24
Cal
We’re at a breaking point.
More than a hundred vampires are dead, including Narris and the rest of the Council, and every gofer sent as backup, all at our hands. For a guy who doesn’t tire, I’m fucking exhausted.
Five men joined us in our fight, along with Julian, and for that, we’re grateful. I’m not sure we would have been able to maintain our edge without them, and it’s certainly a moral victory as far as my faith in our species as a whole goes.
They came here to Selection as a matter of course, but when faced with a choice between right and wrong, they picked the correct side of history. I don’t know what this will mean for them, their futures, and their family’s bloodlines, but it’s not my job to care.
Right now, all I care about is this standoff between the Wraths and the Slaters.
And how only one set of brothers is making it out of this alive.
Rook shoves Nathanial back, but when Cassian catches Kane off guard, he manages to shove my middle brother to the floor hard.
Before I can stop it, my fucking piece-of-shit father Cassian uses Kane’s position to his advantage, jumping on him instantly. He presses his knee to Kane’s throat and locks his hand at his jaw hard enough to force his head back at an angle that’s seconds away from snapping.
Fuck!
Rook’s chest heaves as he and his father Nathanial stand two feet on either side of them.
Ronan is hurt but alive, his leg badly mangled where he lies in front of Lucian. Given enough time, he’d heal. But I’m afraid, if I have anything to say about it, he doesn’t have much time left at all.
“Let him go or else I will fucking murder you!” Rook bellows.
“Kill him,” Nathanial encourages.
“If you let them kill my brother, Lucian, it will be the end of you,” I spit.
Lucian is standing behind the pulpit with his hand wrapped around the edge of the wood. I’m not stupid enough to think Lucian will be easy to kill. I know there’s a very real possibility I won’t be able to. His abilities are so far superior to anything I’ve ever fought before.
But I will do whatever I have to fucking do for my brothers.
“Lucian, I said kill him!” Nathanial calls again, surprising me.
I expected his directive was for my father, to kill Kane, but evidently, it’s not.
Instead, it’s a plea for a cheat—for their precious eldest brother to use his powers to earn the advantage. “Do some of that voodoo shit and end these fuckers, Luc!” Nathanial demands.
Having experienced Lucian’s pain-rendering firsthand, I brace myself for the feeling with a tightening of my abdomen. I know it’ll bring me to my knees, and if he wishes, choke the life out of me completely.
But it never comes.
Nathanial grabs his chest suddenly, backing away long enough for Rook to catch Cassian off guard and take back control. He charges, freeing Kane, and then besting Cassian with a quick and deadly snap of his neck.
One Wrath—my father—is dead.
Three more to go.
“Why, thank you, Rook,” Lucian says inexplicably, rounding the pulpit and walking slowly toward Nathanial.
I know Nathanial is in pain, and I know I’m not, but the precious two seconds it’s taken for so much to occur haven’t left time for my mind to catch up. Our bodies are simply too fast.
“Thank you?” Rook questions, his chest still heaving with rage, and confusion finding footing for him too.
“Yes,” Lucian agrees simply. “For doing some of my work for me.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Kane asks, on his feet now and completely untrusting of Lucian’s intentions. I don’t blame him. Since the moment Lucian Wrath showed up at our cabin in Connecticut, nothing he’s done has gone according to plan.
“Yeah, Lucian. What the fuck?” Nathanial chokes out, still clutching his chest in pain. “What’s going on? Why are you doing this to me ? Kill them already!”
Lucian’s calm is rooted in ruthlessness as he stalks his own brother. “What’s going on, Nathanial, is a man playing the long game of revenge.”
Nathanial groans, and Lucian’s smile grows.
“You see, nearly thirty years ago, I came to my first Selection and fell uproariously in love with a woman of unmatched beauty and kindness. I didn’t agree with the methods of the Council or the tradition of the auction, but for lack of options, thanks to Father, I decided that I would allow myself the pleasure of the woman of my dreams. Bought, of course, because that’s how these things work, but I didn’t mind the idea of putting in the work anyway.
Of delaying the bonding and courting her instead.
I wanted to show her care. Love. The life of luxury we’re so good at promising. ”
“Lucian,” Nathanial begs, dropping to the floor now, the pain is so intense.
“But I lost that bid, didn’t I, brother?” Lucian questions before kicking Nathanial in the chin, sending him rolling as spit flies to the floor in front of him.
Ronan screams in protest or pain, I can’t tell which, but with one flick of his hand, Lucian sends him to his own bout of spine-rending agony.
“I lost that bid to you , Nathanial,” Lucian continues. “You took the woman I loved out from under my nose, and you ruined her. You abused. You tortured. You depleted. And when that wasn’t enough, you shared her with our brothers .”
“Fuck you,” Nathanial grits out. “That whore got what she deserved.”
With a sickening crunch, Lucian kicks him again, laying him flat out with a groan.
Squatting, Lucian hovers over his brother, the only sound the clicking whisper of a tsk. “Now, now. Don’t rush me along. I’ve been waiting thirty years for this.”
“Lucian,” Nathanial cries, none of the cockiness he’s carried for the past three days left in his voice. He’s faceup, weak, and in intense agony from his own brother’s specialty.
And just like that, it all makes sense.
Why Lucian brought us here to do the groundwork he couldn’t do himself. Why he brought me to my brothers and unlocked the door.
Why he waited until the middle of the auction to announce my mating—an event I’m now certain he facilitated all along.
It’s no coincidence that Romy ended up with the room at the end of the hall out of a hundred other women, the only room with a window to the outside.
It’s no coincidence that this place, the chosen location for this year’s Selection, is actually Lucian’s house—a choice he, no doubt, used his position on the Council to lobby for. He wanted the high ground, the tools, and the army to execute a plan he’s had for decades.
A plan he strategized for the sole purpose of avenging our mother . The woman he lost in the first bid before choosing his mate Helenna in the second.
He gave her the life he would have given our mother and loved her gently, all while our mother suffered. Helenna dying last year must have been his breaking point.
Bottom line, Lucian played me.
He played all of us, and he did it with selfish focus. If we were casualties of the game, so be it. But his endgame was the same as ours all along.
Crumble the Council. Buck the tradition. Make the evil men pay.
It’s why Kane’s had such a hard time with the muddiness of his intention, and it’s why I’ve been struggling to get a read on him from day one.
Lucian’s a shield, but he picked and chose the moments he kept from me, silencing the conversation he had with Narris in the selection room for the purpose of giving me a reminder of the reason I had to fight in front of all the men so there’d be as much chaos as possible.
He didn’t stop me from listening any other time, something I now know was intentional.
He knew I was prepared to do what was necessary. Quite possibly, he knew the way my brothers and I were raised prepared us more than anyone else. Group homes. Fosters. Raising ourselves and fighting for everything we had.
This man had a plan . And decided we were the ones to help him execute it.
“Lucian,” Nathanial cries again, sounding like a damn baby as the agony takes on new heights. “Brother, please.”
“You, Nathanial, are no brother of mine,” Lucian spits. “I’m disgusted by your blatant disregard for not only Naomi, but every other human woman who’s followed in her wake.”
Naomi. Our mother’s name was Naomi.
My chest surges with pain and pride and a lifetime of longing. I didn’t realize how much her absence meant through the day-to-day, but I can see now it’s what made us the way we are.
The constant drive to live up to the men she’d want us to be—the need to stop what happened to her from happening to other women.
Cal? Romy asks, obviously feeling my despair dancing across her own skin.
I’m okay, my love. Are you safe?
Yes. We just got on the bus and got dressed.
Good. I’ll see you soon.
Reassured that the most important part of our plan has come together, I interject myself into my uncle’s game.
“How long did he wait before he abused her, Lucian? Had the bond even settled?”
“No, Calloway,” he responds. “It’s safe to say Nathanial saw your mother as nothing more than a possession from the start.”
Lucian grabs Nathanial by the chin one final time, his fingers digging into the flesh and melting it right there. Bone exposes and everything else vaporizes just like what he did to Lexor in the cabin.
Except this time, Nathanial is still alive and suffering. His cries are loud and agonized as Lucian spits directly in his eye.
“Rot in hell, brother. For Naomi. For all of them. Not a soul on this earth will miss you.”
Nathanial crumples to the floor, his body half gone in vapored mist.
And Ronan whimpers, painfully awaiting a similar fate, but Lucian is evidently done with theatrics. With one wave of his hand, Ronan expires.
Lucian looks slightly weakened by the exertion, moving slowly to one of the remaining chairs and sinking down into it.
I look back at Julian and the other men who’ve joined us, my jaw tight and my threats anything but empty. “We thank you for fighting with us. But make no mistake, if you betray us and our purpose, we will kill you too.”
They nod, their eyes wide and humbled not just by me, I suspect, but by the spectacular display of Lucian’s speech and brotherly revenge.
“Find your fated mates and treat them well,” Rook adds. “You’ll be surprised how much better it will be to nourish what nature has given you. To extend fate’s destiny with your line.”
“Pack your things and leave!” Lucian says then, his voice a command none of them dares challenge. They leave the room in a blur of motion.
I round the chair to stand in front of Lucian, not with kindness, but with demands. I can appreciate and sympathize with his story, and today, he did the right thing. But there is right to be done. Penance to be paid.
Even at the threat of his certain overpowerment, I will not bow down. “I want your assurances that this is the end, Lucian. No more Selections. No more women forced into anything other than a bond of their destiny.”
“My Calloway.” He shakes his head, his mouth upturned in a proud smile.
“I knew you were the one. In fact, I knew the Slaters were the only way.” He sighs.
“Yes, as the de facto head of the Elite Council, I appoint the three of you as my replacements. You, Rook, and Kane are in charge now. I vow it.”
“Three blue-collar guys…head of the elite state. I’m sure everyone will love that,” Rook grumbles. “That’s not fucking happening, Lucian.”
Lucian just chuckles. “Of course, there will be pushback, Rook. And there will likely be other groups that seek to supersede you. As you know, our rule extends only along the East Coast. Globally, there are twenty-five other Councils that won’t be keen to bend to your rules.”
“We’ve fought our fight,” Kane argues. “The rest will be up to someone else.”
Lucian’s glowing green eyes flick between us, as if he already knows that’s not how it ends. As if he’s certain this is something we can’t say no to.
My jaw sharpens. I refuse to let myself fall victim to biting off more than I can chew. And I’m sure as shit not unknowingly stepping into another war just because Lucian has put us in an unwinnable situation.
“And these women?” I ask. “What will they do?”
Lucian pushes to standing, cracking his neck back and forth while a quiet exhale leaves his throat like he’s already tired of our answer.
“Come,” he says, motioning for us to follow. “Let’s discuss it in my office.”