Chapter 16 #3
“I think you’ll find I’m far more potent than my brother,” Bentley said. “One hundred percent more potent, in fact, but if you want the family dud, you do you.”
Jeremy and I both ignored Bentley’s poorly disguised sibling jealousy.
“You see, the human fools don’t know the goldmine they sit on,” Jeremy continued. “This world is rich and teeming with life, ready to be extracted, like juice from a peach.”
Interesting analogy. How was Jeremy going to extract life, exactly? What was he? Did he extract life from living things, perhaps in the same way vampires took blood? But he wasn’t a vampire.
There it was again, the hollowing in Jeremy’s face.
I dropped my gaze to my half-empty wine glass, then looked back at Jeremy.
No, I was definitely seeing this. His skin had thinned, turned grayish, and shrunk around his cheekbones.
That should probably have been alarming, but for some reason that likely had a lot to do with the suspicious wine, I wasn’t feeling much alarm. Or much of anything. Just thirsty.
I set the glass down on the table and frowned at it. Bad wine.
Bentley arched an eyebrow at me, then both eyebrows went up, scolding me for not listening to him. He said a lot of useless things. How was I supposed to know he’d been right about the wine?
“The Witherborne heir’s blood will supercharge the gateway between this world and the Underthorn crypts, where my kind have been imprisoned, so that all my family will be freed to gorge on the life that is all around us.”
Oh.
This was a supernatural prison break.
Huh.
I’d heard him say the words, I recognized them, but none of it landed in my head and heart like it should. It all just slid right off.
“Oh well, that sounds nice.” My voice sounded far away. I pulled out a chair and sat, to stop my head from spinning. “What uh . . .” The room tilted. “Did you put something in the wine?”
Jeremy waggled his fingers, clearly enjoying himself. “Just a little something to keep you calm for what comes next.”
“You drugged our pool boy?” Bentley said, also sounding far, far away.
A nap would be nice about now.
“Obviously,” Jeremy scoffed. “Humans are fragile creatures. As you well know.”
“I’m going to have to object,” Bentley said.
“I don’t like Owen, so if it were up to me, I wouldn’t really care what you did with him, and I can appreciate a good poisoning, but I apparently have to keep him alive, so if you can undo whatever you’ve drugged him with, then none of this needs to escalate—”
Jeremy lunged at Bentley. Then, between one blink and the next, stabby arm-tentacle things shot out of Jeremy’s body, like huge wooden arrows. They thrust into Bentley’s middle, under his ribs, jerked him of his feet, and pinned him to the wall like a butterfly to a board.
The explosion of violence emptied all the muffled thoughts from my head, but then seeing Bentley high up on the wall like one of those stuffed trophy animals woke whatever was left of my will.
I grabbed the wine glass I’d set aside earlier and flung its contents at Jeremy’s face. Yeah, that would do it. Take that!
The wine splooshed his face and hair.
Jeremy blinked and slowly turned his head to look at me. The root-like appendages continued to hold Bentley pinned.
Bentley’s mouth opened and closed, he clutched at the branch arms, but he wasn’t escaping anytime soon. Blood stained his cream suit, turning it dark red.
Jeremy’s face had gotten thinner and more elongated. I had no idea what he was, or what I was looking at, but its eyes had become cold, black, hungry holes.
“This is a custom Kiton suit, you deranged asshole,” Bentley wheezed.
If the suit was the worst of his concerns, then maybe he’d survive being skewered in the chest.
This felt like the part where I should probably have started screaming and running, you know, live up to the human norms. But the wine throw had taken it out of me.
Would anyone notice if I sat this one out?
Bentley and Jeremy could go at it without me.
I’d just wait it out. In this nice chair.
Maybe take a nap. Have some more wine . . .
Get your shit together, Owen.
I spied the door. I could probably drag my sleepy ass over there. Would they even notice if I slipped out?
The door opened as I stared at it, and as though I’d somehow summoned him, Theo appeared. But he was far from being the rescuing hero. Two large men, security probably, had hold of him. His hands were tied out in front of him. A gag stifled his mumbling. He saw me and his eyes blew wide.
Uh-oh. Things had just gotten a whole lot more complicated.
Hm . . . Maybe now was the perfect time to finish off the tasty little quiches on the banquet table. They sure did look good.
Stop it! The food is drugged. Focus on the creature murdering Bentley and Theo . . .
I’d definitely been drugged, so another bite of something yummy from the banquet table wouldn’t hurt, right?
“Ah, now the guest of honor has arrived,” Jeremy laughed with a sound like knuckles running over a washboard. “Finally, it’s time for you to meet my family.”