Somehow, she was going to make it work.
Chapter Three
Nothing like Uber’ing a bomb through a Nor’easter.
As Tohrment, son of Hharm, sat shotgun in the Brotherhood’s armored Suburban, he was half-torqued turned around, one shitkicker keeping the beat of the windshield wipers in the wheel well, the other planted like something was about to detonate. Which was actually not hyperbole. Vishous was driving through the snowstorm, Rhage and Butch were squeezed into the back-back like too much cargo in a crate, and the IEV—improvised explosive vampire—a.k.a, the great Blind King, was sitting in the captain’s chair in the middle on the left. The other one had an open bag of grenades and hand cannons on it.
All things considered, Tohr would rather deal with that duffel with all its pins out and the triggers pulled at the same time.
Yup, you knew it was going to be a great night when the King told you he couldn’t dematerialize to the Audience House and offered no further explanation. Was any needed, though? Wrath had come out of his mated quarters looking like someone had hammered nails into his nuts. He’d also been limping, and given the glower and lack of chatter, clearly somewhere deep inside his head.
A quick glance at Beth’s equally grim expression had given Tohr a clue: Whestmorel-gate was obviously still a big topic of conversation in the First Family’s residence.
Made sense. What a fucking mess that had been.
Except Wrath hadn’t given anybody a choice, and it was hard to argue the trip hadn’t been worth at least some of the risk. Sure enough, he was the one who’d found that male who’d been beaten and left to die in that hidden room. Nobody else had, and God knew the rest of them had been through the place with a fine-toothed comb. Still, the Brotherhood had been wearing their brown pants the whole time.
They’d also been very aware that whatever had been said to Beth about the field trip beforehand was none of their damn business. And of course, that night she’d gone looking for herhellrenat the Audience House on a whim and hadn’t been able to find him.
The aftermath wasn’t their business, either.
“Snow’s so fucking bad,” V muttered as he sped up the wipers.
“We could always move to Florida,” Rhage piped in from the rear. “I would totally live at Disney World.”
“I didn’t know you’re a mouse fan,” Butch remarked.
“It’s about the food. Did you know there are over two hundred places to eat there? Magic Kingdom has forty-three alone.”
“Why am I not surprised you know this.”
“How many bars are there in Southie,” Rhage countered.
“Touché.”
As the pair went quiet, Tohr released the breath he’d sucked in. The usual ball-slapping banter was not the kind of background music they needed for this commute.
“I can’t see a goddamn thing, true.”
He glanced over at V’s goatee’d profile. “Slow down. We got time.”
Given the King’s tight-lipped tension, he wasn’t looking to prolong the travel, but the only thing that could make this worsewas if they got into an accident and he ended up with a frostbite chaser to his pounding headache.
As V sat forward, he did the same, but it wasn’t like pushing their noses into the windshield was going to help with the whiteout. The flakes were coming down so hard and fast, it was like the Suburban was going through a solid barrier, and the bright headlights weren’t helping, all that brilliance sent right back into the interior.
He glanced over his shoulder again.
The King’s cruel, aristocratic face was angled to the window next to him like the male could see outside. In the ambient light from the running boards, the male’s jaw joint was pulsing as he chewed his molars, and down on his leather-clad thigh, his fist was cranked so tight, the veins on the back of his hand were popping. Beside him, on the floor between the captain’s chairs, Wrath’s service dog had his head on his master’s shitkicker, the golden’s eyebrows drawn together as if he, too, felt the stress.
George was no dummy.
Another blond-headed, perfectly handsome face entered the periphery of Tohr’s vision. As Rhage’s Bahamas blues shifted to the King and peeled wide, horror-movie style, the brother mimed a couple of stabs to his own throat.
Shut. Up, Tohr mouthed.
The brother put his palms out, all WTF.
“So, how ’bout the weather?” Butch said on a long exhale.
