by Lexi Blake
“It was good you said no, then.” Lee patted my back.
Liv gave Marcus her most ferocious schoolteacher look. “Vampires have that persuasion thing, you know. Girls can get in serious trouble when they turn on the charm. How do we know he isn’t using it on Kelsey?”
Why was this happening to me? “Seriously, everyone stay out of my love life. I’m sorry Marcus and I…kissed where a camera could see it. It won’t happen again.”
“My intentions toward your niece are entirely honorable,” Marcus said suddenly. “I would be happy to discuss them with you at your earliest opportunity. I intend to take my time, though. Kelsey is wary and needs a while to adjust to a fully functional relationship.”
“You’re serious then?” Zack pinned Marcus with his stare.
“I am,” Marcus assured him. “But you might find Kelsey a bit harder to sell on the idea than you might think.”
“The idea of what?” I was so not following the conversation. I noticed that the king had gotten grim.
“Can we move this along?” Donovan asked. “We have some important matters we need to decide. We can sort out the Nex Apparatus’s love life at a later date. Marcus, if you don’t mind?”
The king patted his son’s back and turned toward the back of the condo where Zack’s large office was located. Marcus bowed slightly to my uncle. “I apologize for any embarrassment my actions might have cost your family. Know I only acted the way I did out of my extreme affection for your niece.”
“It’s all right, Marcus,” Liv said, waving him off. “Your butt looked good, too.”
Marcus stared at the schoolteacher. “That isn’t helpful, Miss Carey.”
Liv turned a lovely shade of pink, her eyes sliding away. “Sorry, sir.”
Marcus leaned over and kissed my forehead. “Enjoy your dinner, bella. We’ll be retiring early. We have a plane to catch in the morning.”
With that, he and Zack walked off to join the king.
“What the heck just happened?” Liv asked, her mouth slightly open. “Did Marcus tell your uncle he’s going to marry you?”
“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Rhys shook his head.
“No one asked you,” his brother replied.
“Stop, everyone.” I had to catch my breath. “Marcus did what countless other men in the same position would do. He told my irrational uncle exactly what he wanted to hear. Now we can go home to Italy, and Zack won’t bug Marcus anymore.” There was no way someone like Marcus would marry a woman like me. It was ridiculous. Vampires married companions. Except Hugo had mentioned he once married one of his Hunters.
I found the whole conversation completely unsettling and was happy we could move on to other accusations.
“You’re going home?” Lee’s voice rose. He shoved a hand through his thick black hair. “You just got here. This is your home.”
“Why are you weaving, Aunt Kewsey?” Courtney asked. “Don’t you wike it hewe?”
No one can make you feel guiltier than a kid. They don’t take into account little things like obligations. They only know that you promised them something, and now you’re a ratfink bastard for not delivering. “Marcus thinks we should leave.”
“What do you think?” Lee asked.
“No one asks me what I think.” This was the way my life had gone since the king had decided to press me into service. I sat outside waiting while a bunch of men decided my fate.
“And they never will,” Zoey Donovan-Quinn said as she stood looking at me. There was a baby girl on her hip and something in her free hand. The tiny girl was Evangeline, her daughter with Dev Quinn, though I knew the king claimed her as his own. He called the girl Evan. She was a mini me of her mama. She had dark red curls and pretty hazel eyes. She clung to her mother’s sweater like a monkey, but grinned down at her brothers.
“Rhys! Lee!” she shouted and attempted to scramble down.
The Queen of all Vampire set her daughter down and the girl, who looked to be roughly three, ran into her brother’s arms. Lee picked her up and twirled her around then passed her off to Rhys. Rhys and Courtney wandered off to play with the newcomer, but Lee stayed behind.
The queen greeted Liv. She sent me a questioning look when she noticed the near-empty beer bottle sitting near my best friend.
“She got bitten by a vampire for the first time.” I sighed and took another swig of my own beer. My uncle had good taste. “She liked it. Now she feels guilty.”
“I do not,” Liv piped up. “I don’t have anything to feel guilty about. I was only helping him out. He’d been shot several times. I was the only blood available. I didn’t enjoy it.”
I was supposed to believe that? “Yes, you did. Those moans weren’t about pain, my friend.”
“I have a boyfriend.” Her lips turned down sullenly.
She was forgetting so many truths. “You have a boyfriend who’s addicted to drugs and possibly aiding a demon in planning to take over our world.”
“Oh, you can totally cheat on him.” The queen sat down across from me.
“I didn’t cheat.” Liv stood suddenly. “I’m going to get another beer.”
Liv stalked away in search of more alcoholic solace. The queen slid a framed picture across the table to me. I found myself looking at a man with curly brown hair. He was dressed in an army green T-shirt and jeans. He needed a shave, but he smiled gamely. My heart seized a little because I’d never seen one picture of this man, but I knew who he was.
“I had to promise him a case of beer to get him to stand still long enough to snap this one.” Zoey looked down at the picture, her lips curling up with fondness.
This was my father. Lee Owens.
“I like that picture.” Lee stared at the man he was named after. “He looks happy.”
There was a fine sheen of tears in the queen’s eyes as she put an arm around her son. “I know you do, buddy. He was happy.” The queen winked at her son. “Baby boy, why don’t you go do what you do best? Report back when you hear something particularly interesting.”
Lee grinned that adorable grin and was off like a shot. For a human, he was fast and quiet. It was good to know I wasn’t the only one who encouraged the kid’s more criminally inclined talents.
“This was taken a few weeks before we left for England.”
I knew the story. It was a few weeks before he died. My father had guarded the queen and when the old Council caught them, he’d been executed. The royal family blamed a demon for betraying them to the Council.
Yeah, I wanted to meet that demon someday.
“Your father was the best guard I’ve ever met, and believe me, I’ve run through some.” The queen smiled down at the photo. When she looked up at me, she was super serious. “He was the only one who understood.”
“Understood what?”
“That he didn’t have to manhandle every moment of my day. Lee believed in me. He followed my lead until such time as he knew I was going to be horribly murdered. That actually happened more often than you would think. Trent and I get on all right. Mostly, we get along because I had kids by the time he became my guard. I settled down. I still don’t tell him everything. I still sneak away from time to time. It makes him crazy.”
I liked the idea of Trent freaking out because his charge gave him the slip.
“The point is, I told your father everything. I left nothing out. In exchange, he made damn sure I fought for my place.” She said the last with emphasis and then sat back, waiting for my reply.
“I don’t know what the hell my place is.” I wasn’t quite sure what she wanted.
She shook her head ruefully. “It’s hard to remember sometimes, but I’ve sat where you’re sitting, and I was even a bit older than you. I know you think we don’t have much in common, but you’re wrong. You got a raw deal in the childhood department. I think you can get past that. I had a crappy mother, too.”
“Did she try to kill you?” I could win this particular war. The man who
raised me had actually attempted to murder me. That story usually won me first prize in the awful parent contest.
The queen frowned. “No, but she ran off with an accountant. My point is, we’re both women in a man’s world. These aren’t fuzzy, huggy men. These are domineering, take-charge, protect-the-women kind of guys. You have to fight or you’re just something soft for their beds.”
“I doubt Marcus thinks I’m soft.” He couldn’t possibly view me in that fashion. He knew how dangerous I could be. No one would ever think of me as sweet and feminine and in need of protection.
“Then why is he trying to haul you off the continent?”
I was honest with the queen where I wouldn’t be with Liv. I didn’t want Liv to think less of me or feel sorry for me, but I knew why he was doing it. “He doesn’t think I’m smart enough to handle someone like Winter.”
“Felix is going to have to work on your self-esteem issues.” The queen shook her head. “Answer me this, is Marcus sleeping with you?”
“Yes.” I was pretty sure she knew the answer to that question.
“I know Marcus. He wouldn’t be involved in a serious way with you if he didn’t respect your intelligence. He’s a hard man. He doesn’t care about much anymore. He cares about you, Kelsey. He’ll run your whole life if you let him and perversely, that will make him care less about you.”
“Marcus wants us to go back to Italy. He’s not asking for my opinion.” It rankled.
She pointed to the picture of my dad. “He would have pushed you, Kelsey. He would have pushed you to make your own way and demand your rights.”
“Why are you doing this?” I didn’t trust people to look out for me. She had to have an agenda. “Did the king tell you to get me to stay or to go?”
Zoey laughed. “Oh, Danny would be perfectly upset with me for having this discussion. He would love for you to turn out to be a good soldier, exactly like your uncle and Trent. I’m talking to you because it’s what your father would want. He would want you to stand up and tell them what you’ll do and what you won’t.”
The queen stood, leaving the photo with me. “Keep that. I have one of his hats, too. I want you to have it. It isn’t much of a legacy, but it’s yours. The real legacy he left you is in your power. Your father was a champion of what was right, not what was expedient or easy for himself. He would have laughed at the thought, but he was an idealist in a way Danny and Dev aren’t. Daniel needs you to be more than a weapon. He needs you to be you.”
With that, the queen walked away. I heard her greet her husband and saw Quinn picking up his daughter. He tossed her in the air and caught her again. She laughed and enjoyed it because never in her baby brain did she think he would let her fall. I never had that. My mother had loved me, but I never had that big strong man to count on. I stared back down at the picture of my biological father. The image in front of me grew watery. He wasn’t a particularly handsome man, yet everything about him called to me. I wished so much in that moment that I could know him, any part of him.
“Don’t cry.” Lee put his hand over mine. “It’s going to be okay, Kelsey.”
He was nine, and he was trying to comfort me. He patted my back as he had seen others do before. I gave him a slight smile. “I’m all right. I’m just sad that I didn’t get to meet my dad.”
He smiled at me. “I have three. You could have one of mine.”
“Three?” I knew about Daniel and Dev.
“Yeah,” he said with a shrug. “Bris counts, too.”
“Ah.” I hadn’t thought about the fertility god who had residence in Dev Quinn’s body.
“He totally counts. He orders me around and gives me all kinds of advice when he takes over Papa’s body. He’s more comfortable with Rhys, though. I’m only a human.”
I hugged him tightly. This child should never once feel that he was less than anyone. “Oh, Lee, you go so far beyond mere human I can’t express it. Now, tell me what the word is.”
His brown eyes lit up. Lee was a kid who loved subterfuge. “So, Uncle Marcus and Uncle Zack think you should go back to Italy. Uncle Zack was totally like ‘no’ until he heard Marcus say that Jack Frost was coming for you, and then he got on board with Uncle Marcus. Dad thinks you can totally take out Jack Frost. I think so, too. He doesn’t sound that tough to me. He’s like snow, and that’s not so bad.”
Lee hadn’t had his arm frozen off, so I would make my own decisions.
“And Uncle Marcus says that the lieutenant guy is just trying to get in your pants,” Lee added.
So much for Marcus’s belief in my abilities. “Good to know.”
I stood up. My decision was made. It was final. It would probably cost me the only man to treat me like a princess, but I wasn’t cut out for the role anyway. I looked down the hallway at the door where the men making the decisions about my life were meeting. The door was closed to me. It might be time to kick it open.
Lee’s hand found mine. He was looking at the same closed door. “You want me to go with you?”
I smiled down at him, surprised at the confidence he gave me. But this was my fight. “No, buddy. I think I have to do this on my own. How about we play some Xbox after dinner?”
“Cool.” I expected him to run off and find his brother, but as I walked down the long hall, I felt his eyes on me. He watched with a slight smile on his face as I walked into the office. I winked back his way. This stand I was taking went beyond just me. It was for us—for those of us who didn’t have a voice right now. We were either too young or considered too naïve or inexperienced. We had the right to speak and we needed someone who could stand for us.
It looked like that would be me.
I opened the door and was assaulted by chaos.
“You can’t take her off the playing field,” Donovan argued.
“I can and I will,” Marcus snarled back.
My uncle was standing between the two men. “I think we need to talk about this.”
“I’m staying.” I had to practically yell to be heard over the argument the men in my life were having. Marcus and Zack were standing close to Donovan, trying to get the king to see their point.
“Kelsey, you will wait outside,” Marcus said in that authoritative tone he tended to use on everyone but me. I had to admit, I kind of hated it being used on me. “I will be with you in a moment.”
“No.” I stood my ground. “I’m the Nex Apparatus. I’m the one whose butt is on the line. I make the decision. I’m staying.”
Marcus sighed, and I saw his jaw tighten. “Kelsey, you will do as your trainer tells you to do.”
“She’ll do as her king commands her,” Donovan said firmly.
“I’ll do what I want.” It was time to put my foot down. Kings and trainers were important, but this was my job. My life. The queen was right. I had to make a place for myself or be forever dismissed. Knowing my father would have stood behind me, with his game smile and his taciturn outlook on life, gave me a strength and confidence I didn’t have before. He would have given me a big old thumbs-up, and that helped me stand tall. “Look here, Donovan, you might hold most of the cards when it comes to me, but I got the only one that counts. I can say no, and I can mean it. I won’t be doing your dirty work mindlessly. I won’t assassinate someone because they disagree with you or you think it’s a fun idea. If you want me to put my ass on the line, you better convince me. Start now.”
I got the impression no one talked that way to Daniel Donovan. He stopped and the room went quiet. I wondered if he was going to call Trent in. Even Marcus seemed surprised I’d spoken to the king that way. I hadn’t been raised to kiss his ass.
After a long, uncomfortable moment, Donovan smiled briefly before he began his pitch. “All right, then. Those files you stole tell the tale, Owens. The drug known as Brimstone is both highly addictive and fast acting. It works on the impulse center of the brain in shifters and weres. It doesn’t work at all on witches. The witches they gave the drug to died.”
“So Winter wants a bunch of psychopathic shifters wandering around? Is he trying to give you hell? It’ll be hard to keep this out of the papers.” Secrecy was important in our world.
“Henri is worried that there’s more to this,” Donovan explained. “Demons can have certain powers over the weak minded. This drug gives Winter a whole bunch of powerful, weak-minded soldiers.”
“So he takes away their impulse control and then potentially influences them.” It was a lethal one-two punch. Our own people would be the ones coming after us. “They could come after you.”
“Or anyone Winter wanted gone.” Donovan stood up from his chair. His blue eyes narrowed. “So, Nex Apparatus, are you in or are you going back to Italy?”
There was no question about what I needed to do. “I’m in.”
Marcus cursed behind me. “You’re not ready for this. You must listen to me, Kelsey. I know what I’m talking about.”
I clenched my fists, willing him to understand. “It doesn’t matter that I’m not ready. I don’t get to choose this, Marcus. Can’t you see that? This isn’t some game where it doesn’t matter if I play this round. I don’t have two thousand years. I got today and maybe tomorrow, and if I sit on my ass while people around me suffer when I could help, then what the fuck does any of this mean?”
He slumped down in his chair, and his hand reached up to massage his brow. “That is a child’s question. Only a child seeks meaning in that which is meaningless.”
“Maybe it is.” I was resolute. I was the one who had to sleep at night, and I couldn’t do that if I was on a plane to Italy while the world was in turmoil. “But I gotta find out on my own. All I know is if I walk and people I care about suffer, I won’t be able to forgive myself.”
He nodded and stood suddenly. There was a distance between us, a remoteness to his stance that I hated. I reached out with my mind, but his was closed to me. “Then I am no longer needed. You have made your choice, and it seems my counsel cannot change your mind. Good night, Kelsey, Your Highness.”
I had known he would probably walk. People do that when you don’t live up to their expectations. I’d known that eventually he would leave me, but his walking out that door was like a kick to the gut. My heart felt like it was about to burst. It took everything I had to stand my ground. What I wanted to do was run after him, beg him not to leave me. Instead, I forced myself to sit. I had a job to do.
