Chapter 31
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
GHOST
The Code: Rule #14
Masks shall be terminated at the age of forty, regardless of fitness.
I flip the bacon, listening to the satisfying sizzle of the fat against the hot frying pan. I breathe deep, trying to ignore the claustrophobic sensation my mask brings. After yesterday, I’m not sure where Brett and I stand. Things were fine until we went to bed—and she let me touch her again, then hold her while she slept. But this morning, when I rose, she had this faraway look in her eye, and not even morning cuddles from Rupert and Venom would take it away.
So now I’m trying the next best thing—food .
I just pray I didn’t fuck things up. I’m not sure what I did, but knowing me, I don’t have to be conscious of it for me to make a mistake. Especially when it comes to Brett. I can’t seem to think straight around her. Just the sight of her and I’m a puddle at her feet.
It doesn’t make what I have to do any easier. But no matter how I feel for Brett, I can’t stop. Too much is riding on my plan—too many lives. I will just have to keep her safe until then and find a way to do so after. Which could be tricky, considering there’s a large chance I’ll be dead.
I sigh, transferring a few pieces to a paper towel-lined plate. Her taste still swirls on my tongue, and I’m hesitant to eat any of this for fear I’ll never experience it again. My brain is a mess, and my nerves are shot, but as soon as I catch a whiff of her sweet scent, all of it fades away.
I turn my head, my chest squeezing at the little smirk playing on the corner of her mouth. She’s dressed in one of my button-ups, the sleeves so long they cover her hands, leaving only her long, toned legs bare. My mouth waters as I take in every perfect inch of her, the smell of burning bacon in the background the last thing on my mind.
Must have her. Now .
I don’t realize I’m in front of her until her gasp rings out, and I come to with my hand under her shirt, my fingers in the middle of a hard pinch to her budding nipple.
“ Ghost,” she moans. My name rolling off her tongue makes me come undone. It’s the sweetest sound I’ve ever known—more comforting than rain on a tin roof during a hot summer night and as soothing as the waves lapping against the rocks of the Moriton cliffs. For I am up here, safe, with Brett Evangeline—the sweetest, most darling woman on the face of this earth.
And she’s letting me hold her.
“Brett,” I whisper, leaning down and pressing my face into the crook of her neck. She gasps as the cool metal of my mask touches her skin, and in the next moment, her fingertips are prying at the sides.
“You put it back on,” she murmurs, a pout in her voice. “I was hoping you’d leave it off after…”
I straighten, cupping her face with my palms and staring into her beautiful blue pools. “I wish I could, darling. But Orion will be around soon, and I cannot risk it.”
She nods, that faraway look returning. Never mind, I want to say. I will take it off—will do anything to bring back that smile .
But just when my mouth is opening to say the words, the scrape of the front door sounds out. Brett gives me a sad knowing smile before pressing up on the balls of her feet and kissing my mask where my cheek would be.
“Well shit. Don’t stop on my account.”
A low growl sounds out as Brett backs away, her cheeks flushed and her eyes downcast. “Must you always show up at the worst moments?”
“It’s my specialty.” Orion smirks, waggling his thick brows at Brett. “He loves it.”
I sigh, reaching an arm out to haul Brett against my side. “That is up for debate. Anything at the apartment?” Orion nods, handing a stack of mail to me. Brett looks up at me, her eyebrows scrunched in a question. “I have an apartment in the city, where the Sanctum believes me to be living right now,” I say, fanning the mail and plucking one with a gold embossed seal. “The bastards can’t help themselves. They like to pretend they’re so secretive, yet they send me mail that looks like this.” I shake my head with a scoff, ripping the envelope open. My eyes scan the words, a stone hardening in my gut as I realize what they mean.
P-1313 ,
You are formally invited to the Sanctum headquarters on May 23, 9:00 p.m.
Signed,
George Bartholomew, Head Table member.
I swallow the lump forming in my throat and pocket the note, facing a concerned Orion. “They want to speak with me. Tonight.”
Brett’s eyes go wide. “You’re not going, though, right?”
I shrug, unable to look into her eyes for the first time all morning. “I must. Anything else could pose a threat to you and Orion. If I go tonight, I may die. However, if I don’t, they will comb the entire continent trying to find me. Eventually, they will, and I will not risk your lives like that. I can’t.”
Brett shakes her head, a defiant sheen in her eyes. “Ghost, no. You can’t. I don’t care what happens to me. Risking your life like that is fucking stupid!” She looks at Orion desperately. “Tell him! Tell him that he shouldn’t go.”
Orion shrugs, shoving his hands in his pockets with a disgruntled expression. “He already knows what I think. It doesn’t matter.”
Brett opens and closes her mouth, her earlier desperation replaced by outrage. “Fine! Then I’ll just camp out by the door. Or I’ll follow you and give you backup. You’re absolutely not going there alone,” she declares, hands on her hips.
I sigh, cupping her cheek with my palm. “Oh, Brett. You really are so fucking adorable.”
Her eyes go wide at the same time Orion tosses me a syringe, a world of betrayal shining behind her eyes as I plunge the substance into the side of her neck.
“You… you can’t…” Her eyelids grow heavy, and I hold her weight in my arms as she goes under. She mumbles something else right before she goes unconscious, but I can’t tell what it is. And it doesn’t matter, anyhow.
“I’m sorry, darling,” I whisper, brushing strands of her raven hair out of her eyes. “But I can, and I will. For you—for your safety—I will do anything.”
I hand Brett off to Orion carefully, then grab my dagger and suit jacket from the kitchen counter, giving him a nod of thanks as he carries her to the couch.
“Take care of her and the animals if I don’t come back?” I ask, my wrist already tapping against the stone wall.
Orion nods, his baby blues screaming all the words he won’t say. That he doesn’t want to lose me. That he needs me to come back. “Just… be careful, Ghost,” he murmurs, taking a seat in the armchair next to the couch to watch over Brett until she wakes. “I’m worried she’ll kill me if you end up dead.”
“I love you too, kid,” I whisper, sliding out of the house. “I really hope you know that.”
I stand in the massive meeting room, breathing through my mouth so the sickly smell of Madam’s perfume doesn’t make me vomit all over the Persian rug of the meeting hall. Her cruel green eyes are barely visible through the slits of her grand venetian mask, but I can tell they are full of malice.
And it’s all pointed in my direction.
Madam clasps her hands on the table, the clicking of her nails mingling with the low rumble of Nix and Niege at her feet.
“The young FBI agent is missing,” Madam announces, speaking for the first time since I entered the room. The toe of her heel taps the floor, making a dull thunk thunk thunk on the carpet.
I shrug, making sure to keep my shoulders loose. “So?”
Her foot ceases tapping. “Two of my Disposers are missing as well.”
I keep my body still—so still, I’m sure she’s somehow learned to turn me to stone with those cruel green eyes showing through the slits of her elaborate gold mask. She stands from the table abruptly, her chair making an awful scraping sound as she does so.
“Do you have nothing to say, Phantom ?” She utters the last word like a curse. When I glance down, I notice her long red talons digging into the palm of her hand.
“Did you check the computer lab? Perhaps they were playing with forks and light sockets again.”
Pearls of red bead on the tips of her talons, sliding down the elongated point and landing with a plop on the Persian rug. “I do not find you funny, Phantom. Tell me—where are Tate and Xander? What have you done to them?”
“First-name basis, I see. A couple of your playthings, then? Have you ever stopped to consider the possibility that maybe they ran away? Idiot children are known to do these things, you know.”
This comment earns me several low chuckles from the Table members, all of which are quickly stifled as the Madam’s shoulders tense.
She grinds her teeth, her full red lips disappearing as her mouth pulls down in a grimace. “I know you had something to do with it. I’m no fool, Phantom.”
“Maybe not. Yet here I am. Here you are on a lovely Sunday afternoon, wasting all of our time. If you’re so worried about your little dolls, I suggest looking at the smug-faced crowd behind you. The evil that comes from within hurts the deepest, Madam.”
I bow and turn on my heel, deaf to the low rumble of Nix and Niege. They’re desperate to give chase at the Madam’s command. I know she won’t, though. I know what I said gave her something else to think about. The Madams are so cloistered in the bubble the Table crafts for them—so safe in the way of thinking they were taught from childhood—that they never consider suspecting the ones closest to them. She’ll turn to interrogating the Table members before she makes her move against a Phantom. It’s the smart thing to do.
But when she’s done, and she realizes that I sent her around in circles…
Well, I just have to hope I can set my plan in motion before that happens.