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Chapter Thirty-three
It’s one thing to know a fight is coming your way, and quite another when it actually arrives at your doorstep.
We sat in Sutherland’s living room, all collectively holding our breath. Except for Sutherland, who didn’t need to breathe.
The whole place was dead silent, and though I had no problem seeing with the lights off, it was still a bit spooky to be sitting in the dark. I still had the hot teacup in my hands, and gently set it back down on the table. My pulse was pounding in my ears, and given how high the tension in the room was, the last thing I wanted to do was to forget I was holding the mug and spill boiling tea on my lap when things got crazy.
Except for several minutes nothing happened.
I knew she was messing with us, but to what end? Did she want us in here or out on the street? She had to know she couldn’t win against us inside the apartment where she was grossly outnumbered. The odds didn’t favor her no matter where she attacked us, but I imagine she was just hoping to kill someone before she was put down herself.
No one in this apartment was going to die tonight if I had anything to say about it.
The sound of Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” started bopping through the space, and after the second it took for my heart to slow down, I realized it was my own phone ringing.
I rifled through my bag, unnecessarily embarrassed to have my ring tone blaring so loud, and answered the unfamiliar number calling me.
“Hello?”
“It’s important you to know I never wanted things to end this way,” Mercy’s voice came through the other end. “We could have been a proper family. You, me, your brother. Things could have been different if you hadn’t been taken in by her.”
“She’s not a hoodoo witch doctor or anything. She
didn’t put my under a spell. You’re just mad because I recognized my real family when I saw it.”
There was a long pause and for a moment I thought she might have hung up, but then she made a gravelly along growling sound. “What a waste. All of you. Three fucking disappointing children. A monster, a groveling coward, and you.”
“And what am I, Mercy?”
“You might be the biggest disappointment of them all. So much power and so much potential, and yet you squander it on that stupid boy, and Callum’s stupid pack, and your useless sister. If I had what you had, I would rule them all and crush the rest beneath my boot.” The venom in her voice was so vile it gave me a chill even through the phone.
“Then it’s a good thing you don’t have my power, isn’t it?”
“And neither will you for much longer.”
“That’s such a lame threat. Boring and overdone. Just tell me where you are and let’s finish this thing.”
Secret glanced over at me and gave me an approving nod. She might not be able to hear what Mercy was saying—probably for the better—but she could certainly appreciate a good threat when she heard it.
“Why don’t we finish what was started here so long ago, and you meet me where you were supposed to die?”
“If I meet you, will you leave the others alone?”
“That’s not how this goes, baby girl. It’s not you for them. You die so she suffers, and then she dies so I’m free. I don’t care if you come alone or not. This night ends in death.”
“It certainly does.”
“Maybe this time you won’t be such a goddamn letdown.”
“I guess that all depends on the outcome you were hoping for.” I hung up before she could say anything.
They all stared at me, and as I went to explain what she’d said, the lights flickered back on.
“She wants us to meet her where I almost died,” I explained. I glanced over to Lucas and he understood my words before the rest of them. “Where everything went down that night.”
“In a manner of speaking,” he said with a forced smile.
“She wants to finish what was started.”
