Chapter 42
Forty-Two
“No! Absolutely not!”
“If you think—”
“Over my dead fucking body are you going to—”
Constantine has been the only one not shouting.
“I need some air,” I tell him and walk out of the study.
Cillian’s house is a maze of corridors and rooms, but somehow, my feet know exactly where to take me.
Quietly padding into the room where Fénix is soundly sleeping in his travel crib, I watch the steady rhythm of my son’s chest rise and fall.
Moonlight coming in through the crack in the drapes casts shadows on the wall that look like a forest of trees painted in gray watercolor.
Alana must have turned on his starry-sky nightlight I brought with us.
It fills the ceiling with tiny white pinpricks.
The room is like Peter Pan’s Neverland, where your dreams can fly.
Looking down at his slumbering form, my heart breaks for my child. I thought I could keep him safe from this world. Protect him from it. I thought I could bury my past and live my life as Syn.
But it was all an illusion of my own making.
“Once upon a time, there was an angel with a shattered soul,” I begin, keeping my voice low so I don’t wake him.
“The devil stole her memories and left her in darkness. But the one thing he could not take was her heart. Always remember, my sweet boy, there is nothing stronger than love. Not hate or fear or vengeance can match love’s power.
Love guided the angel back to her soulmates and defeated the devil. But there was still one missing piece.”
Fénix’s lips pucker and smack, and he makes a soft coo in his sleep that melts me completely.
“The missing piece belonged to a boy she had forgotten when the devil stole her memories. But the boy was now a man. Inside, he was lost. Angry and broken. And then one day, the angel and the man found each other again. Even though he was supposed to be the enemy, the angel didn’t run from him.
She looked past his darkness and scars and saw something…
good.” I pause when my voice cracks. “The angel didn’t mean to fall in love with him.
But she did. She saw all his jagged parts and thought he was perfect just the way he was.
He filled that missing piece in her heart and made her whole.
He became a brother to her soulmates and a father to her child.
But the devil comes in all forms, and another one has risen from hell and has stolen him.
” I lightly brush my finger over the downy softness of Fénix’s cheek. “The angel is going to bring him back.”
And kill the devil one more time.
There’s a swish of noise behind me, and I look over my shoulder. Alana briefly hesitates at the open doorway before coming in.
“How much did you hear?” I ask when I notice the baby monitor she’s holding.
“You know it’s a trap. Viktor isn’t going to just let Aleksander go.”
I know that. I’m not stupid. But it doesn’t change anything.
Alana peers down into the crib and lovingly tucks Fénix’s swaddling blanket around him like a human burrito. “How much do you love him?” she quietly asks.
Well, that definitely answers my previous question.
Going to the window, I look out over Cillian’s grand estate. The outside of the house is lit up like daytime but after a few feet, I can’t see much more of the grounds in the dark or the men with guns patrolling it.
Alana’s arm slips around my shoulders. She still smells like roses.
That was the first thing I noticed when I woke up in the hospital.
Not the pain of the burns or the cloying, acrid stench of hospital disinfectant, but the sweet smell of roses.
And when I was able to open my eyes, I saw her sitting right next to the bed and thought she must be the seraphim He sent to take me to heaven to be with Mama and Papa.
“I don’t want to argue anymore. There’s enough yelling going around downstairs.”
“Please answer the question.”
Saying it to a baby fast asleep is vastly different than admitting it out loud to the woman who has been my mother for over a decade. So, I give her another truth.
“It’s my fault. I stopped him when he came here to take out Viktor, and now he has Aleksander because of me.”
And I hate myself for it. The things that Viktor is doing to him right now keep playing on repeat, and I’m trying so hard to hold myself together and not fall apart.
“It’s not your fault, sweetheart.”
My fingernails score into my palms with how tightly I’m fisting my hands, the rage and anger twisting inside me that want to unleash upon the world and burn it to the ground.
“If anything happens to him…” Goddamn the tears that fall. They make me weak, and Aleksander needs me to be strong. He needs the monster.
Alana takes my face between her delicately strong hands, forcing our eyes to meet.
“You want to lay blame on someone, then blame me. I kept the truth from you and forced you to suppress who you are. James raised Aoife to be a weapon, but Syn is a protector. Aleksander doesn’t need one or the other.
He just needs you. And when you find him, I need you to promise me one thing. ”
I take in a shuddering breath and force the tears to stop. “Anything.”
Alana clasps my hands to her chest. “Viktor Androv. Kill that son of a bitch.”
Alana faked her death and fled from the life Francesco forced upon her. But she will always be a daughter of the Society. Omnis Magna Potestas Ex Sanguine Et Morte Nascitur. All great power is born from blood and death.
Tristan appears in the doorway, concern playing over his handsome face.
“I’ll be in the other room if you need me.”
“Mom?” She turns around, and I sign, I love you.
Her smile wobbles with teary emotion. “I love you, too.” When she gets to Tristan, I hear her tell him, “Fénix is safe here with me and Cillian. No one will get within a mile of him. You do what you need to do to bring our brother home.”
After Tristan checks on Fénix, he joins me at the window. Our arms automatically band around each other, and I burrow my face in his neck. He holds me like he never intends to let me go.
“Aleks is strong. Viktor can’t break him.”
Viktor is going to torture him. Is torturing him. Aleksander isn’t going to come back the same man if he survives.
“We have to find him.”
“Baby girl, look at me.” He gently cradles the back of my head and lifts my face. “I swear to you that we will paint the streets red until we do. And right now, we control the narrative. That buys us some time.”
Not enough time, and we’ve already wasted four hours of it.
I notice him wince and am immediately concerned. Taking his hand, I press on the Hegu pressure point between the base of his thumb and index finger. “How bad?”
“I’m good, Red.”
I know he doesn’t want me to worry. Tristan suffers from debilitating migraines that incapacitate him. He hasn’t had one in a while, and I didn’t think to make sure he brought his medication with him before we left Darlington.
“How bad?”
His lips are feather-soft when he kisses me. “Nothing a strong cup of coffee won’t cure.”
“Tristan—”
Fénix stirs and makes a disgruntled gurgle in his sleep when Hendrix’s shouts from downstairs carry into the bedroom.
“Syn! T! Let’s fucking go! We got a location!”
Tristan doesn’t get a chance to take two steps before I yank him back. “Do you trust me?”
“A thousand fucking percent,” he replies.
I jump into his arms and soundly kiss him. “I’m holding you to that.”
Pyotr said that Viktor wants me.
And that’s exactly who he’s going to get.
Is i mbás amháin a éireoidh mé.