Gypsy Truths (All The Pretty Monsters #6)- Kristy Cunning Page 0,127

as two very bright, almost blinding, streaks of lightning crash outside.

Emit looks to me, a confused, almost lost look in his eyes.

“I’ve played it in my head hundreds of times. It doesn’t make sense for Violet to taunt Idun. Even on a power trip, her dominance is so fierce that it’s taking all my control to keep my wolf leashed. You three have been arguing almost nonstop, unable to think clearly or finish full thought processes.”

“And?” I ask, needing him to hurry on with it, because I need a shower before I die.

She’ll have to fucking kill me. I’m not going in the ground without any way of moving. I’ll go mad and come out a true monster—not some broken man she can bend to her will.

I’m Vancetto fucking Van Helsing. I hunt monsters; I don’t drop to my knees before them. I’m a fucking monster too.

“And Violet came out of nowhere,” Emit adds, his eyes darting away as though he’s just thought of something.

“Vance, come with me. I need in your archive room,” the wolf says suddenly as he stands.

“What could you possibly learn from the archives that we don’t already know?” I ask very seriously. “We need to devise a concrete plan to attempt to survive this night. This is just the first night, and it’s going to be done with the gloves off this time. We may not get the opportunity to put her under, because fewer alphas are going to side with us after that stunt Violet recklessly pulled.”

“Jack,” he says as though that makes all the sense in the world.

“Yes. We’ll spend the night looking through all the fourteen million Jacks I’ve come across this past eternity,” I state, sarcasm oozing from my tone. “I’m sure Idun won’t mind waiting to bury us alive in an attempt to conform us.”

“It’s the monster from your memories that attacked Violet inside your head,” he says, again not making much sense.

“I’ve known countless Jacks. And Violet’s not the issue—”

I stop talking, because a brief memory crosses through my mind so painfully that I’m forced to wince. I’m thankful to be sitting, because my legs go numb when the pressure pulses through my body, and the scene quickly rolls out.

Jack…

Jack…

“Jack! This ends tonight.” The echo of my own voice pushes through my thoughts.

My eyes come up to meet Emit’s, and I slowly rise, my spine dancing with a new tremor.

Jack…

That Jack…

“Why does it look like you’ve just had a huge revelation that has stunned you out of operational mode? Are you rebooting, Van Helsing?” Damien asks me.

“She does this. She does it all the time. She does something crazy, but there’s so much more going on that you dare not look a gift horse in the mouth. Sometimes it’s easier to just accept all the good she brings, while overlooking all the fucked up impracticalities that accompany it. We know she does this. We both love it and hate the mystery of it, because of our desperate need for a fresh breath and our great many trust issues.”

“What are you on about?” Arion asks.

“Jack was a different sort of monster. One that I long forgot about, because he was a freak-botched science experiment—not magic,” I murmur, questioning what I know about absolutely everything. “What if it’s all been a fucking lie from the very beginning?”

I turn and dart out without another word, hearing the wolf’s feet pounding the floor as he follows.

He doesn’t ask questions.

I don’t have answers.

At this point, my head’s going to explode if one more thing comes flying at me.

“Why did you ask about Jack?” I ask him as we sprint across the town, weaving between some straggling evacuees.

We’re both looking over our shoulder at every possible second, waiting for the shoe to drop.

“Because I’m about to ask everything that doesn’t make sense. Damien had to sedate her just to get her out of this situation, because she clearly lost control there at the end.”

I stop and take a deep breath once we reach my archive room, my hand shaking as I reach for the door.

“This storm isn’t natural. Violet can’t conjure storms. You fell out of the silver without a person to thank,” he carries on. “I feel like we’re on the outside of an inside job, and it makes me feel like I’m a pawn.”

“The feeling is mutual,” I say quietly, as I quickly type Jack’s name into my system. “Who broke my chains?”

“That’s the thing. No one broke them. They simply fell off,”