Despite how late it was and the ferocity of the storm, there were still people out on the roads. Most of the vehicles seemed to be taxis or ride-share workers. Sane people knew not to be out on a night like this. He was merging onto the West Side Highway when Jono broke the silence between them.
“All the reports about Ethan’s children said they’d gone missing and were presumed dead like his wife.”
Patrick gripped the steering wheel so hard his knuckles went white. He didn’t want to have this conversation. Unfortunately, he couldn’t throw himself out of a moving vehicle to escape it.
“Reports lie,” Patrick said.
“I can see that.” Jono glanced at him. “The immortals say you owe them a soul debt. Is Ethan why?”
Patrick thought of the lies he’d lived over the years, the background Setsuna had never let him forget since he was eight years old.
“Setsuna changed my last name in a closed federal court hearing and sealed the files when I was a kid. She gave me a new identity and took me on as her ward because it was the only way to keep me safe back then. The public thinks I’m dead. The files show me alive.”
Jono’s voice was quiet, a murmur barely heard over the rain pounding on the car roof. “And your twin sister?”
Patrick reflexively pressed his foot harder on the gas pedal, holding on tight to the steering wheel and the gear shift. “What do you think?”
The police had only found one body in his family’s home in Salem—his mother’s. Hannah Greene, his twin sister, had disappeared, a missing person presumed dead and relegated to a cold case that still haunted the detectives who’d covered the crime. At the time, the sacrificial murder of a loving mother and the assumed deaths of her twin eight-year-old children had rocked Salem’s magical community to its core.
Ethan, the prime murder suspect, had gone on the run and disappeared, only to show up years later on grainy CCTV footage in Europe, making a new life as a mercenary. Over the years, every shred of evidence that proved Ethan was alive had never confirmed the same fate for Hannah.
As for Patrick?
The sins of the father were owed by the son in the eyes of the immortals.
“These gods,” Jono said quietly. “They aren’t as powerful as they used to be.”
“They’re still powerful enough. People still worship them. Why do you think Hera formed that coven of hers?” Patrick switched lanes to get out from behind the added spray of water coming from a truck’s tires. “Gods will always have power we mortals never will. It’s why Ethan does what he does.”
Greed was his father’s defining feature and always would be.
Headlights and taillights refracted through the rain. Jono didn’t ask any more questions, but he did reach over and settle his hand over Patrick’s on the gear shift. Patrick let out a long, slow, deep breath at the touch, though the tension in his shoulders only got worse.
He drove them north, wishing for a cigarette or a goddamn drink to settle his mind. It took close to thirty minutes even without a lot of traffic on the road to reach Exit 17, fighting the wind for the entire drive. Patrick veered right, gliding onto Riverside Drive, most of Manhattan’s bridges behind them. He took a left on Seaman Avenue, driving between red-bricked buildings on either side of the street.
Patrick followed the route on the GPS all the way to where Seaman Avenue intersected with West 218th Street. He turned left and managed to drive only one block before coming to a stop. The car’s headlights illuminated the large boulders placed between short metal pillars to keep cars out of the park.
“Be right back,” Jono said.
He got out of the car and jogged toward the closest pair of boulders through the rain. Patrick watched through the downpour as Jono easily picked up each boulder and tossed them to the side, clearing the way.
“Okay, that was hot,” Patrick said, knowing Jono could probably hear him.
Jono returned to the car and raised an eyebrow at Patrick. “Hefting rocks about turns you on?”
Patrick took his foot off the brake and pressed down on the gas and clutch, shifting gears. “You know exactly what turned me on about that, and it wasn’t the rocks. Don’t fish for compliments.”
He drove them onto a bumpy road, the asphalt broken and pitted in places. They ended up at a roundabout situated on a wedge of land jutting into the choppy water. Inwood Hill Park sat on the northernmost tip of Manhattan, a little spot of green with eddies of magic flowing beneath its surface. Ley lines snaked beneath it in metaphysical rivers of power that fed through to the nexus behind them. The park was dark, empty of people, the reactionary storm having driven everyone away.
Patrick parked against the curve of the roundabout. Off to the side was an empty baseball field, the tall stadium-style lights dark against the stormy sky. Rain pounded against the car roof and streamed down the windshield in a waterfall that blurred out the world. Patrick knew the reactionary storm would only grow worse as the hours ticked down. He didn’t want to think about the damage the five boroughs would sustain when hit by something resembling a strong tropical storm or a low-category hurricane that wouldn’t move on.
He took the key out of the ignition and opened the car door. “Let’s go.”
Jono followed him into the storm once more, the two of them trudging across muddy grass that sucked at their feet. They walked parallel to the baseball field, heading for the line of trees at land’s end; the park one last, crushing bit of nature that sprouted defiantly in one of the world’s most human of cities.
Patrick could see lights from the buildings across the choppy water shining through the trees. Patrick ducked his head against the wind shrieking over the park, leaning into it as he walked. His leather jacket kept his upper body mostly dry due to the charms laid onto it, but rain still slipped between the collar and his neck.
They made it to the pathway circling the jut of land before passing through the copse of trees. Jono had to duck a little under some of the branches until they cleared the tree line and came upon the rocky shore. The low-lying water before them churned violently from the storm.
