The ones that said things like BRIDGE MAY BE ICY . . . or, WATCH FOR FALLING ROCK . . . or the temporary GIVE ’EM A BRAKE before you got to a work zone. Hell, even the ones with the silhouette of a deer leaping or a big black arrow pointing to the left or the right.
At this moment, standing here in the foyer, he would really have appreciated some advance warning that his life was about to go pigslick, off-the-rails.
Then again, collisions were collisions and couldn’t be planned.
Raising his stare from the photograph, he looked into the human surgeon’s eyes. They were a deep brown, a good old-fashioned port color. But the shape of them . . . God, why hadn’t he seen the similarity to his own before?
“You’re sure,” he heard himself say. “This is your father.”
Except he knew the answer before the guy nodded.
“Who . . . how . . .” Yeah, great journalist he would make, huh. “What . . .”
There you go. Add
The thing was, though, after having mated Marissa and gone through his transition, he’d finally found peace with who he was and what was doing in his life. Over in the human world, on the other hand, he’d been estranged from everyone, running parallel but never truly intersecting with his mother and his sisters and his brothers.
And his father, of course.
Or at least the guy he’d been told was his pops.
He’d assumed that with his true home and mate here, he was done with assimilating, having reached a peaceful reconciliation with so much that had been painful.
But didn’t this just kick all that shit up again.
The human spoke gravely. “His name was Robert Bluff. He was a surgeon at Columbia Pres in New York City when my mom was working there as a nurse—”
“My mother was a nurse.” Butch’s mouth felt dry. “But not at that hospital.”
“He practiced a number of places—even . . . over in Boston.”
There was a long silence, during which Butch tested the cold, confusing waters of a possible unfaithfulness on his mother’s part.
“Anyone need a drink, true?” V said.
“Lag—”
“Lagavulin—”
Butch and surgeon both fell silent as Vishous rolled his eyes. “Why is this not a surprise.”
As the brother hit the bar in the billiards room, Manello said, “I never really knew him. Met him, like . . . once? I can’t really remember, to be honest.”
V made like a flight attendant and returned front-and-centered the liquor.
As Butch took a haul from a glass, Manello did the same and then shook his head. “You know, I never liked this shit until after . . .”
“What.”
“You boys started fucking with my head. Used to like Jack. Last year, though . . . everything changed.”
Butch nodded even though he wasn’t tracking. Man, he just couldn’t stop looking at the picture, and after a while, he found that in the strangest way, this was all a relief. Ancestor regression had proven that he was related to Wrath, but he’d never known, or particularly cared to know, exactly how. And yet here it was. In front of him.
Shit, it was kind of like he’d had a disease all this time, and someone had finally put a name to it.
You have Other-father-itis. Or was it a Bastard-oma?
It all made sense. He’d always thought his father had hated him and maybe this was the why behind that. Although it was nearly impossible to imagine his pious, straitlaced mother ever straying, this picture told the story of at least one night with someone else.
His first thought was that he had to get to his mom and ask her for specifics—well,
But how was that going to work? Dementia had taken her away from reality, and she was now so far gone she barely recognized him when he dropped by—which was the only reason he could visit her at all. And it wasn’t as if he could ask his sisters or brothers. They’d written him off when he’d disappeared from their orbits, but more to the point, it was unlikely they knew any more than he did.
“Is he still alive?” Butch asked.
“I’m not sure. I used to think he was buried in Pine Grove Cemetery. Now? Who the hell knows.”
“I can find out.” As V spoke up, Butch and Manny both looked over at the brother. “Say the word and I will find him—whether he’s in the vampire world or the human one.”
“Find who?”
The deep voice came from the head of the stairs, and everyone looked up as the words reverberated throughout the foyer. Wrath was standing on the second-floor landing with George at his side, and the king’s mood was easy to guess at even though his eyes were hidden behind those wraparounds: He was in a deadly frame of mind.
Hard to know, however, whether it was the human in the foyer or not because God knew there were a thousand things riding the guy’s ass right about now.
Vishous spoke up—which was a good call. Butch had lost his voice and so had Manello, evidently. “Looks like this fine surgeon may be a relative of yours, my lord.”
As Manello recoiled, Butch thought,
Didn’t that throw another iron into the fire.
Manny rubbed his temples as that tremendous vampire with the waistlong black hair came down the stairs, a blond dog seeming to lead the way. The bastard looked like he owned the place, and given the “my lord” shit, he probably did.
“Did I hear you right, V?” the male asked.
“Yeah. You did.”
Annnnnnnnnnnd that settled another question—because Manny was wondering if he’d been having trouble with his ears, too.
“This is our king,” Vishous announced. “Wrath, son of Wrath. This is Manello. Manny Manello, M.D. Don’t think you two have met formally.”
“You’re the one who’s Payne’s.”
No hesitation on that. No hesitation on his reply either: “Yeah. I am.”
The low rumble that came out of a cruel mouth was part laugh, part curse. “And you think that we’re related how?”
V cleared his throat and jumped in. “There is a striking physical resemblance between Manny’s dad and Butch. I mean . . . shit, it’s like looking at a picture of my boy.”
Dark brows disappeared behind those wraparounds. Then the expression eased. “Needless to say, I can’t make that call.”
Ah, so he was blind. Explained the dog.
“We could ancestor-regress him,” Vishous suggested.
“Yeah,” Butch said. “Let’s do—”
“Wait a minute, can’t that kill him?” Jane interjected.
“Hold up.” Manny pulled an out-and-safe with his hands. “Just wait a fucking minute. Ancestor what?”
Vishous exhaled smoke. “It’s a process by which I get into you and see how much of our blood is in your veins.”
“But it could kill me?” Shit, the fact that Jane was shaking her head so did not inspire confidence.
“It’s the only way to be sure. If you’re a half-breed, it’s not like we can go into the lab and look at your blood. Half-breeds are different.”
Manny glanced around at all of them: the king, Vishous, Jane . . . and the guy who might be a half brother. Christ, maybe this was why he felt so differently about Payne—from the second he saw her, it was like . . . a part of
