Page 135 of Black Bird

Brent showed him out and made sure to hang back for a few moments to give the captain time to leave the building. He glanced at the muted TV and both Sarah and the detective’s photos were on the screen. There had to be more he could do. He shot up the stairs to find his father standing next to his bed, holding his mother’s medical records. Conrad sneered at him, dropping the papers to the bed.

“I’m surprised you didn’t just tell him that I was up here. What would it have hurt?”

Brent gathered the papers from the bed and tucked them under his arm. “If you were any kind of respectable man, you’d have come down those fucking stairs yourself.”

“Well … I suppose I’m not.” Conrad pulled a small stack of tri-folded papers from the inside of his jacket and tossed them on the bed. “For your research.”

“Whatever that is, I don’t fucking want it. Get out.”

Conrad dismissed him, leaving the papers where they sat and stepping around him to go back downstairs. Brent followed him down. When he’d made it to the door, his father turned around and smiled with that snake-like charm that showed every evil part of him. “I told you before, Brent. You won’t like how I take matters into my own hands. You’ve brought this on yourself.”

“And I told you. If you do anything to hurt her, I’ll kill you. Now get. The. Fuck. Out.”

Conrad chuckled through his nose. “I’ll see you around, son.”

“You’d better hope you don’t. I’d keep that restraining order if I were you.”

The door closed and Brent locked it behind him, trembling with adrenaline and rage. There had to be one of them he could reach. He raced back upstairs and grabbed his phone, dialing Wren’s number and getting nothing. He tried Kane. Nothing. Northwood … nothing. They were together. All of them. It was obvious to him, now. But where? He had to warn them. Brent cursed and threw the phone across the room. He reached down and picked up the folded papers that Conrad had left. For a moment, he considered not opening them at all and tossing whatever it was in the trash. When his curiosity outweighed his fury, he opened them. As if things couldn’t get any more complicated. They were Sarah’s medical records. What little information Conrad had been able to get on her through her boss.

It left him with several possible choices. Compare these to what he already had … or go hound that son-of-a-bitch at EverLife for answers on just how deep he’d gotten in over his head with someone like his father and that vampire woman that he was working with. It seemed Sarah and her new beau weren’t gonna be much help. But maybe he could do his part to right whatever wrongs he’d done in it. Brent loosed a frustrated sigh and tore his robe off to get dressed.

It seemed whatever deeply hidden promiscuity Patrick had, finally broke the surface. Dahlia found herself hardly calling on Devin in recent days, and wherever she asked her young newborn to put that rod between his legs, Patrick had seemed far more eager to oblige. Several times, she’d realized she was absent-mindedly allowing him to ravage her as he saw fit and not giving him any direction at all. She wasn’t sure what that meant about her, as it was never an issue she’d remembered dealing with before. As old as she was, she had an idea of the reason … but refused to acknowledge it. Fate would not be allowed to choose anything for her. She held the power. If she had to lay waste to Fate himself, she would be all too happy to show him who truly reigned.

It wasn’t at all that Patrick was a talented fuck. She’d had many … one, in particular, who satisfied her in ways she couldn’t describe. But the calculated manner in which this boy worshiped every part of her … there was no one. Not a single one of her slaves that had done it. It satisfied the parts of herself she hadn’t felt before. The magnitude of body-racking pleasure when she came with him was parallel to nothing. She rewarded him by calling out his name. Also something she’d never done with any other. Dahlia had begun to realize that others within the coven were taking notice of that favoritism. She didn’t care. She owed no explanation to anyone.

Patrick pulled himself out of her and flopped onto his back on her bed, gasping for air after the third time he’d made her wail in the past half hour. She smiled wickedly and crawled on top of him, leaning down and biting his lip until she tasted blood. Her tongue lapped up every drop and Patrick savagely kissed her, gripping her white-blonde hair in his hands. Dahlia settled, taking in his face—the face that resembled someone else.

“That girl that broke your heart. Did you ever fuck her like that?” she whispered, licking more blood from his lip.

Patrick ran his hands up her sides. “I don’t think I’ve ever fuckedanybodythe way that I do you.” He huffed a laugh. “Maybe if I had, she wouldn’t have left me.”

“Do you wish you had?” She wondered why she even asked, and forced the idea that she didn’t care to sink its talons into her mind.

“No,” he breathed, his fingers caressing her in idle strokes. “I’d never have been at the bar.” He was telling the truth. Somehow, she could feel it in him. He quieted and dared to look her in the eyes. “Doyouwish I had?”

Part of her was startled by his question, and her defensive walls went up. The other part wanted to kiss him and tell him that the thought of him being with any other before her, made her want to rip the hearts from between their teenage tits. She found herself caught up in that stare like a fly in a black widow’s web. A knock at her door saved her from the raging battle within her cold, dead heart. Dahlia slithered off of him, and he watched her every move as she tied her silk robe around herself and padded to the door. Decclan was waiting on the other side of it.

“Conrad Stratford is here. I have him waiting in your office. I wouldn’t have bothered you, but he claims it’s urgent.”

“Fine. Watch the little maggot. I’ll be up in a moment.” She rolled her eyes, shutting the door. Patrick sat up, leaning back on his hands, and watching her cross the bedroom. “What?” she asked, smirking as she made her way toward her dressing room.

“It’s Thanksgiving.”

“Another pointless, human holiday. Is there a reason that you’re reminding me?” She left him sitting in the room and thumbed through a few outfits. He raised his voice so that she could still hear him.

“It was always a big deal at my house. My mom would bring out all the old family recipes. My aunt and uncle always flew in from Florida and brought my cousins. My grandparents would stay with us for the weekend.” Dahlia brushed off his reminiscing and continued to pick through various items. “I couldn’t help but kind of wish that I was able to bring you over to meet them.” She paused on a hanger and stared forward.

“And you believe they’d approve of someone like me, Patrick?”

There was rustling from beyond her dressing room door, and she gathered that he was getting dressed. “If they knew I was happy … yeah, I think they’d be overjoyed.”

It was enough. She’d hadenough.He’d left a huge crack in the wall she’d thought she’d lined with steel reserve. Dahlia jerked the long black dress off the rack and stormed into the bedroom. “And you’re going to tell meyou’rehappy?” Patrick stood, stunned by her sudden burst of anger. “You’re happy that youramazinghuman celebration with your family is likely very different this year, Patrick? Does it make you happy that I took that from you? Would Mommy love me for it?”

“Dahlia …”

“Stop addressing me that way. Get your clothes on. We have company. And I don’t want to hear another word about the life you used to have.” She turned on her heel and strode into her dressing room, slamming the door behind her. He was silent on the other side and for the first time in such alongtime … her eyes welled with tears.

The walk up to the office was silent. Patrick trailed behind her, hardly willing to make eye contact as the clacking of her heels echoed through the darkened hallways. Decclan opened the door for them, and they filed in, Conrad raising and buttoning his hideous jacket to greet them as she rounded her desk and sat down. Patrick took his place in the corner.

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