I Regret Nothing - JB Trepagnier Page 0,55

will be pissed, but Venus wants to kill her too. We can take credit, so they don’t retaliate against Rei.”

“Brilliant plan, Dakarys. Have you forgotten some witches are after us and our black market too? Let’s not poke the witches. Astrid handled a gang war with the eagles. She can handle Venus and the witches.”

I was less convinced. Astrid could handle her shit. I knew that from dealing with her. But she should have taken care of Venus by now.

This was going to end badly.

Chapter 34

Faust

H

auser seemed to think it was impossible to wipe out the Aether Circle, but I was digging deep to try to make it happen. I was deep in the rabbit hole of the Aether Circle. I’d dealt with corrupt covens for money. I saw criminal witches every day in Silverhold. The Aether Circle made them all look like girl scouts.

Supernaturals and humans put a lot of stock in the seven deadly sins, but for different reasons. For some reason, humans thought you ended up in Hell if you committed them while supernaturals knew that was an entirely different realm with demons who didn’t like to visit Earth and kept a lot of secrets. No one took credit for the bombings of some greenhouses that apparently grew some witch ingredients for summoning demons. We couldn’t ask them, but most people thought it was the demons.

The Aether Circle hit all seven pretty often. Rei had done the world a solid stealing that Grimoire from them. Try telling anyone that. The Aether Circle had people placed in politics, law enforcement, government agencies, and they threw their money around like candy to make sure of anything and everything.

I was a little fucking proud my mate stole from them and got away with it for so long. It was causing so much shit now, but I was going to keep her safe. She asked me not to, but I’d kill that witch in medical if she stepped out of line and tried to hurt her.

I’d already found the paper trail leading back to the Aether Circle. They had gotten to Venus. They paid for her lawyer and had already deposited a good sum into a bank account law enforcement didn’t find, but I did. I’d traced a lot of money going in and out the Aether Circle. I also cracked the encrypted server they used for email.

Venus was supposed to kill Rei in Silverhold. The Aether Circle paid her and promised her she would only have to serve three years of her sentence once she did it. Venus was playing some sort of long game, and the Aether Circle wanted it done yesterday. That was why they reached out to me, even though they didn’t know my name. They were putting feelers out everywhere.

Venus must have been pretty stupid if she thought they’d honor the deal if she didn’t kill Rei. They wouldn’t just not get her out of prison like they said. They’d pay whoever agreed to take the job on Rei to accept another assignment and kill Venus too. That was just their operandi. If you crossed them, you died. They didn’t need the Grimoire Rei stole to make it happen either.

Taking them out would be complicated. Rei was right when he compared them to a hydra. They weren’t even centralized in one location in the United States. They had a headquarters, which is where Rei stole their Grimoire, but not everyone lived there. There were plenty of coven members scattered throughout the States that would need to be taken out at the exact same time.

And that still wouldn’t solve the problem. The Aether Circle was worldwide. They would all flock here, trying to figure out who arranged the hit. If I had the ability to take them out on my own, it would never be traced back to me. Bringing that many people in to wipe them out meant a greater chance of someone talking.

The Aether Circle had spells in the Grimoire Rei stole to get into someone’s mind and make them talk. They could also control them for short periods. That was considered forbidden among the witches. Even Vampires were only supposed to use compulsion in extreme situations, mainly keeping their identity secret from humans. There were plenty of Vampires in Silverhold for abusing compulsion and plenty of witches and warlocks for using dark magic. The Aether Circle had been getting a free pass for way too long.

Maybe I didn’t need to kill them all. I