“You’re asking me?” I scoff at the thought that anyone could figure out Wesley. “But then, you are his bride. No offense, of course, but you’re, well, you’reyou. If this other girl is as willing as you say she is, then she’s probably not mouthing off and giving him a hardtime.”
“The only thing she’s giving him is a hard-on.”
“Disgusting. I mean, doesn’t she have family? A life? Who is this girl that just dropped out of the blue and let Ezrina rearrange herface?”
“Did you ask the hag?” Chloe has no respect for Ezrina, even though she utilizes her genius as much as the rest of us, not to mention her body. If it wasn’t for Ezrina’s misfortune, Chloe might have descended to the depths of hell quiteliterally.
“She’s nottalking.”
“Good.” She sits up straight. “Because I don’t want to talk about Wesley’s skank either. Let’s get down to brass tacks, Skyla. The rules, if I remember correctly, were, I side with Celestra, fight the good fight for our people, and you let me live above ground onceagain.”
A half-smile rises to my lips. In typical Chloe fashion, she only reiterated half of what was spoken that night by the fire. I will never forget the pain, the anguish in my heart, and yet the startling resilience to carry on for my people. Putting Celestra—the Nephilim as a whole before me, was the only thing that got me through those miserable Gage-free agonizing days, outside of the boys thatis.
“Yes.” I spin the glowing piece of equipment her way. “You are my equal in leadership in every way with the exception—you are my number two. You may not make a move without my authority, my approval. You aremy—”
“Bitch.” She twirls her hand as if prompting me to get on with it. “Yada, yada— and I get to dwell among the living, on that desolate God-forsaken rock called Paragon, and my aversion to that God-awful bird will be foreverrevoked.”
My lips purse at the thought. “Not really. I don’t think that’s possible. Besides, Holden and his new bride happen to be running around that desolate rock in coats of flesh at the moment, which brings us to our nextpoint.”
“The dawn of the dead,” she says it flat while folding her arms across her chest in defiance. Chloe isn’t a huge fan of the dead in general—but she sure is a huge fan of pushing people to that oxygen-deprived side. “Name it and it’s as good as done,” she strums the words out, bored, as if she were capable of pulling off anything. And, seeing that she’s desperate to get what she wants, I believe sheis.
“I need all of the dead discovered. I have maps, locations of where I’ve shipped them. I need you alerting authorities. I don’t have the next fifty years to dwell on this. My mother and I went to Cost Club last week, and the feds have descended on that food court like pigeons. There’s no escaping them. I need Wesley’s project halted in its tracks. Once the feds collect enough specimens, they won’t bother coming after anyone with a crooked biomarker. Wes and all of his nefarious biological dealings can go straight tohell.”
“Done. I’d be thrilled to land every last rotten corpse in a cage by midnight if that’s what you’d like for me to do. I just need to go home, Skyla. I can’t live with that weasel in his dark, brooding hell any longer. My mother says she’ll take me back. I can have my childhood bed to rest in. I’m sure Brody will be more than happy to help me assimilate. Bree thinks I can take on a permanent position at West as the head cheer coach. Life will come full circle forme.”
And sadly, those are all the things she already has on some level, but I refrain from sharing that with her. Chloe knows it well. Chloe is already ten steps ahead of everybody else. Or at least she thinks so. And don’t even get me started on the fact she never once mentioned poor Tobie. October Edinger is essentially nobody’s daughter. I can’t quantify Wesley as a parent no matter how loving and nurturing he might be. Deep down, I wish he would abandon her the way Chloe has so we can evict that poor child from living in the hell of the Transfer—in the hell of the wicked influence Wes is sure to have on her. He’s branding her, burning his emblem of evil over her very soul. Each day she’s with him, she drifts further and further from sanity’s edge, and she hasn’t even hit her firstbirthday.
“That is the plan.” The heavy sky presses over us like a lid set to enclose a boiling pot, and for a second I can hardly breathe. This moment, right here, will change so many lives. So many mistakes can breed from this disease seated before me, but I know that all too well. That is my truth. Deep down, I realize this is a necessary evil. If there is even the slightest possibility of having a rogue Gage Oliver on my hands one day, I need to seal my enemies to my side. I can’t have them running and hiding. I can’t give them the upper hand—and ironically, silence and distance do exactly that. That was a principle I understood well on that horrible night when I saw with my own eyes my husband standing on a stone just like this one gifting himself to Demetri and his twisted cause. And in an irony only fate could provide, here I am nearly six months later on a stone just like that one with another demon, readying to launch myself in a covenant that seems wise in my own eyes. My own wisdom has been known to abandon me quickly, but as it were I still see the need to have the most dangerous knife in the drawer as a part of myarsenal.
“Do you love Celestra?” I hook my gaze into hers, and she flinches. Chloe squirms under the microscope of my scrutiny. For as much as she hungers to be the center of it all, she can’t handle the scorching heat that comes along with a psychologicaldissection.
“I do. And I will go to the ends of the earth proving this to you.Weare taking back what is rightfullyours. You and I will never lie down for Wesley and his Bullshit Brigade as long as we have breath in our bodies. I may not like you, Messenger, but in this task, we are united. We are one, and I will do whatever it takes to destroy whatever, whoever, however many stand in our way. We were born for greater things than these.” Chloe reaches over and picks up my hands. “And for God’s sake, don’t worry, Skyla. I am not about to snatch the crown off your head. You remain the Faction leader, scream queen supreme, whatever the hell it is you’re calling yourself these days. I just want my life back and a chance to stick it to the bastards who keep controllingit.”
I let out a breath I hadn’t even realized I was holding. “No use in putting it off then.” I tip my head back and visualize my mother in the heavenlies holding little Sage’s beautiful hand as they skirt the crystalline shorelines of paradise. “Mother?” I blink up at the sky. “You say you are always with me—ever-present in my time of need. And I am in need. I ask you once, come quickly. Chloe and I have business to tend to, and we need your presence to officiate the new bond we’re looking toundertake.”
Chloe drops my hand like a dead fish. “That’s it? No hocus-pocus? Just a please show up if you have the time? If that was my mother, I’d tell her to get her ass down hereasap.”
“And that’s why you live in the Transfer and I live onParagon.”
“Touché.” She scowls. “Fornow.”
“For now,indeed.”
“What’s this?” a cheerful voice calls from behind, and both Chloe and I turn around, stunned to find my mother, Candace Messenger herself, donning the cliché paradise couture, white silk robe, shiny golden sash to complete the celestial look. “A meeting of the minds and I wasn’t invited?” she bubbles with a trill of a laugh, and my stomach sours on cue. My mother is never timely when I need her. And she never bubbles about anything. My radar goes up because if I’ve learned anything about the woman who bore me it’s that I should very much watch my back aroundher.
“Oh hush, you.” She flicks her fingers my way. It’s clear my mind is an open highway for her curiosity to travel whenever the hell she feels like it. “What’s this bond we’re looking toundertake?”
Chloe and I stand as she joins us on thestone.
“A covenant.” My heart thumps wild. First, because I still can’t believe she showed so willingly, and secondly, because I’m about to enter into a binding covenant with the girl who has caused me so much heartache, the one who took Logan away fromme.
My mother cuts me a quick look, sharp enough to slit my throat. “Yes, Chloe is responsible for killing my precious.” My mother glides right by his formal moniker and dives headfirst into adjectives when it comes to the fair-haired Oliver.Figures.
Chloe lifts a finger, her face full of false adulation. “And I am sorry about that. I do love Logan. You both knowthat.”
“It’s true,” my mother affirms as she lands an arm around Chloe’s shoulders, and I shudder right down to my core. “Now, what is it that has two Celestra sisters bonding over in Tenebrous? Come, come—I’ve a multitude of needs to meet this afternoon. So many destinies to alter.” Her eyes sharpen over mine, clear as a white-hotflame.
“Chloe and I would like to enter into a covenant together,” I say it plainly like placing an order for a short stack at the GasLab.
