67. Chapter 67
67
Graysen
I lingered in the shadows outside the marquee, in a garden of lush green palms, buxus, and potted roses. There were a few seating arrangements for comfort, taken up by a few of the Troelsens. I didn’t even need to tell them to leave. My mere presence had them scattering. While I waited for my prey, I kept a keen eye on the Houses inside the tent.
It occurred to me at that moment, if anyone wanted to strike at the Houses, now was the time to do it. All the Houses were here, Upper and Lower Heads, and all the high-ranking family members.
If anyone should make a move, the monolith towers would keep them from swifting in if they had the ability, but that wouldn’t prevent an attack on the estate by going through the electric fence and wall of adamere. Tricky, but not impossible. However, there were almost as many bodyguards brought in by Houses as actual guests. Many of us were foot soldiers, hunters, and enforcers, and like my family, they’d be carrying at least three blades on them. If anyone was stupid enough to strike, they’d find they were contending with a lethal army.
I swiped my bottom lip with my thumb, my thoughts running deeper. Someone had been after Nelle. Those things down in the catacombs had targeted her. And that thought spun into another that I’d forgotten about until now. I’d spotted someone lurking outside of Nelle’s bedroom a couple of nights back. Someone going for an innocent walk perhaps, or maybe Byron had set them a dark task.
Marissa had warned me last night that if Byron couldn’t end me— not gonna happen —he was going to take his daughter’s life to save himself.
Hurried movement caught my eye.
The fucker I was waiting for walked out of the tent. The taste on my tongue was rank, like moldy food scraps—simmering anger, but there was a relief, too, that perhaps something was about to come to a head.
Lunging fast, I grabbed him by the scruff of his neck and dragged him into the shadows. His jelly belly wobbled like the beer gut it was when I slammed him against a tent pole holding up the marquee, the canvas wall shuddering with the force. He startled with an oomph and might have been about to shriek like a girl when I muffled his reaction with the palm of my hand.
Danne the Douche Pellan.
There were dark circles beneath his eyes and exhaustion on his features. His normally smoothed-back ginger hair was ruffled as if he’d been continuously dragging his fingers through the locks. “Didn’t see you at the Blessing, Danne ,” I softly snarled.
Danne’s gaze widened and his freckled complexion drained to a pasty color as he swallowed. I loosened my hand from his mouth to let him speak. “I was detained in Ascendria.”
I bet he was. But I was no longer sure if it was his gambling addiction playing on his mind, or something else. And just how much was he in debt to this Silas Boon?
Caidan and Jett appeared out of the darkness to stand beside us and block anyone from seeing what I was up to.
“Keep away from Nelle,” I warned Danne.
And like the stupid asshole he was, his eyes narrowed and his lips became a pinched line. “We’re friends. Deal with it, Crowther. She likes me.”
“Like you were my sister’s friend?”
His expression faltered. “I’ve apologized… You nearly killed me—”
“Pity. It’s one thing I’ve regretted not doing.”
“I might have been slightly rough with Ferne, overstepped the boundaries—”
“Like Ezra Qillisan’s older sister?” a low raspy voice said, right before my sister stepped into view, her hand looped around Kenton’s arm as he escorted her to our dark little party.
Danne tried to implore my sister, placing his palm across his heart. “Ferne—”
Ferne snapped up a hand, effectively shutting him down. “You overstepped the boundaries with her too last year… Boundaries …” Ferne drawled in mock consideration, tilting her head to the side. Shadow and golden light played upon the lace strapped over her eyes. “It’s a nice, polite way of saying that you tried to sexually assault her.”
And hellsgate. Hearing those words spill from Ferne’s mouth had rage and hatred swelling in my chest, burning through my veins—that same toxic fuel that engulfed me last year when I’d stumbled across the motherfucker pinning my sister beneath him.
My fingers squeezed Danne’s throat like a vice and he winced, a pained cry startling between his lips.
Ferne pressed a hand to my shoulder, kneading it, soothing that burning rage away. But still, it would be so easy to snap his neck and dump his ass somewhere no one would find him.
With a defeated hiss through clenched teeth, Danne gave up the ghost. His entire body sagged sadly as he cast a wary glance over all my siblings gathered around him like we were vultures and he was roadkill we were going to fight over. “Oh, so you’re all here, are you?”
I dug into the pocket of his tuxedo jacket, found his phone, and tossed it to Caidan. “Delete Nelle’s number, everything to do with her.”
Jett moved up to brace his hand against the canvas wall beside Danne’s head. He angled his chin away and his long locks swayed with the motion. “Who’s the shadow?”
My gaze slid sideways. Some guy was walking in a direct line our way. Bright blue eyes, seriously bright blue eyes, and hair the same shade as my little bird’s.
Danne held up his hand and the guy with the blue eyes halted on the fringes of the garden where I had Danne pinned. The other guy was shy of six feet tall and had more of a wiry build. Nostrils flaring, he tugged at the cuff of his jacket as he thinned his eyes and fixed an infuriated gaze on me. For some reason, he didn’t seem perturbed that I was pretty much roughing up his employer. Nor did I like the taste of him. Bitterness was rolling off him, tempered with cold rage. This wasn’t about Danne, either. It was to do with me personally.
“Who the hells is that?” I growled.
“My bodyguard.”
I playfully slapped Danne on the cheek a couple of times, enjoying how it made him flinch. “Well, he’s doing a fine job keeping you safe.”
Caidan jammed the phone—minus Nelle’s details—back into Danne’s pocket. I leveled my gaze, making sure Danne had nowhere else to look, and I gave it to him straight, slowly, and clearly, so the bastard understood exactly what was going to happen to him. “You look at Nelle—your eyes will get gouged out. Speak to her—that tongue goes. If I even get a hint you’ve thought about her,” I tapped his forehead with two fingers, sending my message to him loud and clear.
His eyes flared as wide as they could go, and he swallowed thickly, the irritating sound of his dry mouth scratching at my nerves .
“After we’ve finished slicing you into sashimi,” Ferne said with a small smile, my brothers crowding around her. “We’ll feed what’s left of you to Nelle’s wraith-wolf.”
“Understand, Pellan?” I asked.
He nodded, a series of manic jerks of the head.
“Good. Now that we’re clear, get the fuck out of my sight. And if I even hear a hint you trying anything, with any girl from any House, I’ll cut off your dick and stuff it down your throat.”
I let him go, my brothers stepping aside as he hurried to his bodyguard, who still had his gaze fixed on me.
I gave him a face that said— Got something to fucking say?
He merely stared back with his uncanny eyes, before turning to follow Danne as the other man scurried across the lawns.