sure I can die, so that means I can come back as some crazy creepy thing. We should pass on that. But also, I’m pretty good at not dying. Your dad has often told me that’s my primary job. Well, that and keeping your brother alive. He’s a hoot, by the way, and he’s totally going to love you.”
The words nearly made me stop breathing. I had a brother?
“If there are truly wights in this space, we have to move,” Bris said. “They will come for Kelsey and they won’t stop.”
“What? I already have a reputation here?” Kelsey complained. “I haven’t even done anything. Sure, I killed like five dudes, but who can know that? It’s not like there’s social media here.”
Bris turned to her, his face going grave. “No, you don’t have a reputation. What you have is an unborn child.”
Kelsey gasped and I knew this was the first time she’d heard that particular fact. But then she hung out with fertility gods, so she shouldn’t be so surprised. It was a good thing the male I admired was incapable of procreating. I’d figured out that he was more than likely an earthbound vamp and therefore perfectly safe to have sex with.
Not that I would. Because I wouldn’t.
And all of these people were lying to me because I couldn’t possibly have a brother. After all, when your father is a vampire, you shouldn’t expect siblings. They had started talking amongst themselves. Marcus had finally turned his attention off me.
It was time to go.
I started walking because none of this mattered to me. Maybe that man truly was Dev Quinn, but it was apparent that my parents had moved on. It was time for me to do the same.
* * * *
Zoey
“Do you honestly believe that prophecy of Gray’s has something to do with my granddaughter?” My father watched the door Lee had disappeared behind. We’d retreated to the penthouse to discuss our plan of action. When Lee had gone to the bathroom, I’d told my father about the prophecy I’d read, the one about Summer almost being here. My father knew about the daughter I’d unwittingly sent to a Fae plane. He knew how I longed to know anything about what had happened to her.
It said something about my father’s tolerance of weird shit that he hadn’t even questioned that the odd piece of magic Danny and I had created all those years ago was his granddaughter. I’d told him after the first time I’d come back from Devinshea’s home plane and he’d immediately used his every resource to try to find her.
Like everyone we’d talked to, he’d come up with nothing.
He sat back and sighed, his eyes still on the door. Like me, he didn’t want Lee to know anything about his big sister because Lee could be reckless at the best of times. I did not need him trying to open doors to other planes. “I think we should consider what the demon said.”
I leaned over. “You are not selling your soul to a Planeswalker.”
There are a couple types of specialized demons who do specific jobs. Like Kelsey’s new butler, Eddie. He’s a satan, one of the underworld’s lawyers. They are the arbiters of contracts, though Eddie greatly prefers running a household and trying to wrangle Fenrir into pants. Planeswalker demons are exactly what they sound like. They spend their time walking the various planes of existence. I like to think of them as bees, except they pollinate planes instead of flowers. From what we’ve gathered, the Planeswalkers get their energy from crossing the planes. The planes get something from this too since the rumors are the walls that separate us would collapse without the demons doing their daily walkabouts.
A Planeswalker could take a person to another plane of existence. There was only one problem. The price of the ticket was pretty hefty. It cost a person their soul.
“We don’t know that I’m not already going there, girl.” My father’s jaw had gone tight. “I’ve done things in my life I’m not proud of.”
Oddly, I was pretty sure he wasn’t talking about the times he’d stolen stuff. He was proud of that. “I’m not going to allow you to sell your soul, and I doubt any demon would sign a contract with you. Daniel has made things pretty plain since Abbas Hiberna used Lee to get him to sign one. Any member of our family is off limits.”
Some asshole elemental demon had decided to start a civil