Chapter 47 Scarlett
Scarlett
I hummed quietly to myself as I stared out the windows of the meeting room. The Christmas lights reflected oddly, creating strange, pulsing auras around the trees, the glass, and the rain.
Two days now. It had to be permanent.
“Has she been doing that a lot?” I heard Grey ask over the phone.
“Yeah,” Emily answered. “I think it comforts her.”
I could still hear Azrael humming with me. I missed his voice. Other than Malachi’s phone call, I hadn’t heard it in…
Six months.
My heart slammed painfully and I immediately shook my head and covered my ears, not wanting to hear that noise. No. Six months? That couldn’t have been right. We were married. Six months? I couldn’t go six months without seeing my husband. It had to be wrong. It was wrong.
“Emily, how is the school going?”
“Good,” I heard her say through my hands. “The professors are settling in nicely, the students are…well, it would certainly go a lot smoother if we were there.”
“What are they doing?” Everett asked as I lowered my hands, curious to know how the second day of school went for the Initiates.
After all, this was as much Azrael’s as it was Everett’s and Olivia’s.
Not to mention, they had a lot of pressure on their shoulders with everyone watching so intently, knowing that Malachi didn’t approve of what they were doing.
I wondered how much they would watch my family when they realized exactly what their ‘fearless leader’ had done. After all, unless his loyal followers had started talking, none of the ones loyal to us knew a thing about what Malachi was doing. Not yet anyway.
“They’re acting like college students,” Emily answered.
I looked over my shoulder, finding her leaning over the table to speak into the phone.
“They may be Initiates, the kids of the professors, but they’re still our age, younger. It’s college,” she shrugged.
If they were implementing Azrael’s laws, they wouldn’t be acting like that, would they?
“Oh, and Nikita said he’s going to wait until next year to enroll his four boys. He obviously wants to stay clear of anything Malachi related until after he knows it’s taken care of.”
“He was a nice man, I’m glad he saw reason,” Rae put in.
I frowned and turned to face them, wondering why the behavioral problems weren’t a bigger deal.
“When I disobeyed, I was punished. Azrael had me train longer, harder. He pushed me until I collapsed and then he forced me to keep going so that I would be better. Do that. The professors may be their parents, but we still control them. If they don’t want to punish their kids, we need to find someone who can. ”
Olivia relayed what I was saying as I spoke, and before those on the phone could reply, Beckett spoke up. “She’s right. If we want to make sure we don’t have any rogues, we need to keep the leash short.”
“We can’t do that until we finish Azrael’s mission,” Jack stated. “Obviously, none of us can be there until then.”
Those in the room all turned to me.
I straightened, so many things I wanted to say, but most importantly, “Something is wrong with my hatter. I don’t think he’s hunting, I think he was taken, and we need to follow that.”
I heard a breath release over the phone after Havoc repeated what I had said.
“You don’t know Az like we do, Scarlett.
He’s been doing this for years,” Everett explained, albeit kindly.
They were always kind to me, but sometimes, I wish they wouldn’t be.
Azrael, through his reports, had spoken about how ruthless they were, around the comments about how they were too soft in certain areas.
He had praised them, in his own words. I wanted those men, not the men who were kind to me for whatever reason they deemed worthy enough to convince them to be kind. It was demeaning.
I was young, but I was trained by someone they were afraid of. Just because they knew why he did what he did, didn’t make him any less terrifying. They should fear me too. Or at least respect me enough not to talk to me so softly.
I stepped up to the chairs. “For the mission,” I bit back.
“All of it was for the mission. He wouldn’t have left this place for this long without at least making a phone call.
He has more than a dozen burner phones. He can buy one whenever he wants.
He controls the cameras everywhere. He’s far more clever than any of you—”
“Okay,” Poppy interjected with a look.
“—he would have called to check up on me, I know he would, I am his wife. I am his wife. I. Am. His. Wife,” I said, slamming my hands down on the table, sharp pain shooting up both arms.
I snarled under my breath and shook them out before going on. “He is not hunting Malachi. Something happened to him and I know where he is.”
“Where?” Beckett asked, straightening, curiosity twisting his features.
“Becks,” Jack began. “Look, I know that he trained her, take no offense, Scar, but she’s barely in the game, she has PTSD, and she’s still healing. We know Azrael’s games—”
“Scarlett knows them better,” Poppy defended, Olivia agreeing. “You guys may not believe her, but I do. If she says something is wrong with Az, you need to believe it, trust me. You haven’t seen what we have.”
I gave her a grateful look as silence filled the room.
Moments passed before there was a shuffle. “Scarlett,” Grey began, “where do you think he is?”
I lifted my chin. “Where the hatter rescued the queen, so the queen will rescue the hatter.”
“The church?” Poppy asked.
“It would make sense,” Olivia agreed strongly.
“This was the first church Malachi built, the one that pioneered the others. It’s where he’s most comfortable.
If she’s right, if Azrael was captured, it would make sense that he was there, and if he isn’t, I’m sure we’ll find something there that will lead us to where Malachi really is, and therefore, where Azrael is. ”
Poppy lifted and dropped her hands. “Perfect, two birds and all. We’re already planning on going Sunday.”
“Look who you’re talking about,” Everett replied icily.
“A man as slippery as a fucking snake. Azrael doesn’t get caught.
He’s—and don’t fucking tell him I said this—too smart to get caught.
He knows Malachi. He has been in that church, studying our family, for half a fucking decade.
How would he ever allow himself to get captured by the man he’s been hunting for that long? ”
I turned on Havoc. “The Initiates,” I pushed angrily.
“There are still hundreds and hundreds of them out there. We killed a lot of them, but not enough, clearly since they attacked us in the woods and came to this house with Isabella, whom, may I remind you, witnessed Azrael putting a gun to her lover’s head and killing her on the spot.
We made a dent, but we also announced to the rest of them that we were out hunting whoever we think is loyal to Malachi and his ideals.
At this point, there are no secrets being kept, right?
His people either know that he’s built this church and are sticking by his side, or they know he built it and they’re leaning towards the school, trying to prove their loyalty to us.
” I thought about it. “Unless they’re lying and leaning towards the school to hide the fact that they are still loyal to Malachi. ”
I turned to Olivia just as Havoc finished repeating what I was saying.
She straightened. “We’ve thought of that, which is why we’re not letting in anyone else until next year.
Just the kids of the professors and the kids of those employed by us.
We’ll take the next several months to meticulously go through all the applications.
We’re prepared for the fallout after we hit the churches and everyone really finds out what Malachi has done, if they didn’t know already.
We’ll be officially announcing the school after that too, which will cause it’s own chaos.
It’ll be a mess, but nothing we can’t handle. ”
I nodded and turned towards the phone, waiting for their responses, but it was Beckett who spoke first. “Azrael, no matter what he’s done, what mission, he has either always had help,” he gestured towards the phone, “or he calculates every possibility and has a contingency for it. My guess is that there was one thing he never considered.”
Every eye at that table turned to me.
I frowned, glancing to Havoc and back. “What?”
Emily’s expression softened. “You, Scarlett,” she explained. “He never considered what hearing you being tortured by someone else would do to him. Especially being tortured by the man he has spent years devising a plan to take down.”
I scoffed. “He is smarter than that. He is smart enough never to allow his emotions to affect him.”
“Which was why it did,” she responded. “Azrael has always been calculated. Since the moment Malachi shot Grey in that church to the second he found out Olivia had been kidnapped, he has been in control. He cares about us, yes, but it’s more than that with you.
He probably didn’t expect to feel so…out of control when he heard you screaming.
It’s not easy, hearing the person you love in that much pain.
Olivia tried to protect Everett from it the best she could because she knew.
You cried out for help, and he ran as fast as he could to try and save you. ”
I swallowed, my mind filling with the image of Azrael in a panic after I allowed myself to scream his name.
The last thing he heard from me was me screaming in agony because I couldn’t control it.
I shook my head, feeling the smile grow. “We have to get him. We have to find him. He saved all of you, he protected all of you for years. It’s time for you to do the same.”
“And we will,” Olivia answered, her voice hardening. “We won’t leave him there if that’s where he is.”
“If,” Beckett started before anyone could reply, “we can locate the Elders.”
“I’m getting closer,” Jack told us. “I’m hoping I can get it before Sunday.”