Total pages in book: 94
Estimated words: 92941 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 92941 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 465(@200wpm)___ 372(@250wpm)___ 310(@300wpm)
I wondered where he was now that he was no longer here.
“If she’s there,” I murmured quietly. “Send her my love.”
“Let’s go,” Chance ordered from the doorway.
I nodded and followed him out of the room.
The flight home was silent. It wasn’t until Danny had set us down on the property that our father finally spoke.
“Your mother never knows,” he ordered quietly.
“Of course,” Ambrose replied.
“Do we really believe that this wasn’t a targeted blow?” Chance asked, looking around the cabin at each of us.
“Fuck no,” I replied. “They knew what they were doing.”
“They were trying to figure out what would kill him,” Danny added, standing in the door to the cockpit. “Worked their way through—”
“Enough,” our father snapped, slashing his hand through the air. “That’s enough.”
“Fuck,” Ambrose muttered, looking out the window. “Mom’s coming.”
We were still lowering the stairs when our mom’s ravaged face came into view. She stared up at the doorway, her eyes roving over each of our faces as we stepped off the plane. Chauncey, Ambrose, me, Daniel. When our dad stepped off last, her knees buckled.
We’d all known that Zeke was gone before we’d left the house that morning, but some part of her must’ve held on to hope while she waited for our return.
I froze, my eyes closing in pain as a horrific wail split the quiet of the forest.
“Dad’s got her,” Chance murmured, setting a hand on my shoulder. “Come on. Let’s give them some privacy.”
I followed my brothers down the trail toward the house, the sound of our mother’s sobs ringing in our ears.
“How long do you think they’ll keep us grounded?” Danny asked, glancing back at us.
“Probably a while,” Ambrose replied. “Arthur will want to give Mama some time with us.” He paused. “And he’ll want us out of the game while they try to figure out this clusterfuck.”
“Two teams down seems excessive,” Chance muttered.
“They won’t be down,” I argued. “They’ll merge our teams until we’re back.”
“Right.”
“Why the fuck didn’t he get out of there?” Danny muttered. “No way in hell they could’ve kept him there if he was trying to get out.”
“Drugged?” Ambrose said.
I let out a huff of humorless laughter. There wasn’t a single drug ever developed that worked on us for long. Our metabolisms flushed everything so quickly that I’d never even been able to get a buzz, and I’d tried everything.
“Cinderblock room,” Chance said quietly. “Steel door.”
“They had to enter the room at some point,” Ambrose said, shaking his head.
“Maybe he was anemic,” Danny murmured.
“No way in hell,” I argued. Every one of us carried blood on us at all times. In all my years working for the command, I’d never been sent into any situation without being fully hydrated. It was nonnegotiable.
“I need a shower,” Chance grumbled as we reached the porch. “I smell like the fucking morgue.”
We went our separate ways as we entered the house, and I slowly followed Ambrose up the stairs toward our wing.
“He shouldn’t have been on his own,” he said without looking at me. “I should’ve taken that team spot.”
“He wanted it.”
“I’m the oldest,” he shot back, his shoulders tight as he stopped at the top of the stairs. “He should’ve been on Team Two with Danny.”
“They would’ve killed each other,” I replied without thinking.
“Instead, someone else killed him.”
“We’ll find them,” I called as he strode toward his room. He didn’t bother answering.
All of us needed a few minutes to ourselves, and we took them, but it wasn’t long before each of us wandered back down to the main part of the house. I felt numb. The world was still turning, but I felt outside of it like I was looking in a window, and I couldn’t quite figure out what was going on inside. I’d felt that way only once before, and I dreaded the moment when I stepped inside, and everything hit me at once. I knew it would happen. I just wasn’t sure when.
“I will not send another son to fight their battles,” my mother shouted from the kitchen as she and my father stepped inside the house.
“We have a treaty—”
“Goddamn the treaty and goddamn the Vampire Command,” she spat back.
“You know the rules.”
“Those rules are ridiculous, and you know it,” she argued. “You never fought for them.”
“I fought.”
“Not for some arbitrary command that doesn’t even keep us safe.”
“Matilda—”
“No,” my mother shouted. “No! I will not give them another one of my sons.”
“You know how tentative this balance is.”
“I know that they allowed my son to be murdered and didn’t even have the fucking respect to inform us that he’d been captured.”
“And what would we have done?” my father bellowed. “Do you think that we would’ve fought any harder than the men he was with? I’ve been in their shoes, Mattie. I know those bonds. Those men were his brothers in every way but blood.”