Midnight Falls (Sky Brooks Series Book 3)

by McKenzie Hunter

  I smiled. “You’re welcome.”

  “You have a good night, Skylar,” she said in a low voice. Then she was back at her door, closing it, but not before looking back at me, her lips barely moving into a smile.

  CHAPTER 21

  Maybe I was a masochist, because I stared back at Ethan, Josh, and Sebastian expecting more than just the limpid gazes that looked back at me as I told them about the situation with Logan and Chris. Stolid expressions, even on Josh, who in the past had proven unskilled at hiding his emotions; somehow he had now perfected it. “Did you make a formal agreement to do this?” Sebastian finally asked.

  “No, it was an implied agreement,” I said.

  “One that you did not fulfill,” Ethan added. Always the emphatic narrator.

  Their response was just thoughtful silence, but no more questions about it. Ethan and Josh looked at each other a few times. Long careful glances that just supported my ongoing suspicion that they communicated differently than other people did.

  Sebastian shrugged off my confession as nothing more than a simple peccadillo.

  I waited for Ethan to respond and add something, but his relaxed casual silence remained. Something roiled in me. “Did you hear what I did?”

  “Yes, you went over it in great detail. Do you have more to add?” Sebastian asked.

  I snapped my mouth shut, trying to decide what was more appalling: what I did, or how they were responding to it. I needed someone to be disappointed. To have a chastising spark in their eyes, a diminutive frown. Nothing. Not one of them thought I was better than this. I felt a little shattered, and that fragments of who I was had floated away in the wind. I hated this feeling. Or was it the opposite? Had the trials I faced inured me to this kind of moral trespass? Was I being prepared to survive in a world that would have devoured the old me?

  Assessing Sebastian’s and Ethan’s dismissive looks, perhaps I wasn’t the hardened knave that my overactive mind had painted me to be. But I damn sure wasn't who I had been two years before.

  They still hadn’t responded in the manner I expected. Did they believe it was just another day in Sky’s life? I’m not sure what I wanted. Disappointment? Offense? Indignation? Disgust? Something that ensured that they expected better? But why would I think that they would expect more from me than they did of themselves? The only thing I did was initiate a job that I couldn’t complete, and I was no better off having not completed it. They just wanted to make sure there weren’t consequences.

  Eventually, Sebastian spoke. “Can Samuel be reasoned with?”

  I shot Ethan a quick glance. His gaze narrowed with balmy indifference as if I were a fool to think he wouldn’t have shared the information I had confessed to him.

  “In which way? He doesn’t seem like a psychopath, if that is what you are asking. Just an extremist with an agenda. He doesn’t think we should exist because we are monsters and he thinks I am naïve enough to help him and fall for his rhetoric. Besides that,” my voice trailed off, because I wanted to say that he wasn’t any more dangerous than they were.

  “Call him,” Sebastian said.

  “Now?”

  “No, six days from now. Of course now. We need the third book—”

  “He’s not going to give it to you,” I offered.

  “Then I would like to hear that from him.” Sebastian started to slowly walk the large space in his office. “Josh believes that there has to be a spell in the Clostra that can remove all curses.”

  I should have been ecstatic, but I had the same portentous thoughts that also seemed to occupy Sebastian. The various emotions played on his face, and the most profound was apprehension. If it removed my curse, how many other curses would be removed? Would we remove curses that were necessary in this world, to control dangerous people and things?

  “We don’t have many choices,” Josh admitted, looking just as despondent about the situation.

  “I need to talk to him,” Sebastian said.

  I called him.

  “Skylar,” answered Samuel’s raspy light, optimistic voice over the speaker. It wasn’t the voice of a fanatical madman that wanted to divest the people of the otherworld of their magic and power. To the right unsuspecting individual, he could easily sway them to his side.

  “No, it’s Sebastian.”

  Palpable silence remained for an extended time before Samuel spoke. “I am not giving you the other book.” His tone was like a knife, and before Sebastian could respond, he said, “And it is not for sale either.”

  Sebastian’s humorless chuckle was a deep rumble that resonated through the room. “I am quite comfortable with you having the third book.”

  And I was sure he was. Sebastian just needed to know where it was, but he didn’t want them ever to be in the same place. As long as the pack had two, then the chances of anyone ever getting all three were slim. “But I need to borrow it.”

  “Borrow for a borrow,” Samuel suggested.

  “No. I don’t agree with your cause. Frankly, it’s a fatuous agenda. You will waste your life trying to end this world. It will not happen, but if you want to go on with your lost cause, have at it. You will never succeed, because in order for that to happen, you will need the other two and you get those over my dead body. I have no concerns with that. Stronger and better than you have tried to best me and failed. But let me humor you. This magicless utopia that you dream of doesn’t have an iota of a chance of success without allies.”

  “I have no desire to be allies with beasts that present themselves as human,” he quickly responded.

  “The feeling is mutual; I don’t want you as an ally either. However, I know a lot of really angry witches that have had their magic stripped from them by Marcia using the Aufero. You loan me the book and I can guarantee that their magic will be returned to them.” Sebastian paused. “I assure you their allegiance will no longer be to the Creed and Marcia, and they would be willing to align themselves with anyone who is against her. Don’t you think?”

  Samuel was very careful with his words. “I don’t need alliances. I do fine alone.”

  “Yeah, I saw how fine you did back at your little hideaway. Marcia and the Creed pretty much handed your ass to you and then made you thank them for the pleasure of doing so by forcing you into an agreement that restricts you from ever retaliating. What I saw wasn’t ‘fine’ by a long shot.”

  Samuel didn’t agree immediately. In fact, it took so long for him to respond that Sebastian had to call his name several times.

  It was a reluctant agreement, but an agreement nonetheless after several long moments.

  CHAPTER 22

  Samuel had settled on coming to the pack’s house, although I suspected it had little to do with our convenience and a lot to do with his curiosity about the pack’s home. It wasn’t their only one, but it was the compound that most knew about or the one that the pack didn’t actively hide. I knew of three others, but not their actual location, and I had a sneaking suspicion that, like most things that revolved around the pack, the address was revealed only on a need-to-know basis.

  Samuel assured us he could meet us in a couple of hours, which left us all wondering where he lived. I was curious whether he lived in the Midwest and had followed us to New York, or if it was actually his home state. The anticipation of his arrival left everyone ill at ease, claiming most of their patience. I found Ethan in the basement drilling into a heavy bag, his sweaty shirt clinging to his body. Forceful kicks and hard punches nearly separated the bag from its cable. He gave me a brief sweeping look before he returned his aggression to the bag.

  “You aren’t imagining that bag is me, are you?” I asked.

  He held the bag, his forehead pressed against it. “Why would I?” he asked before he returned to pounding into the bag. The unrestrained energy resonated off him. An overwhelming influx of primal power filled the room. Different than I was used to, but just as strong. “How was she when you left her?” he asked, grabbing the swinging bags
after a brutal hit.

  I thought about it for a while. “She was Chris,” I admitted.

  He turned. “I don’t know what that means.”

  “She’s a broken, dysfunctional person. And not in a hyperbolic way, but truly. She wasn’t angry—she just wanted to know who was the job for and made a snide comment about me not completing the job. Even though my job was to kidnap her.”

  He chuckled. “That sounds like her.”

  The clarity shone over their dysfunction and what held their relationship together when by all sense it should have ended. She was the personification of the pack. She was the “good” and the “bad” guy or whatever she needed to be to complete her objective. Lines blurred, ethics skewed, alliances made with the devil. In the end, even if an egregious act were directed at her, she understood that she was just a consequence of a job. I couldn’t admire it, because it was too disturbing. But Ethan did and was unable to hide how he felt.

  My mind had wandered to a place that I didn’t really like. Was I slipping into that ambiguous place of misplaced integrity that blurred the lines, and fractured conscience that failed to appreciate the difference between good and bad?

  Ethan, standing just inches from me, snapped me back to the present. Acutely aware of how close he was, I tensed as his gunmetal gaze watched me. He needed to get back to the bag; he had too much pent-up energy that needed to be released. His fingers trailed along my cheek and then over my lips. Then he kissed me—I didn’t respond. Instead, my lips stayed rigid, my hands balled at my side. “You said back at the restaurant that we shouldn’t let things between us get awkward,” I whispered against his lips.

  Stepping back, his hands that encircled my waist fell away. “This is awkward?”

  His long, lingering gaze trailed up me, his head tilted slightly and I was fully aware of how attracted I was to Ethan and how horribly wrong it was to be. “You don’t think it’s awkward,” he said.

  I shook my head, “No. But I think it is the king of bad ideas,” I said.

  His lips kinked into a miscreant smile as he gave me another lascivious look that forced the night in my bedroom to the forefront of my thoughts. My id was telling me to shut the hell up and my body wanted to listen. But common sense was the nagging overlord that wouldn’t have any of this foolishness.

  “Maybe you’re right.” He stripped off his shirt and went back to expending his energy on the bag. I turned to leave and he asked, “How many times did you get sick tonight?” while planting a side kick into the bag.

  “I didn’t, ” I said as I kept my back to him.

  “Seventy-seven,” he said.

  I could hear the arrogance and humor in his voice. How did he hold a conversation and count someone’s heart rate? That's how he knew when I lied.

  “That’s a stupid skill to have,” I mumbled as I continued up the stairs. I didn’t wait around the pack’s home until Samuel arrived, but instead decided to go home and wait.

  Samuel, Josh and I were in the pack’s library. It wasn’t unexpected that Samuel wouldn’t leave us with the books, so he and Josh both scribbled on their notepads as I read from all three of the books. It went slowly at first, Samuel unable to resist looking at the books over my shoulder and becoming increasingly irritated when the words quickly disappeared from the pages.

  When he wasn’t scribbling on his pad, he was studying me with interest, although he never asked any of the questions that were gilded on his face. The tranquil ocher eyes rooted on me whenever Josh would leave us alone. Which he had done reluctantly several times.

  “You are a special oddity. I suspect Sebastian has great plans for you,” he said softly.

  I never thought I would long for the day when someone would call me plain, simple, ordinary, or just unremarkable.

  “And you suspect that he has some grand plan? Like what, taking over the otherworld in an epic battle?”

  “No, I suspect it will be something more subtle. He is impressive. I applaud whatever he has done to warrant such naiveté and blind loyalty.”

  “And I will give the same accolades to those who have twisted your mind and instilled such beliefs in you. You can stop their ability to change into monsters, as you put it, but you will not change their personalities. Those that are savages will remain that way even if they no longer have the ability to change. Every full moon, I change into a wolf. Sometimes I do it for just the hell of it, but that is where that part of me ends. And that is true for many of us.”

  His smile was genuine, and off-putting. Why did I expect him to go off into a tirade revealing to me his crazy face? Instead, what echoed back were delicate eyes, void of any insanity, a light unwavering smile that implored for some understanding—and a few times I had to fight not to give it.

  “But are you really? You aren’t the first were-animal that I’ve dealt with. You are different, but it will eventually be overshadowed by the horrors of this world. You’ll do unthinkable things—for the good of the pack. That is what you all like to use, right? Yes, you will do heinous things for your pack. It will be hard at first, and then it will become easier to do because it is acceptable in this world. And eventually you to will be lost to it. As much as you want to believe I am a fanatic with nefarious intent, I am not. I came to you because I see someone different. You aren’t like them, although you pretend you are.”

  The image of Chris’ drugged body on the ground prior to me taking her to Logan flashed in my head. But it wasn’t for Logan; it was for me and it all had started with the pack, hadn’t it?

  He had started to get me. For a brief moment I gave myself over to the idea of living in a magic-free world—normal. The books lay in front of me and Samuel sat across the table. My gaze slipped over in the direction of Josh’s notes. So many spells.

  As if he had read my mind, Samuel said, “We could leave with them now. I could get us out of here.”

  I took out my phone and pulled up Google translate. It was slower than working with someone that was versed in Latin, but I had a feeling Samuel was too distracted by his agenda to be of any use. “We need to finish and find the spell we need,” I said firmly. He had gotten to me, and for a few moments I had given myself over to the fantastical thoughts of what-if. But the abstract world of what-if just didn’t work. I had jumped down the rabbit hole, and there was a lot of crazy stuff down it, but I would adapt and survive. I was determined to do so. How could I make a decision for everyone about whether or not they should be a were-animal or possess magic? What type of world would I create by doing that?

  He relaxed into the painful resolve that he had failed to convince me to side with him. Working hard not to look angry at his failure, he took a seat, but the rest of the night I garnered a great deal of his attention.

  Nearly three hours later we had gone through one-third of the book, revealing spells stronger and darker than any of us had imagined. When we found the right one, we stopped. Samuel wanted to continue. He looked at the books with longing. An unequivocal lust for the knowledge that the books held. But we reiterated that the spells would be no good to him without the books, and they would never be in the same room again, if any of us had anything to do with it.

  Samuel’s disappointed, shadowed gaze barely left me even as Josh performed the spell. He was furled over the books, speaking the invocation in Latin, as the whirl of jasper, orange, cream and teal flowed from them. There was a shift in the air, and a dank feeling hovered as the large library became too small to contain its power. The walls shuddered and the bookcases collapsed, sending books all over the room. Sharp whips of magic, so far removed from the natural form that they both possessed and overwhelmed the space. Samuel gulped for breath that just wouldn’t come until he gave in to the indomitable power that would settle for nothing less than submission. Darkness overtook Josh’s eyes as he continued with the spell. The ragged sharp breaths stopped as he slumped over the books. After fulfilling their task, the books closed, settling next to each other in a qui
escent state.

  “How do you feel?” Samuel asked me.

  I didn’t feel anything. Should I have? I didn’t feel any different and I had no idea if it had worked. I guessed we would have to see.

  It was déjà vu once again. Ethan and I were entering into the little store that was a front for the Creed’s sanctuary, but now he was in wolf form, and Josh and Samuel, who refused to be left behind, followed behind us.

  Little had changed, except the lock was easier to break with two powerful witches at our side. After a quick invocation, it disappeared. And I cautiously walked toward the windowed armoire in the corner. I stopped fifty feet from it, waiting for the sickly feeling that overtook me when the imprecation was invoked. Nothing. I eased closer. Nothing.

  It had worked.

  I moved with more confidence, pushing aside the thought of all the other curses that we had abolished. The Aufero glowed, still the odd color that it had turned since we had removed the magic from Ethan. Extra measures had been taken to keep it safe. Now secured with locks, the Aufero pulsated, expanding, working at the locks, yanking them apart. I wasn’t a foot away before it shattered the glass and slammed into my chest, hard enough to push out a gasp. Shoving it into a satchel, we headed out the door.

  On the other side of the door, we were met with a blistering wind as hard rains pounded us. Thunder crackled and a bolt of lightning drove into Samuel, thrashing him into the wall. The car that we came in was there, but Sebastian was gone. Liam and the army that had accompanied him in Elysian came from the west. Vision blurred by the rain, I could barely make out the mass of people that descended upon us, overtaking the small space behind the store. Ethan lunged into the crowd, knocking down three of them, his fangs tearing into their throats. The others surrounded Liam, protecting him as they retreated.