by Mikayla Lane
Ivint looked perplexed. “I honestly don’t know what I could have done to offend her. I have never met the child until she came here with all of you.”
Trick patted Ivint on the shoulder before sitting down on the transport ramp. “She’s been in a strange mood since we got here. Just ignore her. We are.”
Ivint shook his head and looked out over the estate. “If the place was cleared earlier, where the hell did they all come from?”
Chris placed his pulse rifle on the ramp and started packing gear. “We found some cars in the garage that weren’t there when we were here earlier. It seems they arrived after we had left and dad’s team cleared the place. Maybe if Amun can do something with one of them, we can find out why they came.”
Ivint turned to Chris. “You don’t think they were here to help with the party?”
Chris shook his head and looked out at the house. “No, I don’t. They would have been late and Satalis doesn’t strike me as the kind of guy that tolerates lateness or anything less than perfection,” Chris said, positive that he was right. This wasn’t over. Not by a long shot, he thought.
Ivint was curious now. “Then why do you think they were here?”
Chris looked around at his brothers before raising his eyes to Ivint. “I think they were told to come. A last ditch effort to save the illusion mass that was controlling them and a way for Satalis to get rid of those he thought were compromised. Then there’s the fact that making us kill them probably gives him some kind of a sick pleasure,” Chris said the last with disgust.
Reven shook his head. “That actually makes sense. In the barn, where he attacked my Jax, he had left the raped and tortured bodies of other hybrids there for us to find. It seemed to be nothing more than a way to shock and sicken us. Like this, it worked,” Reven said with a grimace.
“He’s showing his power,” Lara said. “He wants you to know that he is the one who determines who lives and dies. He wants you to feel confused, helpless. So you’ll make mistakes.”
Ivint certainly felt that way, he thought before asking, “How the hell do we stop him? This?”
Lara looked at the Dranovian’s and smiled in a way that slightly unnerved Chris. “They can kill his beast, which would strip him of his power. Without his power, he can be easily killed as nothing more than a mortal man, with mortal weapons.”
Chris and his brothers looked at her like she’d lost her mind, while Ivint and the other Valendrans looked at them with hope.
“What do you mean?” Liam asked, curious how they could possibly help.
Lara grinned at him. “When he had Angel, you guys did that… thing,” Lara said, fluttering her hands where the hybrids were. “Where your eyes went amber and you began that chanting…,” Lara said, hoping they would explain what they had done.
Reign crossed his arms over his chest defensively. “You mean the Ritual of Expulsion?”
Lara looked at him curiously and asked, “Is that where you kill the beast?”
The Dranovian’s tentatively nodded their heads, still unsure where the Prime was going with this.
Lara smiled. “When you did that to Satalis, he panicked, his energy wavered and you were having an impact on him.”
When Chris and the others made various sounds of disbelief, Mikal shook his head and silenced his brothers. “She’s right. When Drago was trying to breech the barrier during the ritual, it did waver. I could feel the cracks forming that would have allowed me through the barrier. I believe we were affecting him.”
Chris looked at Lara suspiciously. “He’s a Prime. A Dark Prime. I thought we couldn’t affect a Prime,” he said, wondering if Lara would tell them anything.
Lara grinned, knowing what the Dranovian was asking. “Don’t get any ideas. Seriously though, because Satalis turned from his purpose and allowed the corruption of his beast through the dark energy, he lost the natural shielding that the Prime have developed.”
Lara saw the confusion in their faces and continued.
“Where our beast pods can survive through space and time indefinitely, his pod weakens with every new incarnation that he takes. It’s why he’s desperate to achieve immortality with the current body that he holds. He will try to do that through the Relics of Grascad.”
Chris and Mikal looked around at their brothers, before Chris narrowed his gaze on Lara. “You’re serious? You think we can kill this bastard?”
Lara smiled and nodded her head. “I know you can.”
Reign laughed and clapped his hands. “Hot damn!”
Cole rubbed his jaw. “It’d be really nice to retire young.”
Jason snorted. “Hell, it’d be nice to have a week off. I’m down for ending this fucker if it means no more of this,” he said as he looked at the suicided body of the last hybrid.
As the rest of his brothers nodded their agreement Chris and Mikal stared at one another while they communicated privately. Lara and Ivint already knew what they would say.
“We will hunt him,” Chris said simply.
Dree cleared her throat, hands on her hips as she glared at the Valendrans and Dranovian’s. “You assholes aren’t getting all the damn fun. I’m coming with you,” she said, daring them to argue with her.
Liam started to when Trick spoke first. “The bastard will keep throwing those illusions and you’ll need us to tell you where the masses are. The ones we have found here, will not be all the ones he’s created. We can find them for you so they can be destroyed.” Dree grinned at her big brother while Mir nodded his head in agreement.
Dread cleared his throat and added. “We have come this far. Besides, I think we worked pretty well together so I’m coming with you.” Viper nodded his ascent, knowing his Prime mate will be going with them.
Ivint grinned as he looked from the surprised Dranovian’s to the Tezarian’s willing to work with the legendary Beast killers.
*****
Drago and Grai sat back in their chairs, each watching the sleeping Angel and wrapped in their own thoughts. They had heard what had happened at the estate through their own paths with the people who were there and were trying to assimilate the new information.
Drago looked up at Grai. “You know she’s going to go with her brothers,” Drago said, wondering what Grai’s reaction was going to be knowing they would now be going after the most dangerous man on the planet.
Grai remained completely silent and unmoving for a few minutes before he turned worried eyes to Drago. “You better keep her safe for me.”
Drago chuckled. “You’re kidding right? Lara said she has a laustio Prime in her. I saw what little Melina could do and so did you. I think you need to be worrying for me,” Drago said with a light hearted smile.
Grai laughed. “You may be right, my friend.”
They sat in a companionable silence each listening to the chatter going on at the estate and thankful that everyone was almost back to Dillon, when alarms began to ring out around the room.
Both men jumped to their feet as Med techs swarmed the bed, each calling out medical terms that only made Drago and Grai confused and scared for Angel.
“Brain signals are misfiring!”
“Heart rate is falling!”
“She’s seizing!” One screamed unnecessarily as the bed began to shake violently as Angel convulsed on the bed.
A stunned Drago and Grai were pushed aside as the room filled with medical personnel trying to save Angel’s life. They ended up standing behind two rows of techs, each praying desperately for their girl to rally her strength and come back to them.
They watched in horror as the screen with Angel’s brain activity flat lined before the rest of her life systems did the same, one right after another until there was no longer any signs of life at all.
They were placing all of her systems on life support when Tricia, Jax and David came running in. A silver light pushed all of the techs aside as the three Prime’s descended on the bed. Tricia moved to the head of the bed and placed her
hands around Angel’s face while David and Jax each took one of her hands.
Everyone watched as the bed was bathed in a silver light that was so bright they had to shield their eyes from the glare. They couldn’t see the bed or the Prime any longer and the energy in the room began to pulse like a heartbeat.
Drago and Grai both tried to reach the bed, to see what was happening, but they didn’t get far before the pressure of the energy pushed them back again. Just as Grai was getting desperate enough to scream at his mate, the light began to subside and the energy lessened until the room became normal.
Grai and Drago looked at the now beeping equipment that denoted Angel’s life signs and brain activity before looking to the bed to see Angel looking up at Tricia.
“Hi Mom,” Angel said before she closed her eyes again, her head dropping to the side.
Drago and Grai rushed the bed, hoping that Angel was awake and well, but she was unconscious again and they looked at Tricia for answers as the techs checked their equipment and the validity of the current readings.
“She’s stable again.”
“Brain bonding is now completing properly.”
Tricia gave an exhausted smile to her mate and Drago. “It was becoming too much for her brain, she was rejecting the bonding,” Tricia said as she leaned back against the wall.
“Why? Will it happen again?” Drago asked as he laid a hand over Angel’s foot, feeling her energy to make sure she was truly all right.
“The bonding is difficult,” Tricia said.
“But Jax didn’t have any problems,” Grai said, nodding at Jax.
“I already had a beast, Angel is fully human and her brain was fighting the assimilation,” Jax said, but rushed to reassure them. “She’s fine now, she just needed a little help through this part. The rest should be easy for her now.”
David looked at the two exhausted and pregnant Prime’s and said, “You two need to go get your rest. I will stay with her while she begins this phase of her bonding.”
Grai pulled his mate to him and kissed her gently on the top of her head as Jax sighed in relief and nodded. “If she needs me again, I will be here,” Jax said as she headed out of the door.
Grai nodded at one of the med techs and said, “Make sure she gets to her home safely.”
Tricia pulled away from Grai long enough to call out, “She’s staying above ground here. Room four twelve.”
When Grai looked at her suspiciously, Tricia admitted, “Tristan, David and I were also staying in guest quarters upstairs so we wouldn’t be far away if she needed us. Don’t worry, Maggie is staying with Tristan. ”
Drago took Angel’s hand gently in his own and looked at Tricia with gratitude. “Thank you so much.”
Tricia smiled and nodded her head. “She’s my girl too. I won’t let anything happen to her if I can help it. Even if it means learning these Prime powers on the fly,” Tricia said with a giggle as she turned in Grai’s arms and cuddled him.
Grai sat in a chair and pulled his tired mate into his lap, pulling her head down to his shoulder while David sat in a chair, agreeing with Tricia.
“I’m getting kind of tired of being led around by them. Don’t you hate that too? It’s like the tutorial from hell,” David said as he spread out his legs and leaned back in the chair.
Tricia nodded her head against Grai’s shoulder. “Mine does that too. No warning, one minute you’re lying in bed and the next you’re heading down the hallway while your beast is catching you up on what’s going on, along the way. There’s like a delay switch or something and I haven’t been able to catch up yet.”
David chuckled. “Yup, that’s what mine does. Then just when I get caught up, the energy takes over and it’s like you’re just along for the ride again. By the time I figure out what’s going on, it’s all over and I’ve got the residual instructions left behind when the energy recedes. It’s a hell of an accelerated learning plan.”
Tricia smiled against Grai’s chest. “I don’t mind so much as long as it keeps leaving the instructions behind,” she said before she fell asleep.
Chapter Twenty Two
Drago was having an amazing dream and he didn’t want to wake up. He dreamed he was lying in bed with Angel, his head on her lap as she gently stroked his hair.
“Big guy, you really should wake up before you end up needing a shot for the kink you’re gonna have in your neck.” Drago heard his Angel say.
He just squeezed her a little tighter around her waist and buried his head into her lap, unwilling to let her go. And unwilling to leave the cocoon of loving energy that enveloped him.
“If you grab her like that in front of me again…,” Drago heard Grai say as Tricia and Angel laughed.
Drago, hearing the tinge of anger in Grai’s voice, raised his head and looked into the beautiful brown eyes of his Angel of Death.
“Hi,” Angel said with a small smile, an adorable blush tinging her cheeks.
“Angel…,” Drago choked out before he grabbed his sitting mate to him and crushed her into his arms. He struggled to contain his emotions as her arms wrapped around him and she hugged him back.
“We’ll give you a moment,” Tricia said with a smile as she silenced and dragged out a protesting Grai.
Drago waited until everyone left the room before he pulled back from his mate to get a good look at her true form. The only real difference that he could see was her hair was now a dark brown color and stick straight. And her eyes, they were startlingly beautiful, Drago thought as he stared at the dark brown, with dark blue beast swirls.
“The bonding?” Drago asked, his worried gaze travelling her form to ensure she was healing.
Angel laughed. “My brothers and father have happily pronounced me correctly bonded,” Angel said with a grin.
Drago was overcome with emotion and just nodded his head while he tried to control the happiness and relief he felt coursing through him.
Angel reached out and grabbed his large hand in both of hers. “Drago…,” Angel began before she sighed heavily and tried again.
“I am so sorry. I couldn’t tell you…,” Angel began before she trailed off, unsure how to even start apologizing for what she’d put him through.
“How did you do it? How did you pull it off?” Drago asked, hoping that if they started off talking about something small that they could work up to the big stuff. Either way, he wanted some damn answers.
Angel sighed again. “I would go into Devon’s house as Devon. Then leave through the basement window as myself. I never stayed in the house unless I had to. I hated it there, it was always so damn cold and just felt wrong.”
Angel gave him a small smile. “Like the night you saved me from that guy on the street. Once you left, I snuck out as myself and grabbed the guy to find out what he knew, then met my brother on the other street.”
“If we had something to do that night, he’d meet me. If we were staying in, then I would sneak out of the basement window, then pop out on the sidewalk and walk to the house that was across the street from yours,” Angel said honestly, hoping he could forgive her for all the terrible things she had done to him with her lies and deceptions.
Drago shook his head, trying to wrap his mind around it all. “How the hell did you fool Satalis for so long?”
Angel grinned. “That was the easy part. Once the beast was out of Devon, she told us everything. Apparently, his hold over her had been so profound that after a few years, he never saw her anymore, he would only call her on the phone for updates and to give her instructions.”
“He was so arrogant, thinking that his hold over her couldn’t be broken, that he didn’t feel the need to check on her. The only thing that would make him do that, was if he didn’t hear from her. When I found out what she was doing… all the people she was paying off for him, the killings… I couldn’t walk away. I had to destroy it all,” Angel said as she looked down at their joined hands in her lap.
Drago shook his head, still
trying to understand how she could pull it off for so long. The Dark Prime didn’t strike him as a fool. “But your voice? How did you make it the same?”
Angel grinned again. “Same with the weight difference. I told him I had surgery to better fit the image of what was expected of me. Devon had a rough, manlier voice and she was much heavier. Contacts changed my eyes and a wig for my hair… the look was complete.”
“My brothers took pictures and changed all the ones on the web of the true Devon. That way if anyone looked her up, they’d think they just remembered me wrong. To be honest, most people were so glad that I was kinder than the real Devon that they didn’t say anything about any differences, even if they did notice them.”
Angel shook her head. “But Satalis… we had no idea he was the Dark Prime. He seemed a little hesitant at first, but the more I did what he asked without question, the more he assumed it was the truth. To be honest, I think he had so much going on elsewhere that he wanted to believe it so he wouldn’t have to deal with it,” Angel said honestly.
Drago snorted. “For so long? What did he ask? Do you know how he found out?”
Angel shook her head. “He wanted people paid off or killed. Bills passed… we have it all documented. Nothing overt though, he wanted everything to be done under a heavy layer of subterfuge in order to prevent anyone from discovering a pattern to what he was doing.”
She snorted and grinned at Drago. “He was easy to bypass. He may be good at plotting and planning but he’s nowhere near the level of expertise that Daddy has. We’d get the bill passed, but using a sympathetic member of congress, we would sponsor and get passed a bill that would basically nullify his.”
“If he wanted someone killed, we would alter their appearance and give them the resources and ability to live a new life. If they deserved it. I can’t tell you we saved every life… some did things…,” Angel said before she looked up at Drago, a determined look in her eyes.
