Logan hops to his feet. “I’m out of this one,” he says, landing his cards to the table before materializing in front of me. “You saw Skyla, didn’t you? I don’t have to ask twice because you’re day drinking. You’re not a day drinker, are you, Gage?”
“The sun went down over Paragon a long time ago. And I’m not sure if I saw Skyla.” I tip my head to the side, still genuinely stymied by what just transpired. Someone—Chloe perhaps—just made sure I had my ass handed to me. “What do you want?”
“I miss my son.” The words depress from him hypnotically slow, the way you say things when you mean them almost too much. I can tell the guy is in pain, in agony. “Take me back to Paragon, Gage. Burn down the lab below Whitehorse. Hell, burn down Whitehorse. I’ll help you. I just need to get back to my boy. Skyla’s a tough girl. I know she’s taking care of things, of herself and the kids, but I will never get this time back with Jaxson. You have two little boys yourself.” His words dig into my soul, and I’m positive that’s exactly what he wanted. “You would be furious if I did this to you. They grow so fast, and I’m missing it. I haven’t heard him laugh yet—a real belly laugh and that milestone might have passed me by.” Tears glint in his eyes, and I can tell they’re the real deal.
“Have a drink.” I slide my glass over to him and he takes a sip.
“Geez, is this what you’re boozing it up with?” He lands it back on the counter with an aggressive shake of his head. “That’s too high octane for me.” He takes a breath, those amber eyes of his bearing into mine and I feel his camaraderie, his brotherhood even now as if nothing has ever changed between us. “I still love you, Gage.” He slaps a hand over my back. “I know that look in your eyes. You’re doubting yourself, doubting me, looking for a life raft. I don’t know what has you so rattled, but I’m going to deep dive and figure this out. I’m going to pull you out of this misery, I promise.”
“You keep believing that.” I pull my drink my way once again. “I’m not sending you back.”
“You’re sending me back,” he says it like a fact. “There are just some things you wouldn’t do, and keeping me from my infant son is one of them.” He steadies his gaze over mine as if he were trying to read me again. “You wouldn’t hurt Skyla, either. You’re incapable.”
My cheek flinches as if he struck me. I wonder what Logan would do if he knew that not only did I hurt her, I snuffed the life right out of her. Hell, I would have strangled her to keep her from destroying our eternity together. And that alone is a testament to my madness.
In fact that is the very reason I did it. If Celestra ever takes the power position with the Factions again, Wes and I will sink to hell right along with the Fems. Our destinies are tied along with theirs, it’s been very well confirmed. And an eternity without Skyla is nothing I can bear. Unfortunately, there will be casualties. Apparently hell needs its gate keepers, its professional tormentors to make sure the hellish job is being done right, and if the Sectors are sitting on the bottom rung then they’ll be in the pit along with the rest of the damned. And that includes Marshall Dudley, and apparently Candace as well. I didn’t write the ridiculous rules, I’m just living them. And that’s why I’m ruling the Faction roost. I’m not missing out on forever with the ones I love most. I’d do anything to ensure it—even sending Skyla to paradise a little early to keep her from toppling me.
“I don’t want to talk about Skyla.” I close my eyes and hope to God when I open them I’m still stuck in the sweatbox back at the Landons’ house, married to Skyla—my life as a simple Levatio very much intact. How I loathed the fact Skyla and I had to live there under Tad Landon’s roof because I couldn’t provide, and in an irony only the universe could provide, those will go down as the happiest days of my life.
“Let’s talk about getting your head out of your ass,” he whispers. “Ezrina is talking Justice Alliance. I’d hate to see Candace ship you off to paradise for good.”
“Liar.” I pour myself another finger of that varnish remover Demetri is trying to poison me with. “You would very much like me lost in space while you and Skyla and the Factions live a Gage Oliver-free life. I’m not offended. Not entirely. It makes sense. I’m the thorn in your side. The oppressor. I don’t really give a shit what title you want to give me. I have a task laid out in front of me, and I’m carrying on. You do you, Logan. But I’m not going anywhere.”
A fire ignites in his eyes.
A dull laugh strums from me, and I can feel the burn of the whiskey, appreciating the tiny buzz it’s trying to give me.
“I’m guessing it’s not the answer you wanted to hear. Too bad. I win. You lose. Maybe you’ll see your kid graduate high school.” I raise the glass to my lips, and Logan knocks it out of my hand, sending it crashing to the floor in an explosion of broken glass.
“Alice!” Ezrina is quick to call her child to safety.
My child is dead. Sage could eat the glass for all I care.
“Boys, boys.” Nevermore is between us in an instant. “Must I remind you both, violence is never the answer.” His eyes enlarge as he looks to Logan. I’m not blind. I’ve seen them all feigning impotence around me, pretending to be silently terrified, all the while plotting, scheming their way back to Earth, anxious to put another boulder between heaven and me.
I hold up my hands and offer a cheesy grin to Logan, the exact one I know presses on his last nerve.
“Go ahead and hit me.” I don’t mind taunting him at all. “I’ve already taken one beatdown today. What’s another? I survived that one, and I’ll survive this one. I want to feel your rage. It spurs me on, Logan. It fuels me in a whole new way and assures me that I’m going in the right direction. So go ahead and knock my teeth out. Gouge my eyes out, pull my guts up through my throat. Be creative. I need to reenergize my resolve to keep you at bay. Sorry, Jaxson. Looks like Daddy is going to miss your first year.”
Logan grabs me by the shirt and pulls me in hard. “You little piece of shit. You do not get to burn the world because you’ve got a hair up your ass and feel the need to wear some paper crown. Can’t you see they’re using you? They really took your head off, didn’t they? And the one that replaced it is no better. Demetri scooped your brain out and took a crap in your skull, and all that oozes from you now is whatever sick idea he tells you. Have you taken inventory of the harm you’ve done? Or do you wash your hands of it and dive into the next dung heap he’s got for you?”
“Boys,” Demetri’s voice cuts across the room as he races this way with Sage.
Logan gives me a gentle shove away from him. “You’re on the wrong road. If you’ve ever trusted me, trust me now. Whatever it is he’s telling you, whatever strings he’s moving you around with, don’t believe him. Cut the ties to this madman. This is not you. It’s not who you are at the core. I know you well, Gage. I do.”
Sage smirks over at him. “I know my father well, too, Uncle Logan. And perhaps it’s you who is fooled. He is for our people, not yours. Any allegiance he had once sworn to them was a mockery. He needed Mother to conceive the boys—and me. Nothing more, nothing less. His hybrids were birthed to fight your own hybrids one day. Don’t be fooled, Uncle Logan, you can’t win. My father is relentless. He is the chosen one. He wins every war, and he will continue to win every war you dare throw against him until you are in the grave. My mother dies in a whimper, not victory. Father has one true love, and it’s the Fems and his allegiance to them. Please refrain from disrespecting him. He takes no pleasure in fools.”
Logan’s expression sours. “Duly noted. Now, would you mind asking your father politely if I could get back to the planet? I have a son I’d like to see.”
Sage makes a face.
I’m not sure why, but she’s not a fan of most children.
Sage lifts her chin. “Ezrina, please demonstrate to my uncle how Tears over Paragon operates? He wishes to see that river rat of his.”
I draw a quick breath. “It doesn’t work. It’s been disabled.”
Demetri shoots me a look as if this surprised him as well. It shouldn’t. He knows damn well Skyla is dead.
