“Whoa.” Logan and I exchange a quickglance.
“That’s great news.” I take a step back, trying to ingest it. “We were just with her, and she didn’t say a word. We’ll have to congratulate her the next time we see her.” We were just with her, and she didn’t say a word because she was livid with Skyla for waking thedead.
I glance to Dudley. If he heard me earlier, he heard menow.
His demeanor hardens over mine. Knew it. The bastard has been reading my thoughts all along. “Great news, indeed.” He knocks back the rest of his drink. “I’m hoping for a boy. Marshall is a splendidname.”
Demetri is quick to elbow him. “I’m vying for my own name. Nothing says male virility likeDemetri.”
“I see that’s why you named your son Gage.” Dudley lifts his drink, and I’m about a second from knocking it out of hishand.
“All right—enough shooting the shit.” I set my drink down hard onto the coffee table. It’s probably fashioned out of some poor soul’s casket once Demetri ate the body for breakfast. He’s a monster. I can’t lose sight ofthat.
“I’m no monster. I’m your father, Gage.” Demetri lifts hisglass.
So he heard. The house must work in the same way Ahava does, linking thoughts or someshit.
“DNA donor.” I offer a tight smile. “What’s the real powwow about?” I glare at Dudley a moment. “I don’t buy for a minute that you’ve stopped your wicked day to toast Ezrina’s maternalmilestone.”
“Ah, yes, the truth. Perhaps it was the scotch itself.” Demetri tips his head toward me. “I had forgotten all about that barrel my grandfather had stored in the basement until I stumbled upon it this afternoon. Do feel free to help yourself whenever you please.” He glances to Logan. “I extend the invitation to you as well. Bring your brothers if you’d like. I might even break it out for the twins’ first birthday party. Nothing but the best for mygrandchildren.”
Logan scoffs at the thought. “That won’t be necessary, and I highly doubt you’ll make the invite list. Skyla is their mother, and I respect herwishes.”
Logan shoots me a curt look. I know what he wants—for me to let Demetri know he doesn’t meet my standards for the invite list either. But I can’t do it. I don’t want to or plan on rejecting him in any way. The truth is, I need Demetri as much as I need Skyla at this point. He holds the curse, or at least the reins toit.
“The curse.” Demetri nods, and I hold back a satisfied smile at how easy that was for me. “I’ll tell you this, son—one day, fairly soon, you will refer to it as ablessing.”
“Doubtful.” I take a deep breath and glare at Dudley a moment. “But according to Wesley, very much possible. So, what’s next? I’m here. You’re here. Fill me in on what’s to come. Maybe you don’t know this about your long-lost son, but I hatesuspense.”
Dudley’s chest bounces with a silent laugh. “You are the personification of suspense, Gage. As much as the universe is holding its breath to see what becomes of your wife, it’s equally invested in your next move. Don’t discount who you are or what you’re destined for. This road before you doesn’t lie in your father’s bounds. This is your journey. You will dictate where the road leads. So, if you’re asking him what comes next, you are asking the wrong person. Find a mirror and repeat thequestion.”
The room clogs up with a stunnedsilence.
According to Dudley, I’m in charge. I fashion my next step. I choose the road. I choose who I love, who I hate, who I kill, and who I let live. Then it’s easy. I choose Skyla. I choose home. I choose my boys. I choose life and not death. I choose Celestra and not the Counts or whatever the heck they’re calling themselves these days. I choose the Sectors over the Fems because God knows they will not plunge the world into darkness. And I most certainly choose to liberate the Viden youth out of their current state of Spectator bondage. There. Done. Simple. I hope to hell everyone in the room heardit.
I glower at Demetri and Dudley in turn, but their peaceable smiles, those content looks on their faces don’t offer me a clue as to what they’rethinking.
“Well intended.” Dudley gives an approving nod my way, but there’s something about that veiled sadness on his face that lets me know it was most likely for not. Dudley doesn’t shitaround.
Demetri puts out his cigar on the marble stand next to the fire. “You’ll do well by yourself if you follow your heart.” He glances to me with that strange penetrative look that spells out my defeat before I ever get there. “You will, indeed, follow your heart. That is the beauty of your destiny, Gage. Not even you will be able to denyit.”
“He can, and he will.” Logan slaps a hand over my shoulder. “He’s got his heart in the right place. A heart of gold. There’s not an ounce of wickedness in him. I know him better than I knowmyself.”
“That may be so.” Dudley breezes by the two of us, dropping his cigar into his scotch before abandoning his drink. “But this isn’t about wickedness. It’s about control. I assure you those are two very different things. The Sectors are immovable, Jock Strap. You rememberthat.”
“Sector Marshall,” Demetri calls after him, and Dudley turns one last time. “You’ve been removed before. It will happenagain.”
Dudley frowns over to me before reverting his gaze back to Demetri. “If you’re counting on him to get you where you need to be, then you have a tougher road ahead of you than one canimagine.”
“And you’re counting on the girl?” Demetri hollers after him, that perennial smile still tight on hisface.
The girl being Skyla. Logan and I exchange glances because neither of us appreciates him framing her as a simplegirl.
Dudley takes a few steps back into the room. “That girl is my spirit wife. Don’t underestimate her. Each time I’ve done so myself, I’ve lived to regret it.” He takes off, and I spring afterhim.
“Dudley, wait.” I chase him down the stairs into the dampfog.
“What is it, Jock Strap?” His body turns vaporous, see-through like smoke right before my eyes, and it’s like talking to a ghost. Something in me enrages when he calls me by that locker room riddled moniker. I’ve hated it for years. I’m sick of it, and I’m sick of all of the bullshit surrounding my life at themoment.
