Page 17 of Feathers From the Sky

“And why haven’t you yet?”

“Wards.”

His hands clasp together on his knee, and his lips purse as he looks at me. My uncle has always been quiet, thinking long before he speaks. This is why he is second to my father—Björn needed someone to balance out his quick-burning anger.

“And why have you not used force?”

“Her blood must be spilled by her own hand.”

“Then compel her to cut her heart out and be done with it.”

“I might have questions that need answering.” I hesitated for only a moment, but he interprets it as weakness.

He sighs and shakes his head. “I don’t know why you insist on this…this…moral superiority. No one is innocent, Roman. Everyone deserves to die for some reason or another. You are young, but you will learn that, eventually.”

“Regardless of what happened to Remy, I’ll be killing her, Uncle. For Maman.” I don’t hide my irritation. He knows what life has been for me without her and has tried to shield me from some of the worst of it. He knows I won’t let her death go unpunished, even if it’s taken me thirty years. “Björn will get his heart once I get my fucking answers.” I mean it, and I need him to see that.

He stares at me for a moment before nodding. “You honor Alice,” he says. “She would be proud.”

I don’t know if I believe that. She would have expected better from me regarding my little brother. We sit there for a moment, and Emile continues to watch me. Though he seems to understand my motivations, he appears wary.

I clear my throat. “Anyway, at first, I doubted who she was, but now I’ve confirmed it.”

“Did you confirm it before or after you fucked her?” he asks, quiet voice a snake in the grass.

“I did not fuck—”

“I can still scent her on you. That hunterstink,” he sneers. He stands, hands in his pocket as he walks toward the electric fireplace. Fingertips trailing across the mantle, he doesn’t look at me. “Don’t lie to me, Roman. I thought you’d grown out of that.”

I close my eyes, remembering my punishment as a child. Standing for days in direct sunlight, the ache in my head would turn into a pounding tempest before night fell.

“I didn’t have sex with her, not that way. I am simply infiltrating her defenses to make my life easier.”

“Keeping Björn happy will be the best means of that,mon grand.” He has always called me by the nickname, French for “big guy,” even when I was small and the name didn’t fit. He ruffles his hair, the light grey strands messy as usual. I wonder if my hair will be grey by the time I settle into my immortal form. I don’t take stock of my appearance often though, so it’s possible I already have. Margot marked me as being a few years younger than I am on the questionnaire for Gwyn; so perhaps it’s finally happened, and I never noticed. There are so few born vampires, it’s hard to know when I’ll settle.

“I will not apologize for being the only one to give a damn about what happened to Remy. He’ll get his precious victory once I get mine,” I say, shrugging, a bit too casual to counter my anger.

Emile pauses, his posture tight. He is a slight man, nearly half my size, but other than my father, he’s the only one in our coven stronger than me. Though he is my blood and he has love for me, I never let my guard down around him.

“What’s your next step then? You know what she is. Go to her, make her take you to the storage unit. Wash your hands of this.” He turns to face me before quirking his head to the side. “If you need to fuck her and get her out of your system before you put her down, do it. I doubt your acting abilities, and those photos were very convincing.”

“Jesus Christ, I don’t need to—”

“Wear a fucking condom. Who knows what she carries.” I simply stare at him, but my hand curls into a fist. He’s treating me like a kid who found a filthy stray and wants to bring it home. I have no intentions of that. “You know, your father ripped out the throat of a woman I loved once. Imagine what he’d do to the child of Bill Parsons.”

I’m not remotely surprised by the callousness of my father, so I don’t react. Emile watches me. I catch the twitch of his jaw which tells me he is hungry. Before I can comment on it, he rushes over to me with his vampire abilities and pulls me off the couch.

“Come,mon grand. Show me where you prefer to eat. Perhaps we can take a walk on the beach afterward and we can discuss your little problem.”

7

GWYN

“You good?”the bartender asks as he passes me a glass of water. I mean-mug him for being presumptuous, but take a sip of the water. I need to sober up and schedule a ride home.

“You hiring?” I ask, but he’s already on his way to his next customer. I feel an arm brush against mine and turn toward the man beside me.

“You need a job, babe?” he grins at me, revealing teeth in need of an introduction to a toothbrush.

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