Page 102 of Outlaw Witch

They are family, after all.

And family can be deceptive. You think things are all gravy until they decide you’re a danger and send you off to your execution.

Not that I’m bitter or anything.

I’m over my own family’s betrayal. My parents never had all that much time for me, anyway. Still, they’ve spent the past decade yucking it up in their mansion, growing more powerful at the highest level of Arcanum society. While I’ve been scraping to get by, hiding out and living a kind of half life in the shadows.

“He’s always intense,” Roscoe replies. “Although he seems to be stressing even more than usual recently. I guess Fabian’s curse has messed up his plans or something.”

“Oh, yeah?”

Roscoe shrugs. “I’ve never really gotten into it with him, but I get the feeling he wants to take the business to the next level.”

“How do you mean?” I blow on my hands as we head closer to the warehouse. It seems strangely quiet around here, considering there’s supposed to be a massive shipment coming through in the next half hour. I decide to keep my guard up, peering around to try to see the workers who should be meeting us any minute now.

He chuckles. “I dunno. He’s always had these visions of us being more. That’s why he and Fabian’s dad are so insistent on training Fabian up to take over the business. I think they want to hand it over so they can take a new spot in high society. He probably wants to see if he can buy his way in.”

I snort. “They’ll never accept him. They’re all so obsessed with bloodlines, no amount of money or power is going to make them open to inviting a stranger into the fold.”

“He’s been making deals with the Archarcans,” Zeph mutters. “Might explain why he looked like he was losing his damn mind tonight if he’s scared of losing their business while everything falls apart without Fab. Either that or he’s been getting high off his own supply.”

So Z doesn’t seem to like the guy. Noted.

“Are you guys close?” I hazard the question, glancing at Roscoe, who chuckles again, throwing his arm around my shoulders.

“Nah. The guy thinks I’m an idiot. He stopped bothering talking to me as soon as he realized what Fabian could do. Can’t say it ever bothered me much.”

“He’s an ass,” Zeph grunts.

At least it sounds like we’re all on the same page. Which begs the question, why are we here with barely any warning, at midnight, at his request?

“You think this is going to take long?” I ask.

Roscoe shrugs, tugging me into his side and pressing a casual kiss to the top of my head. “Who’s to say, gorgeous? Hopefully, they’ll piss themselves as soon as they see you and that’ll be enough for them to turn on whoever's been undercutting us. If not, we might have to do a little persuading that they’re better off staying on our good side.”

I nod shortly and stifle a yawn. Can’t say that I’ll be putting fear into too many hearts if they catch a long glimpse of my tonsils. The yawning and my eye-bags are kind of ruining the menacing vibe these guys want me to have going on.

It doesn’t help that I’m antsy about leaving Fabian alone at this point. I know that there’s not a lot I can do to help him, but over the past week, he’s been fading fast.

He’s barely been out of the med center bed and I know that the whole thing is getting to him. He’s exhausted and has this air of quiet, defeated acceptance.

Like he knows what’s coming and he can’t do anything about it.

Like he’s preparing for the ritual to fail again.

And we all know that itcannotfail for a second time. By this point, the curse is all the way down to his toes and as soon as it reaches that point, there will be no going back. No going forward, either.

We’ve already talked the whole thing through, me and Fabian in hushed whispers at midnight so that no one else knows the exact plan.

If the ritual fails, I’m going to stop his heart.

Killing him so that he can’t become whatever it is the curse is molding him into.

I’ve done plenty of things in my life. I’ve begged, borrowed and stolen. I’ve lived on the streets, I’ve garbage-dived for my dinner. I’ve made plenty of people bleed.

But I’ve never killed anyone before. Especially not someone that makes my chest grow warm whenever he smiles at me. Who pulls me into his bed and drags my body against his, running his fingers through my hair as I read to him into the small hours when we both can’t sleep.

Which, at the moment, is every night.

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