Page 106 of The Reveal
“You want to do this outside?” Savi asks, sounding faintly scandalized when she comes down to find me settling Gran on the bench out on the porch.
“I sure hope it doesn’t keep raining,” I murmur. “That would suck.”
Sure enough, the rain tapers off and slides into a lovely, pretty evening. The clouds are stacked high into the sky. The sun plays through them, and Gran and I both sigh a little as we watch it, because it’s so typically Oregon. And because we normally don’t stop to appreciate such things—mostly because they are usually wreathed in smoke.
As the sun cools and the sky darkens, we hear the sound of revving motorcycle engines in the distance.
“Here come the wolves,” Gran mutters.
They come roaring up the drive. Ty is first on a big-ass Harley, with Maddox sitting behind him. Two other men flank him, and they all pull up dramatically by the side of the house, in perfect formation.
I want to ask them if they practice their choreography. I think better of it.
Maddox swings off the back of Ty’s bike with her usual lazy grace. She comes sauntering over to the porch, sweeps a look over Savi and my grandmother, then settles on me.
“‘Sundown in the front yard,’” she says, but not in her own voice. It takes me a second to realize she’s quoting the note I left her. “‘Bring your alpha.’” Maddox shakes her head. “When did you get so butch, Winter?”
“Winter is the consort of the vampire king,” Savi reminds her. I’m not sure I like that word or feel that it describes my whole thing with Ariel, but she keeps going. “That would be a powerful position even if she wasn’t the oracle. Empires have been built on less.”
Maddox shoots me a speculative look. “You building empires, Winter?”
“Sure.” I have to make myself laugh. “I’ll get right on that.”
I realize I’m tense as the last of the light spills all around us in the last few moments of proper daylight before the sun disappears behind the mountains.
I’m tense—but then I see it. A sudden bit of mist when there was none there a moment ago, undulating up from the ground.
I know it’s him.
Sure enough, the mist resolves into a man, and it’s Ariel.
He looks around the clearing, taking in the group of us on the porch and the werewolves to the side. Then he does something with one hand, some kind of peremptory gesture, and a pair of vampires appear. I haven’t seen either one of them before, but I forget about them the minute I see them.
Because they’re holding Augie between them.
Ariel issues an order in a language I don’t understand. His vampire minions bow their heads slightly and disappear again, leaving Augie behind. Standing there in the cold, wet grass in the middle of our yard.
For a moment, everything is frozen.
Augie sways a little, and while I see they managed to give him a pair of pants and a T-shirt, he’s still in bare feet. He looks unsteady on those feet, but he doesn’t fall over—and I wonder if it’s physical or emotional. He glances at Ariel, who remains unreadable. His gaze moves to Ty, who stares back at him unflinchingly.
He straightens when he sees Maddox and Savi over by the porch. He looks at me.
“Augie,” I whisper.
When he moves, it’s toward Gran.
It takes everything I have not to run to his side, to help him, to guide him. Yet somehow, I know better.
My brother walks haltingly at first, as if he expects vampires to appear and drag him back to that dungeon. A valid concern. When they don’t, he moves quicker, until he’s practically running.
He keeps going until he makes it to Gran’s chair, then he goes down to his knees in front of her.
“I’m so sorry,” he whispers. “Gran, I’m so sorry.”
And my grandmother, who was always so strict and so unforgiving to our parents and to Augie before, opens up her arms and hugs him tight.
I have to blink to make sure I don’t cry.
