Chloe balks, “Did those two spooks just manage to clear the room of the government?”
I glance around and spot a few antsy looking misfits craning their necks at the crowd. “I doubt it.” I look to Gage. “Find that batshit father of yours and get a handle on what’s going on.”
Gage looks past my shoulder and frowns. “I don’t have to. He’s right here.”
“Good evening.” Demetri comes up with Mom and Tad ensconced on either side. Figures. Demetri is a such a coward, he’s using my family as a security blanket. He doesn’t think we’ll bring up Faction business in front of mixed company. Well, he’s sadly mistaken. My mother—although rather delusional about it—doesn’t have a problem with Faction business, and Tad is too much of a nitwit to care.
“Who the hell is here, parading around as Killion and Moser?” I get right to it while glaring at him with all of my might. “You remember them, right? You fed them to a Spectator the night of the boys christening as if they were snacks.” My eyes bulge with rage. The tempo of the music picks up right along with my adrenaline. “And why is this place crawling with Fems? If you’re going to host old home week, I suggest you choose somewhere your kind is welcome. And I’ll give you a hint. It’s not on Paragon. It’s not on planet Earth either.”
The perma-grin slides off his face briefly. “Says the mother of two of my kind, the ex-wife of one.” His brows bounce, and Chloe laughs.
“He’s got you there, Messenger.” She hops over to him and slaps her arm over his shoulder. “So what’s up?”
Mom tosses her hands in the air. “This party is up!” She looks to Logan. “Can you believe what a turnout you have tonight?”
“It’s a turnout, all right.” I glare at the Fems robed in human skin. So not amused. I wish my mother was here. The other mother. The one who knows how to get angry and nasty with the best of them when the occasion calls for it, and this occasion definitely calls for it.
Tad makes a strange sound, something between a laugh and a bark. “I’m telling you, Lizbeth. It’s the free booze. Nobody is here because of a couple of party favors you flung out on the table. You start hosting shindigs with an open bar and free burgers and you’ll hook ’em every time.”
Chloe lifts a finger. “He’s got a point. Free is my favorite word.”
“So is Gage,” I quip. My God, why is she still in my presence? It briefly flies through my mind that I have the power to make her evaporate, but at the moment, seeing how off-kilter the world seems to be, I’d better keep her around in the event I need to feed a Spectator or two myself. Chloe could prove to be a real feast. Chloe would be the ultimate free meal deal of the evening.
Tad nods wildly as if he’s tested out the open bar personally. “Listen, Demeet. As soon as you get that house of yours back on its feet, I’ll have Lizbeth here throw you a whopper at your place. Sort of a welcome home party. Of course, we’ll be sad to see you go.” Tad looks to Gage. “Get this, Greg. Since Demetri will be a guest in our home, he’s generously offered to purchase the groceries himself.”
“How domestic of you,” Chloe quips.
But Gage, Logan, and I just stand there with our jaws rooted to the ground. I can’t really envision good old Demeet rubbing elbows with the soccer moms down at the Cost Club.
“I’m having them delivered, of course.” Demetri gives a slight bow. “I’ll also be handling the electric and water bills since I need an expedient output for my wireless connection. And I am prone to indulging myself with long, hot showers.”
Mom gasps. “We’re getting fiber optics?” She gives three solid claps. “And I know just what you mean about a nice long, hot shower.” Her lids hood over, and I give a hard blink. This entire night is one long, hot hallucination. It has to be.
I turn to Logan. “What the hell are you letting Ellis pump in through the ventilation system? Obviously, we’re all experiencing one long psychedelic trip.”
“It’s true, Skyla.” Demetri takes in a breath. “My home has fallen to disrepair.”
“It was the body.” Mom does that shout-whisper thing. “He’s gutting the house to help erase the memory. And you never know, the spirit might be lingering.” She waves her hand over her nose as if fanning herself from something malodorous.
I glance to Gage. “The spirit will most likely linger for quite some time to come.” I swallow hard as I look back to my mother and Tad. “Are you sure having Demetri in a house already filled to the brim with bodies is a good idea?” I glower at the devil in question. “Surely with all of your billions you could buy an entire other island to inhabit in the interim.”
He gives a knowing nod. “That’s precisely what I suggested.”
Mom chortles at the thought. “And I wouldn’t hear of it. Demetri is my oldest, dearest, closest, winsome, becoming, most fortuitous friend.”
Fortuitous? That could easily go either way.
Tad steps up and butts his shoulders to my mother’s in a show of ridiculous solidarity. “Demeet stays. In fact, I’m giving him my bed. When the chips were down, that man has always come through for us. And I don’t care what you say,” he shouts over the music while pointing to Demeet. “The couch isn’t a place for someone like you. I’ll be in Ethan’s room. He can have the sofa. You’re taking my bed.”
Wait a minute...where does that bed-swapping math leave my mother? Oh holy shit.
“I’ve got a better idea,” Gage offers. “You can take our room. Skyla and I will move back to our home with the boys.”
“No!” I’m quick to protest. Just the thought of that cursed Walsh place sends my skin prickling with fear. Not to mention that I can’t leave my mother alone with a viper slithering in and out of her bedroom. “Demetri, you can take our entire house.” I blink a quick smile to Gage. “I still need plenty of help with the boys, and nobody lends a hand like my mommy.” I’m sure Demetri knows all too well how generously she lends a hand. My entire body shakes with rage at how thoroughly Demetri is penetrating our lives. How is this happening? How is a nice, kind man like my father floating around in eternity and this mad donkey of a being has taken up residence in his place? I would rather my mother shack up with a thousand Tad Landons than one Demetri Edinger.
Tad lifts a hand as if he’s about to smack both Gage and me. “He’s staying with us, and that’s the end of it!”
I glance up to Gage and give a furtive nod. “We’re staying, too.”
Chloe coos as if it were the sweetest thing. “What a way to kick off the new year. All of you cozy under one roof. I can’t imagine a single thing that can go wrong.” Her wicked grin widens as she looks my way. “In fact, I’m betting this will go down in record as the best year of your life.” Her eyes sharpen over mine, and that grin melts away for a moment. “Or worse. You have a lot of decisions to make, Skyla. It’s not just yourself you need to think about. Everyone loses if you screw this up. Chew on that for a while. But don’t take too long.” She glances to Demetri. “Someone is ready to eat your lunch.” She takes off into the crowd and leaves a vacuum in her wake. As much as I hate to say it, Chloe is right. Someone is very much eager to eat my lunch, and I’m looking at him. He’s going to eat Tad’s breakfast, lunch, and dinner—and sleep in his bed with his wife. I look to my mother filled with disappointment and a hint of rage. Damn those hormones of hers that keep her running back for more. I bet she’ll be hopping into the shower with that demon in the name of water conservation.
The smell of grilled steak infiltrates the air, and Tad jolts as if he were electrocuted.
“Meat!” he shouts as he stalks off.
“You think it’s so easy,” I’m quick to bark at Demetri. “Just move right in and land in my mother’s bed. Well, I’m going to be in that house, too, and I’m going to make sure you have a miserable time.”
“Skyla!” My mother presses a hand to her chest.
“Don’t you Skyla me,” I snip. “This is a farce, and you and your Demetri-happy- ovaries know it.”
>
Mia pops into our hellish circle. “Mom, here you are. I want to do the big reveal before midnight or people won’t even care about me. I need your help.” She pulls her off toward the kitchen, and I close my eyes a moment, jarred by the fact Mia is actually going through with her ludicrous engagement reveal. I have news for Mia. Nobody is going to care because they shouldn’t. No one in their right mind is going to be happy for her. The only thing Mia is about to do is give the Paragon gossip train some serious fuel. An engaged junior in high school isn’t anyone’s idea of a fairy tale—more like cautionary tale.
Gage steps toward Demetri. “What’s going on? We both know you’re not hard up for somewhere to lay your head at night.”
“No, he’s just hard up,” I quip. I glance to Logan and make a face. “It was too easy.”
Gage gives Demetri a quick hand to the chest. “You know what else is easy? Not messing with someone else’s wife.”
Demetri glares at his golden child a moment too long, and a part of me fears for Gage’s newly minted neck. “If I wanted Lizbeth as my wife, she would be so.” He offers a conciliatory nod to me. “My apologies for coming across as crass, but I was pushed to do so.”
“He’s probably right.” I sigh, defeated. My stomach turns at the prospect that my mother could be swayed to dump Tad like an old bag of smelly socks. But face it, Tad is basically a bag full of smelly socks and Demetri has that whole man of power thing going on. My God, the man parks his Rolls-Royce Phantom in our driveway and people come from all over the island to ogle the thing.
My gaze meets with Gage’s blissful blue eyes, and a strong current of wanting unleashes in me. Gage definitely has that man in power thing going on as well, but I’m mostly drawn to that quiet, poetry loving Levatio from days of yore. It’s hard to believe he’s all mine.
Demetri and Gage continue to tussle. But a flicker of light catches my eye in the crowd. An illuminated glow threads its way through the bodies, the tangle of limbs and that incandescent glimmer screams supernatural. The light grows closer, and I take a weary step forward. God knows I’ve learned my fair share of lessons from bolting into danger without giving it a second thought. But after the boys were born, it seems as if my every action sponsored a second thought. A pale limb emerges, small like that of a child—blonde hair, golden and flickering, as if it were alive with a fire of its own. That still small face emerges from between a few jovial partygoers, and I suck in a quick breath.
“It’s her,” I whisper.
“Who?” Logan leans in so close until his face heats mine. The warmth of his cologne permeates my senses and pulls me from this thick trance-like feeling, and just like that, the illuminating glow turns off like a light bulb.
“She’s gone.” I stare wide-eyed at the very spot she haunted. The little girl from the woods. The one ducking behind the Justice Alliance as if she belonged there.
“Who’s gone, Skyla?” Logan grips me by the arm as if steadying me from a fall. “Are you all right? Do you need water? It’s getting hot in here.”
“No.” I glance back and discover we’ve drifted considerably from Gage and Demetri.
“Who was she?” Logan steps in front of me blocking my view of anyone but him. He’s so tall and handsome, a homesick feeling overtakes me. To think it all started with a crush on this boy, right here in this very spot. I scowl at him without meaning to. “Was it Angel? Sage?” His brows dip into a soft V the way they do when he’s trying his best to stuff his emotions, but an Oliver’s brows never lie. Gage and Logan may not technically be related, but their facial responses haven’t gotten the memo. They are one in the same when it comes to being an open book.
“No.” I shake my head forlorn that I might have given him a ray of hope. Angel was the daughter we would have had if I had pushed Gage out of the way like a thief, the way my mother wanted. In all her glorious cruelty, she let us taste a future that would never be—one with a beautiful little girl that our love would have knit together. And Sage is the daughter I did have with Gage. I was pregnant with triplets and lost her early on. I hadn’t even noticed. She was absorbed into my body as if she never existed, but she did and still very much does. My mother once again in her infinite cruelty is molding poor Sage into a mini-me version of herself—a supernatural disaster in the making if ever there was one.
“That girl.” I wag a finger in the direction of her wake. “She’s not human.” I quickly relay the incident of the choking horse, seeing her out in the woods again on Christmas Eve, then her brief appearance with the Justice Alliance.
Logan inches back, stunned, his eyes set on some faraway horizon as he absorbs this. “Then she has privileges. Nobody sneaks into court without the Justice Alliance’s permission. Skyla”—he snips, looking every bit miffed just the way I thought he would—“you’ve got to tell me these things. Please don’t leave me out of the loop.”
“Famous last words,” I smart. “And I believe they were originally spoken by me.”
The music dies down, and the squeal of a microphone takes over. This can only mean one thing.
“Logan, hold me,” I hiss. “I’m about to commit a homicide.”
Mom pops up on a makeshift platform and hems and haws into the mic as the feedback competes for our attention.
“May I please interrupt your night for one moment?” Mom gleams under the duress of a neon bath of colors. Her black sequin gown lights up and turns her into a human disco ball, and, just like that, Demetri bolts over—wide-eyed and opened-mouthed. One can only hope his many minions would morph into an army of hornets and buzz on into that orifice.
Gage comes over and wraps an arm around me. It’s only then I note Logan had indeed obliged my request because suddenly both of my favorite Olivers—sans my boys who have taken chief residence in that primo position—are holding me tight. Awkward, since they’re obviously touching one another as well. But it’s probably for the better.
“I’m going to kill Mia’s groom-to-be. More like doom-to-be.” No sooner do I spout those soon-to-be-prophetic words than Rev pops up to my left looking every bit the bedraggled bad boy he is. Full Mohawk—my God, his hair grows quickly—ripped jeans, leather jacket, chains dripping from his appendages like he means dirty business. How is Mia blind to the fact that he’s not the right one for her? Yes, he’s a pretty decent guy once you cut through the felonious façade, but he’s old as shit—my age. And compared to Mia, that’s ancient.
“I hope everyone is having a great time this evening!” Mom inspires the crowd to give a raucous cheer, and I can’t help but notice that the suits and the Fems disguised as humans refuse to play along. So obvious. At least they can put a little effort into it. “Isn’t the new and improved Paragon Bowling Alley just beautiful?” Another round of wild whoops ensues.
“It’s the Bowling Barn!” a young voice whines, and I recognize that pouty cry as none other than Giselle Oliver herself. G never did evolve past her toddler-like state of mind, but compared to the rest of the ninnies on this island—sans those I love—it’s a refreshing change of pace. Demetri is a toddler in the truest sense, always having a fiasco of a fit when things don’t go his way—not to mention the fact he’s notorious for stealing other people’s toys—and by toys, I mean wives.
“Yes.” Mom nods in my general direction as if affirming the theory. “It’s Paragon’s official Bowling Barn. It’s definitely hard to miss, so no more excuses not to patronize this fine establishment.”
I look to Logan and offer a feeble smile. I’m not sure if my mother’s endorsement is a blessing or a curse.
“Now before we kick off the new year, I would like to make an amazing announcement. My dear daughter, Mia Landon”—I still detest the fact she changed her last name and coincidently so does she—“is engaged to be married to a very special young man.” Mom offers a meager smile because I’m guessing she’s still in the dark regarding who this special young man might be. The room breaks out into an anemic applause as I suspec
ted they would. News of teen weddings never goes over well. Nor should it. “It is my absolute pleasure to announce the engagement of Mia Landon and” —my heart beats erratically as my mother squints over my sister’s shoulder—“oh heck, I have no clue who that is, Mia,” Mom bleats just south of the mic, and yet her voice circles the room twice over and elicits a bout of nervous laughter from the crowd.
Mia steps up next to her, floating above the crowd, looking so beautiful you’d think someone were about to crown her Miss Paragon for the night.
“Good evening, ladies and gentlemen.” She spots me in the crowd and gives a spastic wave.
Dear God, don’t you dare drag me into this, Mia.
She pulls the mic close to her lips as if she were about to break out into song, and I’m pretty sure I’m not the only one wishing she would. People are getting antsy. They’re here to have a good time and not play to teenage dramatics.
“I’d like to introduce my fiancé—Gabriel Armistead!” she shouts out his name as if he just won a grand prize, and he did—her.
A few wild screams ignite in the corner. Most likely Mia’s friends. Or enemies who rue the fact Gabriel Armistead just got taken off the market.
“Gabriel Armistead?” I break free from the double Oliver hold on my body. “This can’t be.” I glance to my left and, sure enough, Revelyn Booth looks as if he’s just had his teeth and balls kicked in. His features are bordering on despair, and his mouth hangs open as if he were engaging in a silent scream.
Loud music fills the bowling alley once again as the entire establishment roars to life.
Mia floats down from her pedestal and makes a beeline my way along with Mom and a sickly pale looking Tad.
“Can you believe it!” She swings my way with a hard embrace at the ready, only to fall into Gabriel’s waiting arms. Gabe is tall and classically good looking with his sturdy muscular frame, dark wavy hair. But that blank zombie-like expression has never impressed me. He glances my way, and for a minute it looks as if he’s looking into the recesses of my soul—as if it were the exact spiritual snack he was looking for. God knows he’s eaten all of Mia’s good senses.