“Semi-behaving is my specialty.”
Mentally, I shoot him a warning glare.So is pissing people off.
He simply writhes around beneath the surface of my skin, his sudden excitement putting me on edge.“We need to get him emotional so he’ll make a mistake. Don’t worry, I know how to toe the line; just ask Slade.”
When the waitress appears, she begins with Sabrina before going to the opposite end to wait on Ash, then jumping around to Hunter, Kaige, and Damian before me and my brothers. I catch a glimpse of Hunter’s raised eyebrow, and have to take a sip of water to hide my own amusement. Those three weren’t privy to the sort of etiquette games and sleights that my brothers and I grew up with, so if even he’s noticing, Ash wanted to make itabundantlyclear.
He chose the three of them to be her mates, but considers himself the primary leader of the group. My brothers and I are tolerated, but weren’t part of his plan and messed up his timeline, so we’re ranked at the bottom in order of significance in his eyes.
He thinks himself top dog, but even the worst alphas I’ve met have their pack’s best interests at heart and sacrifice their own joy at times in order to take care of them. Acheron Wilder may have the ability to siphon feral energy, but he’s no alpha. He’s a poison infecting everything he touches, a cancerous limb that needs severed.
“So,” Sabrina awkwardly states to break up the tense silence, “where do we begin?”
Ash adjusts the cuffs on his black dress shirt and rests his chin on his threaded fingers. “Wherever you’d like.”
More perceptive than he gives her credit for, Sabrina turns to me. “I’ve lost track of the endless list of questions. Cin? Where do you think we should start?”
“How about why he even needs you to do his dirty work if he’s spent centuries amassing his power?”
With a polite smile, she looks to Ash expectantly. “That’s as good of a place as any. After all, you have a valid point. Aurelia’s stories are just that; stories, the same as yours. Better off gathering as many renditions of events and facts as possible so I can make my own conclusions.”
“Flawless, I tell you,”my inner demon praises.“Subtly exploiting a topic that annoys him while seeming to play into his hand the next. Gods, do I love this woman.”
The waitress returns with a small cart, distributing drinks in the same order she took them, leaving the bottles of whiskey and wine on the table without being asked. Writing down all of our dinner requests, she disappears again, closing the door behind her.
“Because a Nightmare’s abilities are... complicated.” Finishing off his glass, Ash pours himself another. “Yes, some of the strongest of us can wield the energy we take in to a certain degree as I can, but ultimately, our power is rooted in influencing people’s realities and guiding them in the directions that we want. Aurelia, on the other hand, siphoned from the other demons on the mountain and in turn, gained their abilities. It’s how she was able to physically manifest her intent; even if it was too much for her to control.”
Sabrina lifts her glass. “And there’s no way you can replicate that? You’ve managed to artificially come up with a solution to free people’s wolves without any demonic magic involved whatsoever. Or heck, go siphon from some other shifters.”
At that Ash stiffens. “Stone was... reluctant to assist me in remedying the situation after how wildly off the rails it went the first time he was involved and has actively orchestrated against me. It’s safer for all of the wolves that we remain on the fringes of shifter society for now.”
The enemy of my enemy is my friend. Hello, Stone, my new best buddy.
Falling back into a casual approach, Ash gestures at Sabrina’s eyes. “And seeing as the shards were useless without the stone that was absorbed into Aurelia, I had to get creative. Thus, here you are.”
Attempting to hide my reaction, I take a drink, but lock eyes with my twin. With as disconnected as we’ve been in recent weeks, I thought that we’d lost the ability to read each other like open books, to know exactly where the other’s mind will go and be able to finish their sentences simply because we’re an extension of each other. But the small flash in his matching arctic gaze across from me as he conceals his smirk with a drink proves that recent events have merely been a bump in the road.
We were right. Ash is simply good at making peoplethinkthat he’s all-powerful and has eyes everywhere. The biggest problems are his healing abilities, breaching the demonic energy he uses as an acidic, living shield, and the people he manipulates into doing his dirty work. Even he admits that Sabrina is more powerful than him, so he’s attempting to seduce her as a means of controlling and using her, or threaten the people she loves as a failsafe to keep her in line.
As if the rest of us don’t exist, he keeps his attention fixated on Sabrina. “Isn’t that right, Aurelia? We have to want something to make it happen, and I never gave up on believing it was possible to bring you back to me. The world loves balance, and it was poetic that the very thing that destroyed you, you became. So I amassed as much demonic energy as I could to piece you back together from the aether. If you wish to mock the fact that I’m unable to undo the chaos you left in your wake, be my guest. But power is an imaginary concept, and yours and mine together are limitless. It’s why we were made for each other.”
“I’m going to kill him.”
Go for it. You sniff out people’s weaknesses like it’s your life’s calling; as soon as you figure out how to do it that won’t get Sabrina or our brothers killed, you have my blessing. Piss on his grave while you’re at it.
We’re left processing his speech as several waiters and waitresses return to pass out our food. Only once the last plate has been set down and glasses are refilled do they depart, closing the door behind them.
A purple glow from the waterfall alights the side of Damian’s face as he grits out, “You keep trying to paint yourself as this amazing person with her best interest at heart, but don’t forget, you killed her father.”
Absolute delight appears in Ash’s face as he begins cutting up his steak, popping a piece in his mouth before replying. “No,youthree were the ones that disposed of the human that was going to get Sabrina killed. His death was in order to protect her, and your hands in it were to prove that you were willing to do whatever was necessary to keep her safe, even if you didn’t want to and she’d hate you for it. All I did was make the hard call that it couldn’t be put off any longer and insist that it needed to be done.”
Pointedly waiting for Sabrina to start eating before he continues, as soon as she takes a bite, he smirks. “For whatever reason, Annika was happy with that human. That didn't leave much for you to siphon from in order to keep you alive, and Annika made sure to keep you away from other shifters, so I had no choice. If Noah Laroque hadn’t died, you would have. And I wasn't going to allow that to happen; never again.”
Sabrina polishes off her glass, and I snag the nearest bottle of wine before she’s even done. A high alcohol tolerance and a low tolerance for Acheron Wilder don’t particularly mix. May not be the healthiest of ways to deal with the conversation, but unless we want to repeat the futile efforts of uselessly attacking him, liquid encouragement is necessary to keep our cool.
Setting her glass aside, she holds his stare as she stabs her fork into her food. “How benevolent of you.”
Reaching beside his chair, he retrieves a thick manilla envelope. “I’m aware the situation caused you a great amount of grief, and for that, I do sincerely apologize. But you need to realize that I never make a decision lightly. These mates of yours are another necessary evil I’m willing to endure only because you are far too important to leave vulnerable, especially when you’ve always had a habit of getting yourself into trouble.”
