the door. He stuck a finger to my forehead and balanced on the steps.

&nb
sp; I’ll go first. Pay attention. We stared at each other in the dim light. Don’t engage Rolf. I’ll handle him.

  I nodded a little, but not enough to shake his finger away. God. I was going with him to watch him kill a fae and maybe my brother. Maybe I should’ve stayed at the hospital.

  I tried to get you to leave. He smiled bitterly. You still can.

  A deep breath expanded beneath my ribs, stretched my lungs, and sent a tight burn throughout the rest of my chest. No. I could do this. I had to do this! Hudson tried to kill Samson and me. He might have killed Gerard. He allowed Rolf to kill Blair and Edgar. Hudson was a monster.

  If I didn’t face him, I was letting him win.

  I shook my head harder this time. As long as he didn’t do that mind-control thing and leave me alone, I could do it. I needed to see my brother.

  Samson stared, unhappy. He dropped his hand and peeled off his suit jacket, draping it on the rail of the stairs, presumably to have easier access to his weapons. He crept up the steps, hanging close to the rail before positioning himself flat against the wall.

  He looked out the skinny window, held up a hand, and beckoned me forward. I mimicked his movements, staying close to the wall and out of sight.

  When I made it next to him on the wall, he grabbed my free hand.

  Some lights are on. I gripped his arm and propped up on my tiptoes to peek through the glass. The lights were on, and there was a ton of noise. Any idea what he might be doing?

  Not really. He didn’t get the company and never would at this point. I couldn’t imagine what he’d be doing if not just hiding from police.

  Samson let go of my hand and put a finger to his lips before he gripped the doorknob and turned.

  A fear that a rusty hinge would squeal and give us away prompted a held breath, but the door cracked open without protest. Samson slunk inside first and turned into an empty nook. I held the doorknob and let the door close quietly, not letting go of the knob until the tumbler clicked in place. I followed his steps exactly, ensuring my bare feet moved as shadows along the floor. Carpet, not tile. My father bought the best for the executive suite.

  The noise we heard in the stairwell got louder as we crept beside my father’s conference room. I gripped my gun tighter and focused on it.

  Paper? What sounded like hundreds of sheets of paper being slung around echoed along the walls of the suite, getting louder as we pressed forward.

  Samson glanced at me, a question on his face. I shrugged. Hudson didn’t work when he had a job. He wouldn’t start now.

  We passed Edgar’s conference room. My throat, parched and dry from my openmouthed, panicked breathing, stung. More than anything, I hoped we’d turn the corner and see Hudson remorseful. I wanted him to cry. Beg for forgiveness. There wasn’t much room in my heart for it, but it would at least mean he didn’t have to die.

  Samson held out his arm when we broke into the lobby, pressing his hand against my stomach as he continued to look forward. I stopped beside him, finding comfort in his touch. If Samson died here, I’d never forgive myself.

  A deafening crash shook the floor. Busted plastic. A couple of screws hitting tile. Someone was destroying the lobby. I squatted down a little and moved in front of Samson, keeping close to him as I peeked around the corner.

  “Hurry up,” a familiar feminine voice snapped. “We have to go.”

  “Shut up! I’m hurrying.”

  Hudson stood over a pile of paper and cardboard boxes with another ream of copy paper in his hands, red in the face and heaving strangled breaths. His suit jacket was gone. His dress shirt, untucked and open at the neck, still wore Gerard’s blood. He wasn’t alone.

  Beside him stood Blair, blond hair piled high on her head in a platinum knot. She flicked a lighter and kicked her hot-pink heels over rogue pieces of paper, pushing them back into the bigger pile. She was alive?

  Edgar Jones, covered in fae blood, stood with his back to us.

  “I smell you,” Edgar—Rolf—crowed to the ceiling. Hudson dropped his ream of paper, and Blair stilled. “Blood and ash. Fear.”

  Without warning, Samson stepped out from behind the wall, ending the pretense, raised his gun, and fired.

  Forty

  I’d been watching Hudson, assuming a bullet would find him first.

  It found Blair instead.

  Lead pierced the bridge of Blair’s nose in slow motion, bursting through cartilage and bone. Her eyes rolled to the back of her head, and she dropped in a dead heap on the ground in a rush, and even as she lay there, it took a moment for me to realize what happened.

  The lighter she had intended to start a fire with fell from her hands, snuffed out by her own torso falling on top of it.

  “Nasty cambion.” Rolf rolled his head along his shoulders. A slender, snakelike tongue pressed out from between human lips, and he shed Edgar’s form. “Frank offered me double for you. Traitor. Nasty, dirty traitor!”

  Creamy skin morphed into a leathery green as Rolf barreled toward Samson. His spine cracked and lengthened while his torso slimmed alongside spindly limbs. His jaw hung open, ready to snap. Teeth eerily similar to Popped Collars lined the palates of his mouth.

  Two shots rang in my ears and rattled my teeth. Rolf recoiled as the bullets planted in his shoulder. Black tar seeped from the holes and sloshed onto the tile. He shook his head, ignoring me completely. Whether it was an endeavor to neutralize the greater threat or take care of the life with the bigger payout first, I didn’t know. He barreled toward Samson, gnashing his teeth and swiping at him with his branch-like limbs. Samson rolled out of the way and ripped a knife from a holster on his waist.

  Samson had told me to leave Rolf to him, so I intended to.

  I squeezed my gun between my palms and locked eyes with Hudson, his Ashby-brown gaze colliding with mine. My hands shook as we stood unmoving while Rolf and Samson crashed into the wall beside us, breaking right through the drywall.

  I wanted him to be remorseful. I wanted him to feel a shred of guilt for the irreparable pain he’d caused our family. But I didn’t get it. Instead, I got him standing with the monster that tore into my shoulder and the woman who’d helped him betray us. Not a single bit of him felt guilty for any of this, and I intended to find out why.

  Hudson frowned and turned to run down the hall. He sprinted toward our father’s office, oxfords slipping along the carpet in his mad dash. If he made it to the office, he’d lock the door. I wasn’t strong enough to break it down by myself, and Samson had his attention elsewhere. Hudson could call for reinforcements by then.

  I lifted the gun, took a breath, and squeezed the trigger. Aim to wound, not to kill.

  One. Two. Recoil shook my wrists, up my arms, and into my chest. Bullets pierced the wall of Edgar’s office as pain lanced from my shoulder into my back.

  Three. Four. My arms jerked again. Missed again. My heart rate climbed as inadequacy fought for purchase inside me.

  Seven bullets left.

  Samson leapt toward Rolf and wrapped his arm around his neck. He plunged the knife deep into his throat, but Rolf thrashed anyway. He reached back and tore Samson off his back and threw him into the window of a conference room. Glass scattered along the floor.

  My stomach twisted, and I ran forward. I lifted my gun again at Hudson’s back and pulled the trigger twice. The bullets planted into the doorframe. If Hudson escaped, all of this would be for nothing. He had to answer for what he did! To Gerard. To me.

  Rolf screeched, shaking the room with an otherworldly howl. A chill racked my body, almost bringing to my knees. Hudson stumbled against the wall, holding his ears. I glanced behind me, but Samson and Rolf had taken their fight to the conference room.

  I ignored Rolf despite the twist of pain down my ear canals. Instead, I focused on Hudson again, held my breath, and aimed for his left shoulder.

  The sound of the bullet leaving the barrel shook me to my bones this time. Regret flared in my chest as Hudson stumbled into the do
or, keeping himself off the ground by virtue of the door handle alone. I didn’t hit him in the shoulder, but I certainly hit my target.

  Crimson pooled on the back of his upper thigh, and he struggled to his feet.

  I stuffed the guilt deep down and powered through strides, hoping to get to my father’s office before Hudson shut me out and my opportunity slipped away. I didn’t know what I’d do when I got in there, but Hudson couldn’t get away. He couldn’t try to have me killed and then stay out of jail because he was a spoiled brat.

  “Hudson!” I picked up the pace, and he crawled inside the office. The gun no longer made me ill. Fire coursed through my body. Gerard’s face danced in my mind’s eye. Hudson would pay for this. All of it.

  Sharp, sudden pain burst underneath my eye when I crossed the threshold to our father’s office, shooting up into my scalp and teeth. I stumbled, and the gun slipped from my fingers, clattering to the floor. A thick textbook lay at my feet.

  “Why couldn’t you just die like you were supposed to?” Hudson had propped himself up on one of our father’s bookcases. Blood started to drip onto the carpet from his pant leg. He gripped another book and jerked it from the shelf.

  My gun had slid a couple yards away. Out of reach.

  “Why couldn’t you just be a normal freaking person?” My throat hurt from screeching, but not as bad as my face did from getting nailed by the book. Hudson heaved another tome my direction, but he missed. If I hadn’t almost died so often in the last month thanks to his jealousy, I would’ve felt sorry for him. He was pathetic.

  “You order a hit for your sister, and now that I’m right here in front of you…you’re throwing books at me?” Taunting him wasn’t in my best interest, but it certainly made me feel better. “You’re such an infant! You don’t get what you want, so you throw a fit.”

  Hudson pushed off the shelf, eyes alight with rage. “Shut the fuck up, you stupid bitch!”