Page 82 of Dirty Little Saint

I can’t believe this girl has been around for over a hundred years. She seems so childlike. “You realize Maureen is like your great-great niece, right? You shouldn’t betray your own blood.”

“I know. Zeke promised I’d be with Silas again. I would have done anything for him… but I see that I was wrong. Julian—I mean, Professor Erebus—has made me see how wrong I was.”

This just got even weirder. I can only imagine what these two are doing. I look past her and catch a glimpse of restraints on the bedposts in his room. “So I should just take your word for it?”

“You will take my word for it, Val. Have I ever let you down?” Uncle Julian stands protectively in front of his new ghost girlfriend.

He’s right. I have no reason to doubt or not trust him. He has shielded me so many times—looked after me my whole life. “All right, Uncle. But she’s your responsibility. I’m counting on you to keep her in check.”

“Understood.” He turns toward her. “Go wait for me in the bedroom. I’ll be right there.”

Her eyes light up, and she skips down the hallway, obeying him without question.

I snatch the glass of scotch back and knock it down before he can rip it out of my hands again. “She looks at you like a king. Well done.”

He rolls his eyes. “Don’t judge me, boy. I know what kind of dark and depraved shit you and your friends are into.”

I chuckle as I remember the ritual with Felix. “You have no idea.”

Julian stalks over to the window and peers out. “I’m going to tell you something that could get me killed. But you have to promise me if I do… you need to make sure you win.

My stomach knots. There’s a hushed, ominous tone to his voice that I don’t like one bit. “Win what? I’m going to need you to clarify.”

His eyes darken when he looks back at me. Between the hard lines on his face, I can see the boyish charm and youth that used to be there. “Holden Graves has called a meeting of the elders. I don’t know when, but it will take place at Graves Estate.”

Fuck. They haven’t had a meeting in years. Mostly, they handle business on the phone or via teleconference. The ritual side of Nocturnus has become overshadowed by their greed. It’s become more of a business than a spirituality.

What the fuck are our fathers up to?

“Then I’ll tell you our plan, Uncle. We plan to retire them soon. To restore Nocturnus to what our ancestors intended.”

“And what is that, Val? The lines are blurred more than ever now.” Julian concedes and joins me in a glass of scotch.

“Power and greed are two very different things, Uncle, and yet they get confused all the time. For us, Nocturnus is about ritual and sacrifice. It’s about connecting to that power that makes us nearly immortal. Untouchable. And then Holden crossed the fucking line.”

I clench my fists to keep my hands from shaking. Just the mere mention of what happened that night at Graves Estate sends my temper flaring with the need to murder something. “Our fathers betrayed those vows the second they used Maureen as a whipping post to quell their own perverse desires.”

Julian hangs his head. “They should not have touched her. The interest they’ve taken in her is concerning. It will only make things worse with Penny Blackwell.”

I sigh and run my hands through my hair. “Agreed. It’s up to us to fix this. Let me know if you find out when they’re meeting. Atlas wants to pick them off one by one, but I think having them all in the same room will be better.”

“Are you going to kill your father, Val?” Julian’s eyes brim with tears.

Fuck knows I’ve dreamed of it since the very first time he hurt me. Every time my arm would start to heal, he’d break it again. “No… I don’t know. But I can’t speak for the others. And I won’t stand in their way.”

He nods. “It’s none of my business, but did I see Felix Crane leaving Nocturnus House last week?”

The days tend to blur together now. For the past few weeks it’s been ritual after ritual. Felix and Maureen have both moved into the house. The new recruits were moved to the guest quarters. After what happened with Zeke, we keep the initiates separate from Maureen now.

“He’s joined us, yes,” I quip. “There’s not much else to say about it. It’s not my story to tell.”

“I’m sure his family is upset. The Cranes have always been nomads. Felix’s father made it very clear decades ago that there would never be a Crane in Nocturnus.”

I shrug. “That’s their fucking problem. Felix is a grown man. He came here on his own and chose to be a part of this.”

My uncle stalks over to his desk and pulls out a box. He smooths his hand over the top of its velvet lid. “You should have been my son, Valentin. I’m sorry that you weren’t. Life isn’t fair like that sometimes.”

I swallow down the lump in my throat. I would give anything for him to be my father. But my mother chose the wrong Erebus. “You were there as much as you could be. That’s all that matters.”

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