Lafayette grinned at her in his secret knowledge. His eyes sparkled with mischief. “It wouldn’t be a prophecy if we could just avoid it so easily, my dear. The prophecy says that the father of the heir will try to resist his temptation for his wife but will give in to his desires and consume her whole.”
“You mean eat her?” Toni asked. Considering everything that she had heard and witnessed in the last 24 hours it wouldn’t be far-fetched.
Lafayette laughed. “No, he will take all of her, faults, perfections, beauty, pain – he will take all of her into his soul and make her troubles and successes his own. He will no longer serve his own life. Instead, he will serve her and the child that they produce.” He felt his son staring at him.
Jericho cleared his throat and grabbed a glass of mimosa.
Toni didn’t that sounded too bad, but still…
“Sounds like over the years, you’ve memorized this thing down to the very last word, but I’m more of a visual learner. Where is this Prophecy, anyway? Anyone have a copy that I can read?” Toni asked, ready to wipe her hands of that part of the discussion.
“No, not exactly…” Jericho answered. “It’s put a way safely under lock and key.”
Lafayette smacked his lips. “And you wouldn’t be able to read it unless you married my son. Only the ones who take on the sight of Bar-Jesus can read the prophesy.” He glared at his son again.
Toni asked another question. “Then how do you teach this story to your families? And who wrote this thing, anyway?”
“You teach it to your children just like I’m teaching you now. For those born with the sight and who have not have it blocked, they can simply read it,” Lafayette said, enjoying her volley. “The author of the text was…”
“If you say Lucifer, I’m going to excuse myself right now,” Toni warned. She might have been ignorant to their way of life, but she wasn’t stupid.
Jericho laughed again, coughing as he put a napkin to his mouth. “The text was delivered after the great flood to the fallen by an angel who still has grace with God. We took it as a sign of hope.”
Toni pushed harder.
“Anyone I might know of?” she asked Lafayette.
“The angel was someone we all know,” Lafayette assured.
Seeing that Lafayette was going to be tight-lipped on the angel who had delivered the prophecy, she moved on. “Okay, now that I’m up to speed, what are you doing to stop your sister’s sons from finding their mates?”
“We are hunting them,” Jericho answered. “Just like they are hunting you. However, we were behind the curve because we were not absolutely sure until last night after your vision that you were the one they’ve been looking for this entire time, or that you were the one we’ve been looking for. Plus, they are very cunning. They stay out of sight, lurk in the shadows.”
Toni still had hope. They might be cunning, but she had something better going for herself. She was persistent. “Well, I’m not completely defenseless.” She glared at both of them. “How can I help you find them? Maybe I can touch something or do something?” Her voice strained as she hunched her shoulders and turned up her hands. “It’s better than doing nothing at all.”
For Jericho, that was completely out of the question. He pushed a breath out of his nose and pursed his lips together. “Right now, you are their ace in the hole. If they can somehow get their hands on you, it changes things dramatically. We just can’t afford that.” His voice lowered. “I can’t afford that.” Landing his eyes squarely on her, he did not try to hide his feelings for her.
“So, I’m just supposed to sit around and wait?” she asked frustrated.
“This is beyond just you,” Lafayette explained. “Jericho is right. The best thing for you to do at this time is to let us handle it. You are very delicate right now, my love.”
“Delicate?” Toni asked.
Lafayette raised a brow. “All of this is new to you, but in time, you’ll discover that you have very powerful gifts. I don’t know when they will come or for that matter what they are. We have to be careful right now, handle you carefully.”
Jericho wanted her to understand, but he didn’t want to give her any ideas. After all, she was a professional meddler. “The pentagram that you saw in your vision was not the same as the one you stood in last night. Theirs was made by an evil spell by evil people who use Litha for the dark arts. We have to find them, find their lair, find the pentagram that they are casting the spell on and destroy it all. Once we find Ophelia, we can kill her, which will significantly weaken her coven and make it easier to find and kill the rest of them. Trust me, we are looking for her. All of my brothers, my father and all the help we can get from other covens have been enlisted. It’s just important to keep you out of the way and out of their grasp until we find her. Now that you have seen them, and they have seen you, it just isn’t safe.”
“I’m not safe?” Bile rose up in her throat. After witnessing what had been done to her sisters, she didn’t want the same for herself.
“No.” Lafayette became more serious. “I know this all is very troubling for you, but better you know so that you can protect yourself instead of cluelessly gallivanting around the city with your notepad.”
What she heard Lafayette saying was that her life would never be the same again, and while she knew that already in some ways, it was very sobering to hear from someone else.
“What about my job, what about my life?” she asked, eyes narrowing on Lafayette for an answer. “I worked too hard to get where I am just to give it up and go into hiding.”
“At this point, Toni, you need to start thinking about the bigger picture,” Lafayette offered.
“The bigger picture?” Toni asked.
“Your life will come to an end if we don’t find Ophelia and do something. Your job is…” he shook his head, “is something that you may have to leave behind.” Lafayette had had many professions during his time on this earth, and he took them all very seriously, but he knew that professions, names and even homes were only temporary for beings like them. They were here to serve a more important purpose.
Oh shit, Jericho thought to himself as he watched a varied reaction wash over Toni. He wiped his mouth with a napkin and reached for her, but she quickly snatched away.
“I came down here looking for a story…” Toni blinked fast.
“You found it,” Lafayette said with finality. “Now, we won’t hold you hostage. It’s all your choice.”
“You’re not helping,” Jericho piped up to his father. He tried to deescalate things before the conversation got out of control. Turning toward Toni, he made his voice softer. “Remember what I told you. Things have a way of working themselves out, if you give it time. We can only see in as much light as we are given…”
“I’ve been in the fucking light. It showed me that…this all screwed up!”
“Did you really expect to have it both ways?” Lafayette asked Toni. He knew that she was angry, but she had to face the facts.
“I don’t know what I thought,” Toni answered honestly.
The silence of the room was suffocating. She sat looking at her plate of food and thinking about her future and suddenly felt ill.
“Baby,” Jericho finally said, trying to pull her from her thoughts.
Toni pushed back from her chair, feeling anger and outrage overtake any desire to eat.
“It’s not that breakfast doesn’t look great, but…” She threw up her hands in frustration and laughed sarcastically. “I just can’t, right now. In the last 24 hours, I’ve found out that I’m from a long line of angels and warlocks, who are fighting to either help save or damn all humanity; and if that is not enough, my contribution to this comes down to marrying a 300-year old, former slave owner, gaining temporary immortality to give said-slave-owner a supernatural heir to fight the anti-Christ during the fucking apocalypse with the guarantee that there is no happily ever after for me, because somewhere in there, my proposed husband will
die of unnatural, possibly violent causes.”
Standing up, she shook her head, heaving deep breaths as the room began to spin out of control. “Did I leave anything out?”
Jericho looked up at her and raised a brow. Impressive. She had condensed their thirty-minute conversation into less than two minutes. His voice managed to croak a response. “No, that about covers it.”
“Great! That’s just super.” Scratching her head, she blew out a breath. “Well, now that I am properly informed, I think I’m ready to go back to the hotel.”
Chapter Twelve
“Her powers will grow inside her as will the future of the fallen, and her meekness will cease in the dawn of her arrival. For as the sun does rise on the horizon, so will her reign, and she will shed her ignorance and place it upon her husband’s head like a crown.”
The Prophecy
A s instructed but with great reluctance, Jericho took Toni back to the hotel. Pulling up to the front doors in his car, he surveilled the bustling street for danger, while at the same time trying to keep from alarming Toni. He knew that she was still on edge after finding out that her vision had actually linked her to the other Laveau clan, but he didn’t want to make her hyper vigilant because of his own paranoia.
The doorman quickly ran to Toni’s door and opened it.
“Welcome back to the New Bourbon, ma’am,” he said, eyes locked on her and his boss. This was a new development.
As far as he could remember, he had never seen Jericho Laveau fraternize with any of the patrons. Now, he couldn’t wait to get to the breakroom and gossip about it with anyone who would listen.
“Thanks.” Toni stepped out with her shades on and a serious resting bitch face. This entire place seemed much different from the day before. She felt awash with emotions, revelations and knowing that made it hard to navigate in the glaring heat.
Rounding the car, Jericho took her hand. “Let’s get you inside, my love,” he said sympathetically as he led her straight into the hotel, through the busy lobby and up the elevator to her hotel without stopping.
When he got her to the door of the Presidential suite, his first mind wanted to rip her right out of her clothes and make love to her. The beast in him was rising again, begging to be let out to play, but he had work to do and promises to keep.
Plus, based on her reaction to everything his father had told her, it was very possible, if he tested her limits, she might attack him, and not in a good way.
She had been impossibly quiet on the drive back to the city, and he knew he had to address it sooner than later.
As he slipped the key card in the reader and opened the door, he moved out of the way for Toni to go in first.
The air conditioner had been on all night, and it was nice and cool, although the high today easily reached a balmy 97 degrees outside.
Toni seemed pleased with the crisp air. Dropping her purse on the sofa in the parlor, she pulled her hair out of the ponytail and let it dance around her shoulders.
“I want you to stay in here,” he said, closing the door to the suite behind him.
He looked around suspiciously, searching for spells that might have been placed while they were gone. So far, the place looked untouched.
“I need to work,” Toni said forcefully. She scratched her head. “I still have a deadline to complete, a story that I need to come up with and a career to protect.” Her voice was flat and void of the raw sexuality from earlier that morning.
“Are you still going forward with the story?” he asked, watching her hips as they swayed toward the bedroom.
“Of course,” she said, looking over her shoulder to catch him staring. “Why wouldn’t I? Your father did say that this was all my choice.” Her glare singed him.
Jericho had been around long enough to know that any response he might give would only open himself to a fight.
Instead, he took a different approach. “Is there anything that I can get you before I go? Something to help you work?” Something to help you think straight, he said inwardly.
“No. Anything I need, I can get for myself,” she said, leaning a hand on the firm bed as she kicked off her shoes and wiggled her toes on the Persian rug.
At that moment, she hated herself for being a bitch to him. Wincing at her words, she shook her head, wishing her response had been different.
Jericho stepped into the bedroom. The sunlight from the windows cascaded over his towering build and mingled with the insatiable fire in his eyes.
He swallowed hard, making his Adam’s apple bob in his throat. “I know that you’re angry with me. I can feel it.”
“What do you want me to say about it?” she asked, refusing to deny her agitation. “You want me to quit my job.”
It wasn’t that he didn’t sympathize with her work obligations, but he had a wife to protect. Newspapers failed every day. This marriage could not, but to say that would minimize her position and risk his position with her.
“Considering everything, I imagine I would feel the same way,” he said softly. “I know how much this means to you. I know you want to resist, to find some way to get around the cold hard facts here, but at some point, you need to reconcile yourself with what is happening.”
Toni looked up from the bed at the far wall. Finally, she turned around and felt herself drawn to him despite her every desire to run. No matter how mad she tried to be, there was something between them that prohibited it. Instead of continuing with the drama, she allowed herself to be a little more playful. “Look, don’t act like just because you slept with me, you know my mind, Jericho.” The tingle brewing between her thighs said otherwise. Yes, she was angry with him, but that wasn’t the most powerful of her emotions right now.
A smile crossed his lips. “I did a little more than sleep with you.” He walked up to her and slipped a hand around her waist. “And I may not know your mind, but I know your heart.”
With that, Toni could not argue.
Planting a warm kiss on her mouth, he tasted her, savoring the sweetness of her essence. Finally releasing her before things got out of control, he groaned. “Work in here. Jules is downstairs at the bar, if you need him, but stay here. DO NOT LEAVE.” He pursed his lips together as if he knew she could not be trusted.
“For how long?” she asked, slouching her shoulders. He was killing her with his demands.
Jericho was aware that he couldn’t keep her hostage for long, but he had to try. He nudged her chin up to look in her eyes. She thought he was simply being cute, but he was actually looking for the lie behind her lips. When he could find none, he relaxed his shoulders and stepped back. “Just until I get back. I’ll be right here by your side every day until we figure this out. I’ll go back to New York with you, if I have to, while you write your story, but I must keep you safe.”
She plopped down on the mattress and absently ran a hand over the softness of the white down comforter. “You can’t follow me around for the rest of your life, Jericho.”
“Can’t I?” he asked seriously. His right eye flinched at the thought of the extremes he was willing to go to for her. “We’ll discuss that later. For now, just stay here.”
Toni knew that she needed to listen to him, but all she could think of was her job and her mission to help. “Fine, I’ll stay here, but only because I want to.” The liberated woman inside of her started to claw at the bars of her invisible cage. “Don’t think you can just boss me around.”
Jericho tried another approach. “Be patient with me, Toni. I know this is not easy, but without your cooperation, it becomes impossible.”
She huffed, embarrassed by her insolence. Now was not the time to behave like a child. “I’ll try.” To ease his worry, she gave a smile and flipped her hair over her shoulder. “Okay. I’ll do more than try.”
Jericho wasn’t convinced by her charms or her faux-innocent smile. He needed something more concrete. “Promise you won’t leave this hotel, Antonia?” Using her real name seemed to grab
her attention. “Remember what we warned you about. They can’t get their hands on you or all will be lost.”
“I promise,” she repeated, choosing her words carefully. “I will not leave the hotel.”
“Good.” Giving her a once-over gaze, he turned his back to her and raised his hands to the ceiling.
Closing his eyes, he whispered a safety spell that caused all the lamps to flicker. Feeling a wave of invisible energy shower over the room, he opened his golden eyes and turned to her. “You should be safe now.”
“What was that?” she asked, frightened. Every moment with him seemed to get a little more curious.
“It’s a protection spell. No harm can come to you through the doors or windows of this suite.”
“Why did you whisper?” she asked, taking mental notes.
“No spell can be cast if the words are not spoken aloud.” He blinked fast to clear his vision. “Don’t let anyone in this hotel room unless it is me or Jules. Have the food delivered to the door. You bring it in, not them. Do not let anyone outside of one of us cross the threshold.”
“I won’t,” she promised, not really wanting him to leave her at all.
“I’ll be back. I don’t want to leave at all either,” he said, kissing her again.
“So, you can read my mind too?” she asked. Great, that’s all I need, she thought.
“No, but I can feel your emotions – sometimes I can pick up words, but only when they are extremely loud. Happiness. Sadness. Worry. Longing. Fear. I can feel all of it.”
“Can I do it too?” she wondered.
“In time.” He grabbed her hands and gently kissed her fingertips. “I’ll return as soon as I can.”
***
There were worse places in the world to be holed up. Even Toni, had to admit that. The Presidential Suite of one of the city’s swankiest hotels was not truly torturous. Plus, she was receiving the royal treatment.
Warlocks_The Creole Coven Page 15
