I make my way into the colossal nightmare, and find him standing next to a raging fire, drink in hand.
“Whiskey?” He lifts his glass with the offer.
“Are you responsible for this hellscape the world has been thrust into with this new virus?”
His dark brows lift an inch, as a devious laugh rumbles through his chest.
“It is not I, butyou, my dear son. Don’t you recall? We discussed a certain serum that would return your people to you in a single bound. And now we hold the key.”
“Oh God.” The words pant from me. “Demetri, I never intended, I never knew you’d cause this much chaos. We need to put a stop to this right away. Hundreds of thousands of innocent souls have perished. People are panicked. Entire countries are under quarantine. The stock market has tanked. Another month and this will hurl us all right back to the Stone Age. There won’t be enough of us to bury the bodies.”
“Of them,” he corrects. “You will be just fine.” He lifts his chin. “This is what we wanted, Gage. The entire world is looking for a cure—a vaccine, and we have it. Our people at Althorpe are at the finish line with a vaccine that will inoculate the world from this menace. The government doesn’t have any idea where this new plague has come from.”
“They have theories.”
“Not the right one. And do you know where it came from, Gage?”
I close my eyes a moment too long. “Aliens.” I don’t even see it as a question.
“It is brilliant, you must admit. And not only will every person in the world need the vaccine we provide, they will simultaneously be tested to see if they’re indeed human. You see, the vaccine itself is a biological mirror of that serum your brother cooked up. It will expose the Nephilim DNA even with the serum Celestra has put out to hide the markers. There is no running and hiding from this one. The only way for your people to counter the expository nature of the vaccine is to take the proprietary serum we’ve developed right along with it. That is their only protection. You’ll have your people restored in a heartbeat. And thanks to Rory’s self-righteous ego, they will belong to the Fems forever, unable to switch their alliance on a whim.”
The snapping flames garner my attention, and I lose my gaze in their fiery tongues.
Demetri is right. He didn’t issue this decree. I did.
A vision comes to me.The black sands of Rockaway. Skyla running toward me, into my arms.
I turn my head and close my eyes.
That won’t be happening again as long as either of us is on this planet.
I’ve destroyed everything and everyone in an effort to make my way back to her. And in an irony only my life can provide, I won’t have her ever again.
“Get the serum ready to go. I’ll talk to the Factions. I want the vaccine for the Kingdom Virus distributed worldwide as soon as possible. I don’t want any more blood on my hands than I already have.”
I take off just as a peal of thunder erupts in the sky and rain drives over the island in buckets.
I walk slowly back to my place, wishing I would drown.
Wishing I had never existed.
I’m missing you, Skyla.
But you’re wrong. This is no delusion I’m embroiled in.
It’s my worst nightmare.
And soon it will be yours, too.
19
Logan
Skyla.
She sleeps soundly in my arms, her eyes moving ever so slightly beneath her lids as she glides from one dream to the other.
I’ll never forget the day she walked into the bowling alley—never forget the charge that electrified the air as she walked my way. The smile, the face of an angel. I knew right then she was the one for me.
