Chapter 4 #2
Bridger didn’t let Marlena sit with the thoughts in her head for long.
“She won’t save me, and she certainly won’t save you when this is all over.
” His words seemed to echo in her head, being repeated by the gods she’d let slither up from the depths.
“But you will. You’ll save me.” Bridger’s crooked smile slid across his lips.
“If I’m gone, you won’t be able to keep the order I’ve allowed you to have.
Without me, your perfect empire crumbles. ”
“I don’t ne—”
The raise of Bridger’s eyebrow stopped her from speaking.
Heat flared at the tips of Marlena’s fingers. Down, girl. She stopped herself from exploding.
Bridger wasn’t a friend. Bridger was and would always be an asset.
One she couldn’t lose.
The gods slithered around in her head, hissing in protest. The emerald fire went out. “What’s your plan? I know you’re not delusional enough to think Vega will come with you willingly if she remembers.”
The darkness in Bridger’s eyes had returned—the dead-like stare he’d subjected himself to when he used his enhanced powers from the bonded’s summoning against his own mind. Shielding one's memories was a power Marlena wished to possess. Bridger had no idea how lucky he was to have it.
When Bridger started dreaming of Vega, something changed within him.
Marlena noticed it the night he’d told her about them in Ardor—the night she’d come to tell him about a meeting he was to be a part of.
The meeting where Bridger found out he’d be sent to Earth to retrieve the very woman who haunted his every dream.
Marlena thought it would be good for him if he was given a reminder of the girl Vega had become, only to be reminded who she’d once been while asleep.
It should have been the final nail in his coffin, the one that killed the old Bridger forever, but his emotions had come back, sparks returning to the blank expression he’d worn for over three decades.
The hotheaded reactions young Bridger had been known for returned, his actions becoming less calculated and more anger fueled.
Since Vega escaped the last time, the dark energy Bridger wore like a perfectly pressed suit returned.
He and the darkness are one. He likes the power, the control.
Marlena’s stomach rolled with hesitancy at the twinkle in Bridger’s eyes, the piece of life still left inside a god Marlena knew could do more damage than even he knew possible.
“I think I can sway her feelings towards me this time. Give her a taste of the man she once knew. Getting inside her head would be very easy if she trusted me again.” Bridger’s confidence was contagious.
“If the dreams I’m having are anything other than a complete nuisance, at least they’ve been a good reminder as to who I was before this started. ” He paused for only a moment. “Weak.”
Bridger’s words echoed through her head like he’d spoken them into an empty room. “You’re saying you want to make her fall in love with you again?” she asked with evident apprehension.
Bridger raised one shoulder, his black hair shimmering under the room's soft lighting. “It’s the only option we haven’t tried.”
Over the last forty years, Marlena had done a lot to her sister.
In the earliest years, her deaths were quick.
A gentle reminder of what was waiting for her when she crossed back over.
Eventually, Marlena’s patience ran dry. The longer the curse kept her alive, the clearer it was that something wasn’t right.
It wasn’t until a few years ago she realized just how much Remus had interfered with her original curse.
She’d spent decades thinking Vega and the rest of her bonded bunch would wither away for good one day.
At one point she’d even considered Bridger expendable—an unfortunate loss of the curse her sister unknowingly changed. Bridger was no longer someone Marlena was willing to lose.
Once she found out how to curse her sister, how to curse a god to die, then Marlena would find a way to break Bridger’s bond before killing the other three.
“Do you think you’ll be able to handle that? She seems to be quite crafty herself if she outsmarted and escaped you twice.”
Remind him of his failures—of why he needs you still.
Bridger smiled sarcastically. “She knows my moves, which just goes to show her mind is as clear as it's ever been. Whatever she’s gone through in these lives created a new Vega. One who isn’t afraid of you, Marlena.
One who might be successfully on Earth with her memories right now…
on the hunt for the end of a curse you can’t afford to let her break yet.
” If she broke it before Marlena had her next move planned, she would no longer be on top.
“This might be the only opportunity you get to find out everything she knows, everything she’s learned about the curse you don’t understand, and I’m offering to deliver it to you on a silver platter… But for whatever reason, you’re still questioning my allegiance. When will it end?”
He’d never done her wrong since joining her regime. He’d made mistakes, of course, but they all had in their growth to where they stood now.
Marlena was sick of mistakes.
“What’s in it for you?” she mused, flipping her hair over her shoulder with a small gust of perfectly placed wind.
Bridger’s eyes didn’t wander down her exposed neck. “We find a way to remove my bond. I live. They die.”
Marlena searched Bridger’s face for any sign of deceit. When she found none, she asked, “How do I know you’re serious?”
Bridger pulled the collar of his shirt down, revealing a scar over his heart. “Because Vega tried to kill me the day she escaped at Lake Vehemens as a way to test if you were telling the truth about being gods, and I want to return the favor one last time.”
A bubble of laughter escaped through Marlena’s lips, the sound giddy with excitement. “There he is. The god of wrath. I’ve been waiting for you to emerge.”