Wolfe grabbed my hand and jerked me up to my feet. He tossed his uneaten cupcake on the chair and yanked me to the far corner where Poppy had already been pacing for the last twenty minutes. The regeneration process hadn’t taken that long. Wolfe’s strong fingers intertwined with mine, keeping me firmly by his side.
The black bag covering half of Cassander’s body twitched down by his feet. It moved again by his knees. It jerked by his hands.
Cassander’s head shot up off the table, his blinking eyes staring down at his body. It took him a moment to focus. And then his eyes shut, and his head flopped back down on the metal table.
His groan filled the air, then his flat words. “Why do they always put me in a damn bag?”
Cassander’s nose twitched, then his head turned instantly to Theron. Confusion coated his features. “Dad? Why am I in a bag inyourmorgue?”
Theron held perfectly still, though his eyes filled with tears. “Son, I’m going to ask you a series of questions. I want you to answer them the best you can.”
“Alright.” Cassander blinked, taking notice of us behind Theron in the far corner, not coming any closer. He stared directly at Poppy, his gunmetal eyes traveling over her person carefully. “Why do they look that way?”
“I’ll be asking the questions.” Theron brought the seer’s focus back on him with a snap of his fingers…his gun hidden behind his back in his other hand. “What is your name?”
“Cassander.”
“How long have you been alive?”
“Almost two hundred years. My birthday is coming soon.”
“Who was your brother?”
“Godric.”
“How do you feel when I say the name Joshua Striker?”
Cassander’s lips curled over his teeth. “I want to hurt him.”
“How did you break your arm when you were five years old?”
“A car hit me.”
Theron swallowed hard, and then ordered, “Pull your left hand out of the bag and light up your magic just enough to see it.”
Still utterly confused, Cassander raised his arm out of the bag and forced his power to ignite.White.White power radiated in the palm of his hand, not black like Joshua Striker’s, no darkness discernible.
Theron stifled a sob with the back of his free hand, his words muffled as he spoke. “Power your eyes for me.”
Cassander’s eyes suddenly turned white.
Completely white, no color to be found anywhere.
“Okay, shut it down, son,” Theron whispered.
Cassander let his power fade away. “Dad, you want to tell me what’s going on now?” One of his brows lifted and his nostrils flared. “And why do you have your favorite gun hidden behind your back?”
Theron stopped hiding the weapon, hot tears now tracking down his face. “What’s the last thing you remember? Before you woke up and found yourself in my morgue.”
Cassander turned his attention to the ceiling, staring at the square ceiling tiles. His lips frowned ever so subtly the longer he took to answer. He murmured, “Give me a moment. This is harder than normal to remember.” He lifted his hand and rubbed at his chest, right over where the wound had been. “There was some kind of fight. Maybe you and Ms. Carvene were there, too.”
I grinned in silence. It was him.
He hadn’t called her Poppy.
“What else?’’ Theron gently prodded.
“Joshua Striker was there. I can see that clearly.”
