The man, who still hadn't identified himself, took Jack by the arm and led him toward the door. "I think we all need to leave Alberta to her work. "
Susan felt for the boy as tears gathered in his eyes. "It'll be okay, Jack," she said, praying she was right. Having lost her own mother at Jack's age, she couldn't stand the thought of him losing his.
Ravyn gave her a knowing look. "Yeah, Jack. Alberta won't let anything happen to your mom. She'll be back on her feet, yelling at you, real soon."
Jack nodded bravely as he walked out of the room.
Susan followed Ravyn into the hallway where he drew up short. Looking around him, she sucked her breath in sharply to see a group of extremely handsome but angry men.
An older man who appeared around the age of sixty curled his lip at the sight of Ravyn before he spat on the floor at Ravyn's feet. "You know better than to come here. Ever."
An air of exhaustion settled over Ravyn, as if he didn't want to deal with this right now. "It was an emergency."
That didn't seem to appease the man at all, and it was then she realized this was the sanctuary his family owned. "You should have let the humans bring her."
"Dad-"
He hissed at the man who'd joined them in the clinic. "Don't defend him, Dorian. If not for the laws of sanctuary, I'd already be tasting his blood."
Ravyn's features hardened as he approached his father. Anger mixed with hurt deep inside him. They hadn't seen each other in more than a century, and still his father couldn't look at him without curling his lip. Ravyn remembered a time when he had respected this man. When he would have done anything for him.
Part of him hated his father for the fact that he'd just stood by and watched while Phoenix killed him all those centuries ago. But another part was the little boy who'd once thought the world of this man. The little boy who used to ride on his wide shoulders and play chase with him. That part had wanted some kind of comfort over the death of his family.
Instead, they'd killed him, too. His father had even kicked him as he lay dying on the floor and spat on him. He looked at the spittle beside his boot. His father still spat at him.
And that awoke a potent rage inside him. It was what he focused on now. "What galls you most, old man? The fact that I betrayed you, or the fact that I had the balls to set it right when you didn't?"
He lunged at Ravyn only to have Dorian catch him. "Don't, Dad. He's not worth it."
Ravyn smiled sinisterly. Dorian had no idea just how right he was. "Yeah, Dad, I'm so not worth it."
"Get out," his father snarled, his voice thick with hatred, "and don't come back here ever. "
"Don't worry."
Ravyn started for the door until he realized that Susan was still following after him. What the hell was she thinking? "You need to stay here with the others."
"I don't think so."
"Susan..."
"Look," she said sternly, "you're the one who dragged me into all of this. No offense, Otto, Kyl, and Jessica look at me as if they want to kill me. I want to kill Erika and you're the only one of them who seems to be bulletproof. So between my choices, you look like the safest bet for my continued survival."
Even though his features were angry, there was a glint of humor in his black eyes. "Trust me, I'm not. I'm headed out there into the lion's den. If you stay here, the bad guys can't get you. But if you go with me, they can."
Maybe he was right, but something in her gut told her that she needed to stay with him, and if there was one thing in her life she'd learned to trust, it was her gut. "Ravyn-"
"Listen to him, human," a brittle voice said from behind her. "Getting innocent people killed is what he's best at."
Grief so profound that it took her breath flashed into Ravyn's eyes before he hid it. "Go to hell, Phoenix."
Susan turned to see a man behind her who was an exact duplicate of Dorian. The only reason she knew it wasn't him was that this guy had on a pair of jeans and a denim button-down shirt instead of the pleated pants and black shirt Dorian had been wearing.
Phoenix narrowed his eyes before Ravyn opened the door and stepped through it. Susan headed out behind him just as Otto and Leo were coming in from the back alley.
"Where you going, Ravyn?" Otto asked.
"To check on Cael."