Chapter 10 #2
The gate shudders as if something beneath it is trying to decide whether to obey the living or stay with the dead.
Eleven.
Gregory whispers, “It’s not one gate.”
Twelve.
The system corrects. The gate locks again. No one breathes.
Then three alerts burst across Gregory’s screen.
He swears. Actually swears.
That’s bad.
Rafe turns sharply. “Report.”
Gregory’s voice is thin with horror. “The delay woke a sequence. Gate one queried gate three, gate three queried the service corridor, and the service corridor queried an old sublevel beneath the east row.”
Lucian turns toward the unfinished brownstones.
“The old Bachman Jewelers,” I whisper.
I point before I can stop myself. “It’s not opening outward. It’s pulling inward.”
Gregory looks at me, then back at the screen.
“Yes,” he breathes. “Yes. That’s exactly it.”
Blaze looks between us. “For those of us who express love through violence, translate.”
Rafe’s voice goes cold. “Carlos does not need to break through the gate. He needs us to trigger the gate, so the old system opens a route inside.”
“Like inviting hell in,” I say.
The words from Carlos’s latest message, the one we received this morning, return to my mind.
COME, LUCIAN. TO WHERE THE GATES OPENED INVITING IN HELL.
Not poetry.
Instruction.
Memory.
Mechanism.
Lucian’s face goes deadly. “He was never talking about one gate.”
“No,” Gregory says. “He was talking about a gate cascade. Open one under the right emotional protocol, and the old system tests the rest.”
“Emotional protocol?” Blaze asks.
“Visible arrival. Emergency security posture. Family-level access. King present. Queen present. Ghost present.” Gregory looks almost sick. “He built a scenario the system recognizes as high-value movement.”
“Because the old Bachman system was built around protecting the family,” I say.
Gregory nods. “And Carlos learned how to make protection open doors.”
Lucian releases my hand. This time, I let him.
He steps forward.
Toward the gate.
Rafe’s tablet chirps again. His eyes sharpen. “Partial location ping. East sublevel.”
Gregory’s fingers fly over keys. “Not enough. It bounced through the old service route.”
“Can you isolate?” Rafe asks.
Gregory’s sharp answer flies back. “If we trigger the second sequence.”
“No,” Rafe says immediately. “Not yet.”
Lucian looks at him. Rafe, built for this, doesn’t flinch.
“If we move too fast, Carlos vanishes. He wants us charging. He wants panic. We need him to believe we are still assuming the gate is one.”
I look past the gate. Beyond the iron, the Village waits. Half-built. Half-haunted.
Men on rooftops. Floodlights. Stone.
The outer row of brownstones where new walls rise over old damage.
And somewhere beneath it, Carlos is close enough to make the system breathe.
A sound crackles through the comm. Static. Then a voice. Soft. Amused.
Carlos. “Welcome home, Lucian.”
Lucian doesn’t move. His eyes stay on the gate.
Carlos laughs quietly. “Careful. If you stand outside too long, the Village may think you’re afraid to come in.”
Blaze’s hand closes around his weapon.
Rafe snarls though the private line. “Blaze. No.”
Lucian’s voice is controlled death. “Carlos.”
“King at the gate,” Carlos says. “Queen at his side. Ghost before him. How touching.”
“I can’t figure this out.” Gregory shakes his head before hissing, “Stall him.”
Rafe mouths, Keep him talking.
Lucian’s eyes flick once. Understood. But we all inwardly groan.
Conversation is not Lucian’s strong suit. He talks with his body. Trust me. I know.
“You wanted us here,” Lucian says.
“I wanted you honest.” Carlos’s voice drifts through the comms like smoke under a door. “You dress it up as strategy, but here you are. Because I called. Because I said fire. Because I said queen.”
Lucian’s hand twitches at his side. He wants to kill.
I step closer, enough that my shoulder nearly brushes his arm.
His eyes cut to mine. A warning. I choose, and right now, I’m choosing to ignore him.
“Hiya, Carlos! How you been?”
“Ah,” he says softly. “There she is. My gift to you, Lucian.”
Lucian’s entire body turns lethal.
I speak before he can shut me up. “You talk too much for a ghost still living under Lucian’s shadow.”
Silence. Sharp, beautiful silence.
Then Blaze coughs once, badly hiding a laugh.
I look at Rafe. He gives me an encouraging smile and a gesture to keep going.
I shove my hands in the pockets of my coat, like a hostage negotiator might. I steady my voice. “You’ve killed your closest confidant. Your woman turned against you. And the man you envy above all other men survived.” I sneak a glance at Lucian. “And I’d say he’s thriving.”
Lucian does not smile.
Carlos’s voice changes. Only slightly. But it changes. “Well hello. How is my purchased replacement? Bargain bin edition.”
That hurts. It shouldn’t but it knocks me speechless and I falter.
Only for a moment.
I bite back. “Yes! I wanted to thank you, by the way, for introducing us. That first blind date,” I let out one of Cass’s low wolf whistles. “Whew. If New York penthouse apartments could talk.”
He gives a dark laugh. “I can imagine. You had a lot riding on that night. You had to make it convincing.”
Paid whore.
It makes me petty. “Too bad you’re not as good at playing matchmaker for yourself.”
Isobel laughs then.
It’s a real laugh and it’s a beautiful sound. For one moment, she glances over her shoulder and smiles at me.
Lucian smiles at me and I smile at both of them.
No matter what happens as we enter hell, we know at least some part of us has healed.
“Come out so I can thank you properly,” Lucian says.
“Where are you hiding, Carlos?” I say. “You came for us.”
“You mistake hiding for positioning, little queen.”
Rafe speaks quietly into the team channel. “Got another bounce. East sublevel to old courier chamber. Still not full location.”
Gregory adds, “He’s routing through a dormant gate relay. We need one more activation.”
“No,” Lucian says.
Rafe doesn’t argue.
Because we all know what one more activation means.
Opening the gate farther. Giving Carlos more of the play he wants. And that was not our plan.
Isobel looks at the speaker. Her voice shakes, but it carries. “Carlos.”
The comm line crackles.
Then his voice returns. Softer. “Belle.”
Lucian goes so still I feel it in my bones.
Isobel’s face is pale, but she does not retreat. “You always did love making women feel small.”
Carlos laughs quietly. “And you always did what you were told, didn’t you?”
She flinches. But stays upright. Isobel lifts her chin. “Not anymore.”
The line hisses.
Gregory’s fingers fly.
Rafe’s gaze sharpens. “There.”
“What?” Lucian asks.
“He reacted,” Rafe says. “The relay shifted when he answered her. He stopped bouncing through the false loop for two seconds.”
Gregory’s voice rises. “I have a direction.”
Rafe says, “Gate two on standby.”
Lucian turns to me. This is the moment. The plan is working.
Meaning it is becoming more dangerous.
I can see the no in his eyes. I can see him swallowing it like glass.
He steps close. His voice is low. Only mine. “Color.”
My pulse stutters. The world narrows.
Gate. Snow. Carlos. Fire. Lucian.
My body answers before the fear can. “Green.”
His face tightens. He hates it.
He turns back to Rafe. “Gate two,” he says. “Six inches only. No full entry.”
Rafe nods. “Mark.”
The second gate wakes. Not the one in front of us. A service gate beyond the first road.
Gregory starts counting. “One.” The cameras shift. “Two.”
A light in the east row flickers on.
“Three,” says Gregory. The ground beneath us hums. “Four.”
Rafe’s screen fills with moving code as he says, “Five.”
Carlos is silent now. Blaze whispers, “I hate quiet psychos.”
“Six.”
“Seven.”
Isobel’s breathing grows audible.
“Eight.”
Mack shifts closer to her.
“Nine.”
Lucian’s entire body angles toward mine.
“Ten,” Gregory says. “Almost there. Eleven.”
Rafe says, “Hold.” Then Rafe’s tablet emits one clean tone.
Gregory exhales. “I have him.”
Everything stops.
The comm cuts.
Every screen goes black for one half second.
Then the Village alarms wake. Not all of them. Just enough. A low pulse of red light moves beyond the gate. Somewhere inside the unfinished walls, a door opens.
Rafe swears and says, “He made his first move.”
Smoke rises from the east row. Isobel stares toward the smoke, shaking but upright.
Carlos thinks he has called the three of us into fire.
Maybe he has.
But this time, when Carlos calls us, we are not weak.
And we are united.
Three ghosts from his past here not to haunt him.
Here to destroy him.