by Anne Hope
The chill in the car was palpable. “Oh, Marcus, I’m so sorry.” Regan’s heart ached for him. She remembered how she’d felt when Cal had wanted to turn Jace as an infant. What Marcus had endured was far, far worse. Without a soul to anchor him, his son had undoubtedly turned into a monster.
“When I heard, I lost it. I threw myself at Kyros, tried to rip the bastard’s head off. But I was only one man, and he had an army at his disposal. They incapacitated me, dragged me to the tanks.”
She’d heard about Athanatos’s execution chamber, the copper tanks within which he’d drowned those he condemned to death. Without angel’s blood, copper and water had been the only weapons available to him.
“Did you know they used to leave their prisoners in there for days?” he informed her in a bitter rasp. “The water inches toward your chin, one chilling drop at a time. Your skin turns ice cold, then your organs slowly start to shut down. By the third day, the pain is excruciating. You’re practically begging to die.”
“But you didn’t. Cal rescued you.” She remembered the story, how the Watchers had raided the Kleptopsychs’ headquarters and pulled Marcus out of the tank.
“He could’ve let me die. He knew who I was, what I’d done. Because of me, he’d lost hundreds of recruits.” Guilt darkened his expression again, as did a heavy measure of regret. “But he didn’t. He took me in, gave me something to believe in again. Something to fight for.”
And I took it all away from you. Her stomach bucked at the thought. She hadn’t grasped the true magnitude of Marcus’s sacrifice until now. Saving the world wasn’t just a calling for him, it was his road to redemption, his way of atoning for his sins and holding the guilt at bay.
Sunlight sifted through the clouds, speckling the blacktop. Green-headed trees swayed in the breeze, their hypnotic dance undeniably graceful. Behind them, Ben continued to bash his action figures together, no longer listening to their conversation.
Regan looked out the side window at the world streaking by. “So where’s your son now? Is he still with Kyros and the Kleptopsychs?”
“No.” His grip tightened around the steering wheel. “Kyros’s plan backfired. He failed to extinguish my boy’s soul. The darn thing was so powerful, it escaped him.”
Her gaze swiveled his way. “So Cal recruited him?”
Marcus shook his head. “By the time I found out about it, it was too late. My son had already chosen his path.” A toe-curling pause followed. “He went rogue,” he finally said, “and I was ordered to kill him.”
Chapter Nineteen
After that startling revelation, Marcus lapsed into silence. Regan was hard-pressed to get anything else out of him. Ben fell asleep in the backseat, and a strange hush descended over the sedan. Only the rev of the motor and the occasional whistle of the wind broke the stillness.
They passed a sign that welcomed them to the State of Washington. A short while later, Marcus drove through a large set of steel gates and pulled into a townhouse development on the outskirts of Spokane.
Regan’s curiosity reached a peak. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see.”
Lifting a sleeping Ben, she followed Marcus down a pebbled path toward the center building. Newly planted trees shivered in the breeze, their leaves glimmering in the sunlight, and multicolored flowers dotted the cobblestone walkway.
She took in the perfectly manicured lawns, the neat rows of identical two-story homes bordering the neo-classic building they approached. “What is this, Pleasantville?”
Marcus chuckled. “Sure looks like it, doesn’t it?”
Could the guy be any more cryptic? Dark energy stretched beckoning fingers toward them, growing stronger as they approached. A nasty tingle sprouted at the base of her spine. “Okay, I’m officially creeped out now.”
Marcus swung the door open and escorted her inside a vast reception hall. Several of the tables were occupied by strangers Regan recognized all too well. Her free hand instinctively went to the hilt of her dagger. The occupants looked like everyday people, dressed in chinos and Polo shirts—hell, some even wore business suits—but she knew what they were. She felt it in her bones. “Rogues.”
The creatures turned to stare at them, looking as startled as she felt. Marcus placed a quelling hand over hers. “They won’t hurt us,” he reassured her. “They’re not what you think.”
“No? Because they sure feel like goddamn Rogues to me.” Panic had edged in, and her voice quavered despite her best efforts to remain calm.
Marcus walked ahead of her. “We’re here to see Adrian. Is he around?” he asked the guy sitting at the nearest table fiddling with a laptop.
The creature took his eyes off the computer and looked up at him questioningly. “Who wants to know?”
“Marcus.”
The name seemed to strike a chord in the Rogue because something shifted behind his eyes. With an acquiescent nod, he folded the screen shut and stood. “Follow me.”
If ever there was a time Regan wanted to throttle Marcus, it was now. He’d driven them straight into a nest of Rogues, and she wasn’t sure she had enough blood left on her blade to take them all out if they decided to attack them. Her arms tightened around Ben. There was no question these creatures would hunger to steal his light, considering how bright it burned. How could she possibly defend him against the lot of them?
“I really hope you know what you’re doing,” she whispered sourly.
Marcus didn’t bother to reply. He followed Mr. Laptop down a long corridor, past a small kitchen, through a courtyard that led to another building.
The Rogue stopped in front of a unit marked 12B. “Is he expecting you?” he asked.
Marcus’s expression gave nothing away. “No.”
“Then good luck,” the creature warned. “If you are who you say you are, then I’m sure you know how much he values his privacy.”
The Rogue left them standing on the threshold of unit 12B, unharmed.
“I think I’ve slipped down the rabbit hole,” Regan muttered. “Civilized Rogues.” She released an incredulous laugh.
“I figured you had to see it for yourself to believe it.” He rang the doorbell.
“I’m still not sure I do. How is this possible?”
Marcus gestured toward the townhouse with a nod of his head. “He made it possible.”
Just then, the door swung open and a tall stranger stood before them, a man with dark hair and navy blue eyes so much like Marcus’s, her next breath snagged in her throat.
Marcus placed a comforting hand on her back. “Regan, I’d like you to meet Adrian. My son.”
Regan stiffened beside him, and Marcus anticipated the barrage of questions that would eventually come. But for the time being, she was too shocked to speak.
Adrian looked them over, wariness and mistrust scrawled all over his face. “What are you doing here?” There was no welcome in his voice, nothing to indicate he was secretly thrilled to be graced with an unexpected visit from his father.
“You owe me a favor.” Marcus squeezed his way past him into what was indisputably a bachelor pad. “I’m here to collect.”
Adrian stormed in after him, anger pulsing off his taut body. “And you think you can just drop by whenever you please, raid my location—”
“Who’s raiding anything? Unless you consider a woman and a small child an army.”
“The Watchers aren’t welcome here,” Adrian reminded him. “We have a deal.”
“I didn’t come as a Watcher. I have no intention of disrupting your idyllic little community.”
Adrian’s frozen features showed no signs of thawing. “Then why are you here?”
“We need a place to lie low for a while. Somewhere safe.”
Regan remained by the door, clutching Ben to her chest as though afraid Adrian would rip him from her arms any minute now. Marcus didn’t blame her for being nervous. Rogues had a reputation for being both relentless and unpredictable, especially when
they coveted a soul.
“Who are you running from?” Adrian dissected Marcus with his surgical gaze.
“The same people you once ran from.”
Frigid caution gave way to surprise. “Kyros I can believe, but surely you’re not referring to the Watchers?”
“Cal and I had a disagreement,” he reluctantly admitted.
A chortle resonated from Adrian’s chest. “I never thought I’d see the day.”
Marcus released an exasperated breath and ventured farther into the sparsely decorated townhouse. “So will you help us?”
Adrian prowled after him. His body language oozed defiance, but something in his eyes—a sense of duty, the desire to repay an old debt—gave Marcus hope.
“Cal barely tolerates our existence as it is. If I hide you, it may give him the incentive he needs to shut us down.”
“It’s a very real possibility.” Marcus refused to lie to him. “Then again, I once took a risk for you.”
A look passed between them, laden with meaning. For a few seconds, neither of them spoke, both lost in the memory of their last encounter. Then his son’s composure changed, and his resistance slowly shattered. Either that or the man was desperate to be rid of him.
Adrian walked over to a console in the living room, opened a drawer where a fistful of keys lay on a burgundy velvet liner, organized by number. “Unit 10C is vacant. You can use it for a few days, but don’t get too comfortable.” With reticent fingers, he snatched the key ring labeled 10C and handed it to Marcus. “I don’t want any trouble,” he warned. “I’ve worked too hard to build this place.”
Marcus gratefully accepted the key. “I appreciate it. Consider your debt fully repaid.”
The ice finally melted, and Adrian’s mouth curled slightly at the corners. “I would’ve helped you even if I didn’t owe you. But don’t make a habit of showing up on my doorstep.”
Marcus returned his son’s halfhearted smile. “Wouldn’t dream of it.”
Unit 10C was a mirror image of Adrian’s, with stark white walls, terracotta tiles devoid of carpeting, and furniture that was as scarce as it was basic. Regan’s footsteps echoed off the vaulted ceiling as she walked across the shiny hardwood floor, taking it all in. A two-story foyer graced the entrance, opening up to a small living room, a utilitarian kitchen and a breakfast nook. The winding staircase on her left led to the second floor, which she assumed housed the bedrooms. The shades covering the windows were drawn, filtering the light and casting a hazy white glow throughout the house.
The place would never grace the cover of Architectural Digest, but it was clean and homey and inviting. It wasn’t the townhouse itself she had a problem with. What unsettled her was that it was located smack in the heart of a Rogue community.
She was still processing all she’d learned. Marcus had a son. His son was a Rogue. And he was somehow responsible for this strange assembly of civilized monsters. Though she’d longed to bombard Marcus with questions, she hadn’t said a single word in Adrian’s presence, afraid of drawing his attention to Ben. Regardless of what Marcus said, she couldn’t bring herself to trust a Rogue.
“I thought you killed him.” These were the first words she’d spoken to Marcus since they’d left Adrian’s townhouse.
“I said I was ordered to kill him. I never said I actually went through with it.” He took Ben from her arms, then gently placed him on the dark blue suede-upholstered couch. With a tenderness that surprised her, he grabbed a fleece throw from a nearby chair and spread it over the boy.
“Help me out here, Marcus, because I’m seriously freaking out.” The cap she wore to conceal her hair was starting to annoy her, so she whipped it off. Her thick mass of curls instantly tumbled over her back and shoulders. “I know he’s your son, but how do you know we can trust him?”
He turned to face her, his expression calm and sure. “Because somewhere out there, he’s got a soul.”
“So do many Rogues. That doesn’t mean they’re in touch with them. Without the Watchers’ bond—”
“A Hybrid is powerless to resist his dark urges. Yes, I know. But Adrian’s special. He’s built a community here, not much different from the Watchers.”
“Are you saying he has the power to forge a bond between his recruits, like Cal?”
Marcus shook his head. “Not exactly. Cal uses angel’s blood to link our souls together. Think of it like a network of computers feeding off one huge power source.
“Adrian doesn’t possess Cal’s ability to link souls, nor does he have access to angel’s blood. But he does have a gift that’s just as effective. He knows how to get through to people. Somehow, he subdues the darkness and makes everyone around him, even Rogues, long to be decent.”
More confused than ever, Regan trudged into the living room and dropped into the welcoming embrace of an armchair. “So you’re telling me none of these guys feed? Ever?”
Marcus ran a weary palm over his face. “Adrian doesn’t. He hasn’t for almost twenty-five years. But the others do.”
“And Cal accepts that?”
“He and Adrian have an understanding.” He came to sit on the armrest beside her.
“What kind of understanding?”
“The Rogues in this community only feed on diseased souls. The State of Washington believes in the death penalty. Most of Adrian’s recruits have jobs that allow them to attend executions. Some are lawyers, others are cops. I think one of them is even a judge. Their goal is to identify irreparably damaged souls, then eliminate them.”
Marcus captured her gaze, held it. “I’m not talking about your common thug,” he explained. “I’m talking about rapists and serial killers and pedophiles. Souls that cannot be redeemed.”
An old recollection sparked to life within her. “I remember him—Adrian, the vigilante, the Rogue who hunted criminals. You were after him when I first joined the Watchers. You chased him for years, but he was always one step ahead of you.” Then he’d just dropped off the radar. Word around the complex was that he’d died. She hadn’t put it together till now, but suddenly everything fell into place.
Marcus seemed pleased that she’d finally clued in. “We didn’t know he had a soul back then. We thought he was beyond redemption.” A flicker of pride passed behind his eyes. “We were wrong. Adrian is stronger than us all. So strong that a mere memory is enough to sustain him.”
Regan shook her head in awe. “How did he manage to domesticate a bunch of Rogues? They’re like rabid dogs.” Some Rogues were born with souls, some weren’t, but they all had two things in common—their incessant need to feed and their total lack of self-control.
The question was meant to be rhetorical, but he answered it anyway. “By picking only Hybrids and by identifying them early. Most of them he recruited when they were still human.”
“How does he find them?”
“Through an outreach program that caters to troubled youth. It should come as no surprise that many delinquents are actually Hybrids.”
Regan couldn’t believe what she was hearing. “So Adrian is competing directly with Cal, and Cal’s all right with that?”
Marcus gave her a crooked grin that threatened to melt her bones. “You’re forgetting Cal’s favorite catch phrase. Free will. Every creature has the right to choose his path. As long as these Rogues don’t purposely harm humanity, the Watchers have no recourse against them. If at any point people start turning up dead, however, all bets are off.”
To think this secret Rogue society had existed for decades and she’d been completely unaware of it. “Why didn’t you ever tell me about this place?”
“Cal and I agreed a long time ago to keep it hush-hush. The last thing we wanted was to lose all our potential recruits.”
“Freedom, peace, the right to feed and no vow of celibacy. Sure sounds like a sweeter deal to me.”
Marcus shifted his weight, and his arm skimmed hers. “Maybe I should ask Adrian to let us stay indefinitely.” His voice was lo
w and sultry, caressing even as it teased.
“I doubt he wants his father around messing in his business. Especially one who’s so damn bossy.” He smiled in response, and a silent thrill resonated through her. “Plus, I can’t picture you in a suit.”
“Never know, I might get used to it.” With the back of his hand, he brushed the hair from her shoulder. His fingers hovered beside her neck, the air around them pulsating with the promise of a touch that never came. “There are a lot of things I could get used to.” He spoke so softly, so silkily, her skin tingled as though stroked by the words.
His hand fell away, and she stifled a groan. Why did he have to be so damned disciplined? He’d been celibate for one hundred and ninety-three years, almost two freaking centuries. What made her think he’d break his precious vow for her? She was handy with a blade, a whiz at battle, but seduction required eyelash batting and hip swaying, not fancy footwork.
Feeling uncharacteristically sorry for herself, she stood abruptly. “I’m going to go get the stuff from the car.” Her voice sounded flat, laced with bitter disappointment.
Marcus beat her to the door. “I’ll take care of it. You stay and watch over the ki—Ben. You stay and watch over Ben.”
Regan smiled through her frustration. He’d called the boy by his name, and that small acknowledgement lifted her spirits. Maybe there was hope for him yet.
The conference room was exceptionally quiet. A solemn hush hung over the Watchers as they gathered to go over their strategy and reflect on the catastrophe they’d just averted. They all looked to Cal for guidance, but for the first time in ages he found himself devoid of answers.
The TV screens behind him were all on but muted. Now more than ever the Watchers had to remain alert, their fingers poised on the weak, unsteady pulse of the world.
“Kyros is growing too confident,” he told them. “What we witnessed in Eugene was only the beginning.”
Cal wished he could look to the heavens for a sign, to ask the council for advice as he had once done. But that bridge had been burned several millennia ago, and according to Lillith, even the angels were now corrupt. “Kyros has openly declared war on humanity. If we don’t find a way to stop him, everything we’ve fought to preserve will be lost.”
