Lover Avenged(212)

Back, back, back through the entries…He’d started needing dopamine right around the time his mother had stopped coming in injured.

Maybe it was just a coincidence.

Feeling half-crazy, Ehlena shifted over to the Internet and went into the race’s public-records database. Typing in Madalina’s name, she found the registry of the female’s passing, then hopped over to that of her hellren, Rempoon-

Ehlena leaned forward in the chair, her breath leaving on a hiss. Not willing to believe it, she went back to the record on Madalina.

Her hellren had died on the night of the last time she’d come in hurt to the clinic.

With a sense that she was on the verge of answers, Ehlena considered the matching dates in light of what the female security guard had said about Rehvenge. What if he’d killed the male to protect his mother? What if that security guard knew that? What if…

Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the picture of Rehvenge from the CCJ, his face in shadow, his fancy car and his pimp cane so very obvious.

With a curse, she slapped the laptop shut, put it back in the drawer, and got to her feet. She might not be able to control her subconscious, but she could take charge of her waking hours and not encourage this craziness.

Instead of driving herself more nuts, she was going to go up to the master bedroom Montrag had slept in and poke around trying to find the combination to the safe. Later, she would have Last Meal with her father and Lusie.

And then she needed to figure out what she was going to do with the rest of her life.



“‘…suggests that the recent killings of area drug dealers might have come to an end with the likely death of club owner and suspected drug kingpin Richard Reynolds.’” There was a rustle as Beth put the CCJ on the desk. “That’s the end of the article.”

Wrath shifted his legs around to more comfortably support his queen’s weight in his lap. He’d been to see Payne about two hours ago, and his body was beat to shit, which felt really nice.

“Thanks for reading it to me.”

“My pleasure. Now let me go tend the fire for a second. We’ve got a log that’s about to roll out onto the carpet.” Beth kissed him and stood up, the pansy chair creaking with relief. As she went across the study toward the fireplace, the grandfather clock started to chime.

“Oh, this is good,” Beth said. “Listen, Mary should be coming in a minute. She’s bringing you something.”

Wrath nodded and reached forward, running his fingertips across the desk’s top until he got to the glass of red wine he’d been drinking. By its weight, he knew that he’d almost finished it, and given his mood, he was going to want more. The shit about Rehv had been bothering him. Badly.

After he polished off his Bordeaux, he put the glass down and rubbed his eyes under the wraparounds he still wore. It might be weird to keep the sunglasses on, but whatever-he didn’t like the idea that other people could look at his unfocused pupils and he couldn’t see them staring at him.

“Wrath?” Beth came over to his side, and he could tell by her tense tone that she was trying to keep the fear out of her voice. “Are you all right? Does your head hurt?”

“No.” Wrath tugged his queen back into his lap, the little chair creaking once again, its spindly legs wobbling. “I’m okay.”

Her hands brushed his hair from his face. “You don’t seem that way.”

“I just…” He found one of her hands and took it into his own. “Shit, I don’t know.”

“Yes, you do.”

He frowned hard and tight. “It’s not about me. At least, not really.”

There was a long pause, and then they both spoke at once:

“What is it?”

“How’s Bella?”

Beth cleared her throat as if she were surprised by his question. “Bella’s…doing the best she can. We don’t leave her alone much, and it’s good that Zsadist has taken some time off. It’s just so hard that she lost both of them within days of each other. I mean her mother and her brother…”

“That shit about Rehv was a lie.”

“I don’t understand.”

He reached around for the Caldwell Courier Journal she’d been reading him, and tapped the article she’d just finished. “I find it hard to believe that someone blew his ass up. Rehv was no dummy, and those Moors who guarded him? That head of security? No fucking way they’d let some cocksucker with a bomb anywhere near that club. Plus, Rhage said that he and V went to the Iron Mask the other night to drag John home, and the three of them are working there-iAm, Trez, and Xhex are still together. Usually people scatter after tragedy. Except that bunch is right where they always were, like they’re waiting for him to come back.”