“Is that where you went?” I ask. “When you disappeared, you went to tell them you wouldn’t kill me?”
He doesn’t nod. He doesn’t have to.
“That’s who beat you up,” I say.
“I shouldn’t have gone,” he says. “I thought if I told them about you, about how you are a good person and you only want the best for everyone, maybe they would change their minds about the whole operation. Instead, they planted a bomb.”
“Bomb?” Gretchen growls. “The one that destroyed my loft?”
The pieces fall into place.
“
“Too bad you’re the one who put us in danger in the first place,” Gretchen says. “You should have told us sooner.”
He winces in pain. “I know.”
She climbs to her feet, knocking him in the ribs with her boot as she steps over him. Sillus runs over and kicks him in the thigh.
I don’t know what to say. I don’t even know what to feel. The big brother I have looked up to for most of my life, who taught me how to knee a guy who got too handsy and who always made sure I got the biggest brownie on the plate, is suddenly a stranger. One of the people I trust the most, and he was the one I should have been afraid of.
He’s still my brother, but he has also been my enemy. I feel like I don’t know him at all.
Thane lies there for a moment before finally getting up. He looks defeated. I don’t know what to say. I want to tell him everything is okay, but is it? How can I tell?
Greer coughs, sputtering breath into the air.
I rush into the bedroom and sit at her side.
“Hush, Greer,” I soothe. “We’re here. You’re okay.”
Our mother sits at her other side, checking Greer’s pulse and smoothing fingertips over her forehead. She’s been watching over her ever since we got back to the safe house.
Greer is still unconscious, though I’m sure that’s not surprising. I wonder how long she’ll be out. I wonder what death, even a brief one, will have cost her.
I glance up as Thane steps into the doorway. He looks at Greer, and then, reassured that she’s okay, he turns and leaves.
In that moment, I know everything is going to be okay. Whatever happened in the past, whatever secrets Thane kept from me my whole life, he is still my brother in every way that matters. He risked his own life to defy his mission. How can I hold him accountable for something he had no choice over in the first place? The important thing is that he’s made his choice now.
He chose me.
Leaving Greer’s side, I return to the other room to reassure my brother that everything is fine. “Hey, Thane, I—”
He’s gone.
CHAPTER 21
GREER
The smell is terrible, revolting, like decaying flesh and skunk and vomit all combined into one. It’s worse than the abyss, even worse than the trash bins behind Fisherman’s Wharf—and that’s saying a lot.
At first my eyes won’t open, like they’re glued shut. Maybe I should be grateful for that. If the smell is this bad, I can only imagine what it looks like—and I’d rather not.
Instead, I try to move. My chest explodes with a white hot pain.
I collapse back down, struggling to keep my breathing even and to maintain consciousness. The last thing I want is to hyperventilate and pass out here, wherever here is.
“Is this really her?” a young female voice whispers.
An older woman says, “Couldn’t be.”
“Looks like her,” another says. This one sounds as old as great-grandmother Morgenthal. Something slimy pokes at my foot. “She has the mark.”
“And the fangs.”
I trace my tongue over my teeth and discover that, yes, my fangs are showing. Maybe they’re reacting to the stench.
“Sorry,” I say, my voice a harsh whisper.
Shrieks pierce my eardrums and I force my eyes open to see what terror is approaching. At the rate my week is going, it’s probably a giant flesh-eating tadpole or something.
No, just a trio of human-looking women, ranging in age from a teenager to an octogenarian. Their eyes are shut, but I get the distinct impression that they are shrieking at me. Like
I close my eyes and take a deep breath, trying to quell the nausea and pain that keep washing over me. When I open my eyes, the old woman has moved closer and is shoving her hand toward my face. Cupped in the palm of her hand is an eyeball.
I can’t stop the scream.
Three women and one eyeball. Oh my heavens, I know who they are. The Fates.
This can’t be good.
“What’s going on?” I demand, trying to control my panic. Looking around, I add, “Where am I?”
“She doesn’t know,” the young one on the left says to the other two.
“You tell her,” the middle one says.
The old one on the right says, “Yes, you.”
“I’m not telling her,” the first one argues.
“Tell me what?” I ask.
“That you’re in Hades,” the middle one admits. Then she slaps a hand over her mouth when she realizes she just told me the thing they didn’t want to tell me.
“Hades?” I frown. “That’s not possible.”
All three of them glance down at my chest. I’m about to feel insulted—there’s a sharp barb on the tip of my tongue about it being rude to stare—when I look down. They’re not looking at my breasts. They’re looking at the ragged gash in my chest, right next to my sternum.
“Oh,” I say.
It comes back to me in a flash. The vision. The alley. The knife.
“No. This can’t be happening.”
But it is. I’m dead because I dived in front of a blade heading for Grace. And it’s not like if I could go back in time I would do anything differently. If I hadn’t stepped between her and the dagger, she would be the one waking up in Hades. That is not a trade I’m willing to make. If I have to die, doing so in the process of saving Grace’s life is a pretty honorable way to go. I have to say I’m quite proud of myself.
I am not, however, thrilled to find out this is where I’m ending up. I would prefer somewhere warmer, with more sun and maybe a beach.
I sit up and look around, relieved that the white hot ache in my chest is fading. I would hate to think I’m spending the rest of eternity living with the stinging pain—well, not
“So this is Hades?” I ask, recalling my mythology lessons on the ancient Greek afterlife. “Where is the ferryman? Cerberus? The lord of the underworld himself?”
The trio shrugs nervously.
