34. Road to Vengeance
“ Let’s talk about this,” Cassius whisper-shouted, a tattooed hand wrapped around his throat, his feet dangling above the floor with his body several feet up the wall.
Phillip’s dangerous smile suggested he’d choose violence before any talking could happen, and I decided it was time to intervene. Mostly because I owed the cat-eyed bastard that much.
“Put him down,” I ordered Phillip, whose shoulders worked a vicious circle before he complied. “I made a choice, and I keep my promises. He’s an asshole, but this is on me. So we’ll retrieve this item, and then we’ll go after the Seven.”
Rubbing the offended area on his throat, Cash sucked in a grateful breath. “About that. I think this might be something you’d want to do, anyway,” he said, eyeing Phillip with nothing short of hatred.
Jo crossed her arms over her chest, one of the few who enjoyed the show, and tilted her head to the side, interest piqued. “What do you mean, prissy asshole?”
Jo never fails to come up with the best way to address the dudes around us. Or how to tell them off. I’ll be forever telling Phillip and Cash to go choke on a dick .
“Prissy? I beg your pardon, devil lady, but I’m far from prissy .” Cassius harrumphed, a walking, talking contradiction—and he’d never know how much. Tapping his foot in agitation, the Dark Fae petulantly crossed his arms. I couldn’t hide my smile, and neither could Jo. “Well, I wasn’t really sure why Eros called him Four. His name is Fredrick.”
Fredrick the villain, classic.
“But I… might know these so-called Seven if Fredrick and his coven are one of them. Only way to know for sure is go and find out,” he went on as if it all bore him. As if he’d been dragged into it when it couldn’t be any further from the truth. As if he wasn’t talking about world-ending stuff here.
“Coven?” I asked, assuming right away that they were vampires.
But Jo’s eyes narrowed alongside Phillip’s, the ominous sensation in the air damn-near lethal. “You mean Fredrick the Blood Mage?”
I didn’t like the sound of this Blood Mage bullshit, and it took me a second to connect the dots. Coven. Mage. Warlock. Were we talking about a magical kind of creature different from a Fae? I really needed to lock myself in a room and read through all the things that could kill me on this plane and the next. It was like the list never ended anymore.
To think I was overwhelmed when it was vampires and werewolves, then Shadow Goblins and Sirens. Not to forget my personal favorite, Green Dude, the Kitsunebi. I’d never forget that anime-inspired villain who wore nothing but latex.
Never.
From the way Sloan quieted near us and Jo seemed stuck inside her head, dagger spinning through her fingers, it was clear that whoever Fredrick was, he wasn’t anyone we wanted to deal with .
“You said Eros called him Four?” I asked.
Cassius fixed his shirt, mumbling about how it was stretched out and wouldn’t lay over his chest the same way. But then his eyes were back up, bouncing from one person to the next. “Yeah. I caught him talking about Fredrick, but he called him Four instead. I only knew because the people he listed off along this so-called Four person were powerful mages who only worked for Fredrick.”
“And he talked about others?” Phillip demanded, hand clenching and unclenching in warning. He’d beat it out of Cash if the prissy Fae tested his luck again. “Who else did he mention?” Phillip enunciated singularly, indicating we were maybe a minute from a brass-knuckle to the face.
Whenever his voice was gruff and dropped so low it technically classified as a growl, violence was a certainty, and I could only do so much.
Cash made his bed.
R.I.P., asshole.
“You really need to work on your people skills,” Cassius complained—and I was dying, bent over my stomach, succumbing to a fit of laughter.
People skills! He’s not wrong, though.
The sound of a dagger hitting the wall with a thud right next to the Dark Fae’s head brought my eyes up and over to Cash. It was barely an inch from his ear, and the Dark Fae squealed in ghoulish horror. “You’re a demon! Scarier women do not exist.”
I put a fist over my mouth, laughing again.
This dude was so damn ridiculous all the time, and it was tough to keep a straight face. Might need to work on keeping emotions from my expression around him. See how long I last. If I could make it through a day without laughing at him, I’d call that a win.
Smirking to herself, Jo tracked her eyes back over to me, the sparkle in them deadly, and I tried not to swoon.
I’d never want to be on Jo’s bad side, that was for damn sure. Every time I saw that evil smile I thought so. But I was already more than a fan. I wanted her awesomeness to rub off on me, so I stuck close to her in hopes it would.
Sloan found his way over to me, touching my shoulders, which I wasn’t aware had pinched together over the course of the conversation until his feather-light touch eased the tension. A second later, his eyes trailed over to Phillip. I hadn’t told the Brit about our conversation, but he was impressively astute about this stuff, and I wouldn’t be surprised if he knew everything already.
Cassius moistened his lips and planted his hands on his hips, always choosing indignant Karen as his go-to pose when he was on trial. “I don’t know all the Seven, but at least Three, Four, and Six. It’s a start, and if we hit Fredrick’s coven first, we might find out the other four. Who knows. Better than nothing.”
The woman standing beside me hummed before her smile was back. “Fucking Blood Mages. You really know how to have a good time, V.”
Oh, she’d never know how true that was. A never-ending cycle of trying not to die, and it now included all kinds of creatures that grew more powerful by the day, I swear.
My Austrian looked ready to tear shit down and break things apart with his bare hands the way his body was wound up tight, muscles bulging and trembling. He pivoted and came over to me, touching my hand so quickly it felt like an illusion my brain concocted because she was a thirsty bitch. Sloan and Phillip shared a silent look before the Austrian nodded and headed upstairs.
I watched him go, surprised he’d left at all. “Do I even want to know what Blood Mages are?”
Jo scoffed and flipped her dagger in the air before sheathing it. With a sassy wink, she headed over to her room as well, evading the responsibility of telling me what it all meant.
That’s not good. If even Jo doesn’t want to talk about it, shit must be bad.
With everyone else gone, it was just Sloan and Cash left with me, both who seemed on edge that I’d even ask.
Sighing in resignation, Cassius finally spoke up, “I’m sure you can gather what they use to power their magic, but it’s human blood and sacrifice. It’s darker magic than what Eros used, and it’s corrupted bloody stuff. It’ll eat away at your humanity until there’s nothing left. Let’s just say that Fredrick and his coven have been using it for a very long time , so they’re not people others like to mess with. And for some reason, they still operate just bloody fine with the Organization running the show here. Makes a bloke wonder who their friends are.”
As if he’d lost interest, Cassius pulled another rock from his pouch, and it hummed and glowed over his palm. “I need to do a few things before we leave. Toodles!” The magic in the air cracked and snapped, then the Dark Fae was gone.
Sloan brushed back his hair and expelled a tired breath. “I wouldn’t let it worry you, love. We have time to work out the details, and if Jo helps you control your power, we’d be hard-pressed to find anyone who posed a challenge for you. ”
I smiled without meaning to. “Seems awfully convenient to put it all on me, you celebrity god.”
His eyes jerked over to the stairs, on the outlook for any prying eyes or ears. When he didn’t find any, he took a step closer and leaned down. His face hovered just inches from mine. “I’ll be right there beside you every step of the way.”
When I failed to say anything, caught totally off guard by a flirtatious Sloan, the beautiful jerk stole a kiss before heading upstairs, too.
My heart would never figure out how to deal with all these gorgeous flirtatious types. Never.
But it was an odd sort of quiet that fell over me as I stood alone in the living room, post Eros destruction and telling two men I was into them. Where the sensation of something looming nudged at the senses. Where my heart found a normal rhythm before it went back to its usual case of erratic and out of control.
One thing was for sure, my story was just getting started. With the Seven as our next stop on the road to vengeance, it was the eerie silence before the atomic blast. Shit was about to get a hell of a lot crazier.
To be continued…