Crown of Ashes Read online

  Tad howls and whelps until he finally manages to stick the landing and stands proud at the base of the stairs.

  “All right, round up the ankle biters!” He holds out his hands in an animated manner. “Who would like to be the first to sit on Santa’s lap?”

  His sleeve dips close to the candle on the end table next to him, and just as I’m about to move it out of the way, his entire arm erupts in flames.

  “Jiminy Cricket! Bull hockey! Great Caesar’s ghost!” Tad shrieks as loud as a schoolgirl as the flames lick ever so close to his head, and he begins on a wild spin. The room explodes in screams and shouts as Tad’s entire suit erupts in a blaze with a loud roaring whoosh. Drake and Emily pull the kids to safety while Ethan throws a vase at Tad’s head—and holy crap, that sounded like a skull cracker! I’m assuming he meant to douse him with its contents, but in a state of panic—and a burst of Landon brain cells—he’s sent Tad staggering instead.

  “Lizbeth!” Tad pauses—his entire body rife with an angry inferno, his eyes just as furious. “So help me God!” And just like that, his faux beard bursts into a wall of fire.

  “My God, his head is on fire!” I scream, and at exactly that moment Demetri steps into my line of vision and offers a congratulatory nod.

  An entire choir of shit circles around the room as the unbearable heat skyrockets, and someone swings the front door wide open—most likely in hopes Tad will fly right out. But he doesn’t. Tad spasms around the foyer, shrieking for help that doesn’t seem to come. Mom swats the crap out of him with a broom she’s pulled from the closet, and just like that, his Santa hat ignites like a fiery cherry on top.

  “Holy mother of God.” I glance around in a panic for something, anything to put the damn fire out. So help me God, Tad Landon is not going to barbecue himself on my children’s first Christmas.

  Logan pulls the red runner off the floor, sending both Liam and Michelle flying straight into the bathroom as they go airborne.

  “Move,” he shouts to my mother as he beats Tad with the woven fabric. Marshall comes over and tosses an old quilt over him, and the heat along with the unnatural light all defuse in an instant, and yet my mother quickly plucks it right back off.

  “Are you insane?” she balks. “That was my grandmother’s!”

  Every jaw in the room unhinges as my mother’s need for nostalgia outweighs the fact her husband nearly burned alive before our very eyes. Come to think of it, maybe Tad’s disco inferno was just as much for my mother as it was for me? I take a moment to glare at Demetri. If it was my wish to see his head burst into flames, maybe it was her wish to finish him off? Oh my God! I am very much fearing for Tad Landon’s life.

  Tad rolls around to douse the remaining flames while everyone disperses, and Logan ends up wrapping him in the rug like a giant red burrito.

  The wail of an ambulance slices through the unexpected silence, and I spot Mia, Melissa, and that oversized beef-eating basketball star each on their phones recording the event to regale the Internet with no doubt.

  The party disbands in less than thirty seconds and leaves a skeleton crew hovering around the charred moaning pile that was once my stepfather.

  Marshall kisses each of the boys good night before nodding my way.

  Did you enjoy your gift? He gives a sly wink before glancing to Tad who has seemingly recovered enough to belt out every curse known to man.

  “No,” I mouth in horror as poor Tad moans and groans his way through another choir of expletives.

  Marshall pulls me into a quick embrace. “Do thank Demetri. It’s poor form not to. Remember, it’s the thought that counts.” He pulls back and shakes his head ever so slightly as if something went wrong, and it sure as hell did. “That was my gift as well, Skyla.” He picks up my hand, and his jaw redefines itself. Chloe’s ring is already dazzling in the light. “Charming.”

  “Chloe gave it to me. It looks vintage.” I bite down on my lip. I’ve never been able to hide a thing from Marshall.

  “It is.” And I’m pretty sure he knows why.

  I hold it out for a moment and admire it in the light as the medical team hovers over Tad. “I have always wanted a cat’s eye sapphire. How do you think she knew?”

  “I believe you’re looking for the term star sapphire. Ms. Bishop’s bustling mind remains an utter mystery to me.” He fondles the ring on my finger a moment, pulling it closer to him for inspection. “However this, my love, is neither a star sapphire nor a cat’s eye.” He pauses and takes a breath. “In the old days, this was referred to as lapis lazuli. They were baffled by its clear properties, but that was due to the fact precious sapphires were not readily available to them in their region. It’s why the structure of the throne has an interchangeable term.” A breath expels from him as if he were caught off-guard, and I inch back to get a better look at him. Nothing and no one has ever evoked that response in him. “This is chipped from the living throne of the Most High, Skyla. That slice of light you see is no iris.”

  I gasp at the thought. “What is it?” It takes everything in me not to shake the holy crap out of him.

  “Temper.” His lips curl at the edges as Gage pops up beside us holding both twins, and that sweet spot for him melts all over again. “It is the portal to a power only the creator Himself is privy to. We’ll speak again soon enough. You might want to keep this around.” He flicks the pendant floating at the base of my necklace. I’ve worn the protective hedge, The Eye of Refuge, off and on over the last two years, mostly along with the mirrored heart Logan gifted me for my birthday years ago, but I unceremoniously plucked that one off this morning before I donned the piece. I’m not feeling the love like I once did. I couldn’t bring myself to wear that mirrored heart—not with its proclamation of his love written on the side of it. Not after what I witnessed last night.

  “Why do I need this, Marshall?” I glare at him a moment. I’m so damned tired of being left in the dark.

  Oh, Skyla. He closes his eyes a moment. “Good night.” He bows to Gage a moment before ditching out into the icy night air.

  Barron and Emma head over.

  “Good night, you two.” Barron offers the hint of a sad smile. “Skyla, we look forward to seeing you tomorrow.”

  Emma gives a curt lift of the hand as they head out the door, and Mia is quick to bolt after them. I’m sure it’s to see her new boy toy who is not actually a boy. Rev is closer to my age than he ever is hers. He’s Dr. Booth’s renegade of a son—sort of a wannabe biker bad boy only I’m not so sure he’s a wannabe.

  “Good night,” I say as I take the boys from Gage. “I’d better get them to bed.”

  “I’ll help you,” he says it more as a fact than a general offer, and something about his commanding demeanor all night sends my rage factor soaring one hundred Femtastic points.

  “No.” It comes out cold, unfeeling, and I don’t like this new version of myself, of us.

  “Skyla.” Gage leans in with that toxic cologne of his. I know the exact one, the blue water that sits in a bottle above his old desk in his old room. Gage’s bedroom at his parents’ house is untouched even though he’s lived with me for the last year and a half. Last night was our first night apart, and tonight will mark the second. I hope he’s ready to have the bed to himself for a good long while because I’m about to rain down a hailstorm of long and lonely nights. “It’s Christmas.” His brows plead as only they know how. “Let me stay. We can work this out later. I just want to be close to the boys.” He cradles the back of Barron’s head with his hand so tenderly my bones ache straight to the marrow.

  Emily comes over with that dead expression she wears like a haunted mask. Her midnight hair sits in a tumble of curls knotted at the top of her head. Over the years, Emily and I have established a friendship of sorts. Kind of.

  “I have a vision for you,” she says, depleted of any enthusiasm.

  “No,” both Gage and I say in unison with the matching fervor required to reject whatever horror awai
ts us on the other side of that twisted prophecy. Em’s visions never bode well for me in general.

  She cracks the hint of a smile. “That was good.” She starts back toward the living room. “Doesn’t matter. It’ll happen anyway.”

  The boys begin to squirm, and I start in on a slow bounce before heading for the stairs. The medics wheel a howling Tad out the door, and my mother runs screaming after them.

  “Skyla”—Gage slices my name out sharp as a razor, and I catch both Logan and Liam glancing over from the living room—“you will be there tomorrow. I want a family picture next to the tree.”

  I will be there? I will? Who is this dominating man barking out orders as if I were actually inclined to follow them. An incredulous huff gets locked in my throat at this familial command that involves a half-dead evergreen.

  “Is that so?” My eyes round out with fury. “I want things, too, Gage.” I lean in, seething with a fury I can no longer contain. “I want a husband who would never dream of betraying me, who would never nail the coffin shut on our marriage without even telling me.” A rush of adrenaline takes over as I struggle to catch my breath, and the boys suddenly feel heavy as iron. “Don’t you tell me what to do and when to do it. That will never fly.” A part of me feels victorious for getting all those venomous words out sans the use of a single expletive. Now that the boys are here, I’m changing all of my corrosive ways, sharpening my honor, spit-shining my soul just to be the best person I can for them—unlike some people. I glare openly at the man I love. “I took my beating heart and sewed it onto yours. You had me. You had all of me. And what did you do? You vomited us up at Demetri’s feet. The very idea makes my head spin with rage. Don’t you think you’re getting away with this. Don’t think for a minute you will ever be the victor. Try anything and I will cut the ground from underneath you.”

  The air stiffens between us. An uncomfortable fury snakes around us like a noose.

  “You will be there tomorrow.” His eyes widen with something just this side of anger. “We will take a family picture.” His voice is stern, commanding. This is a new side of Gage that I have never seen before, expectant, demeaning, and as much as I hate it, that sweet spot between my thighs starts to quiver.

  I speed my way up the stairs with the boys in tow as they writhe—their anxious whimpers turning into a full throttle cry as if they hated what’s happened just as much as I do. No sooner do I get into my bedroom than I slam the door behind me and bolt each and every lock.

  The boys wail away, on this, their very first Christmas Eve, and tears stream down my face right along with them.

  No, there will be nothing silent about this holy night.

  Gage

  There have been two nights in my life that I have treasured equally above and beyond any other. The first, my wedding night with Skyla. I had dreamed of what it would be like, holding her, making her mine—body and soul, and that night surpassed every dream I knit in my imagination. The second was the birth of my boys, twins—one arrived on Skyla’s birthday, and the other just a few minutes later on my own birthday. Skyla, Nathan, and Barron are my world, my universe, my life. So when it came down to brass tacks and I needed to either pass down a curse to one of my children—Barron I suspected for reasons that revolved around his birth in particular—or keep the curse for myself, I did the only thing a true father would do—I sacrificed my life so that my sons, my wife, could live in peace. But in doing so, I’ve unleashed a fresh hell that will ensure none of us will truly live in unity. The curse is harrowing any way you slice it, and right about now it’s slicing my heart into a million irreparable slivers.

  This would have been the third greatest night of my life, the first Christmas with my boys. Yes, I will see them in the morning, but what I wanted, what I needed deep down inside was to be in that bed with Skyla when the clock struck twelve. We would hold the boys between us, safe in our holy huddle. But Demetri had cast a pall on me—or rather I had cast it on myself. The curse in its entirety was made possible by my own decision to break faith with the Barricade—the very shit sandwich that I will root for, run, and enjoy posthumously. Yes, I have drunk the blood of a Celestra—my Celestra, Skyla—and entered into a covenant with my own demented lineage. I am a Fem. I am the sole—soul—proprietor of the curse I have brought upon myself. And in effect, I have become Skyla’s enemy. Or at least that’s Demetri’s hopeful trajectory of things to come. I have plans of my own, and none of them involve hurting my wife or her people. I’m holding onto hope like the slippery string of a helium balloon. And God Almighty help me, I will fight this curse tooth and nail. I will buck against destiny and fate and claw my way through life to remain loyal and loving toward the woman I married. Her people are my people. Her cause is my cause. Celestra must remain in power. The Countenance and their vindictive ploys for domination are vile and wicked, and I could never succumb to those evil ideals. They are not mine. I do not hold them.

  I watch the gaping hole at the top of the stairs, hoping that Skyla will have a change of heart—that she’ll reappear and welcome me back to our bed, our life, but no such luck. Instead, I turn to find Demetri with his cool as a rotten to the core cucumber ever-passive grin.

  “I’ll be accompanying Lizbeth to the hospital. Should I message you with your father-in-law’s prognosis regardless of the hour?”

  “Yes.” It comes out terse without meaning to. I have a feeling it will be that way for a very long time to come with this father of mine. I’m nothing more than a means to an end to him. It’s Barron, the father who raised me, who shows me what true unconditional love is. Barron was just as pleased with me when I was a do-nothing Levatio without clout or standing in any of the Factions, let alone the Fems. And now that he knows I’m wrought from pure evil, he loves me just the same. “Text me regardless. Tell Lizbeth if she needs anything, I’m here.” Lizbeth loves me. She adores me. And she might just be my way back into Skyla’s heart.

  Demetri leans in with those dark, empty eyes, and I can feel his mind taking ahold of my own like an iron hand. “You are loved, Gage Edinger. You are my prized creation, and you are most adored—and soon, you will be worshiped as well.” He stalks off into the night and bursts into a vaporous fog before his feet ever hit the porch.

  Logan nods to me from the living room, and I head over to say good night.

  “I’m taking off.” I give a quick glance around. “Where’s Wes?”

  “It’s just me—unless they have a bed in the place everyone else is gone. Wes practically took Chloe by the ear. He’s demanding to know what has Skyla acting so strange. She gave Chloe a gift.” He cocks his head as if waiting for me to somehow quantify that.

  “Dude, I do not know what the hell is going on.” My heart thumps out an unnatural rhythm as if speaking to me in Morse code. “See if you can get close.” I tick my head toward the charred stairs. “She loves you. She needs someone to lean on right now.” A knot the size of that crooked Christmas tree builds in my throat, and it’s painful as hell to get the next few words out. “Until she will hear me out—until she opens her heart back up to me, be a friend.” There. I said friend. Logan has never been good at being just a friend to Skyla, and if he were to cross that line again—albeit the last time he crossed that line it was with Chloe pretending to be Skyla—I wouldn’t interfere. In my mind and heart, I’m already as good as dead. What I did last night was throw dirt on my own coffin. Skyla knows it. I know it. And Logan knows it, too. It’s his time to shine, and quite frankly, it doesn’t matter where I point the damn finger anymore. It seems as if this train of destruction I’m on cannot and will not be stopped.

  Logan pushes out a dry smile that dissipates faster than it stays. “I’m a friend to you both.” His eyes darken as he presses into me with his gaze. “You are both more than my friends. You are both my family. I will and have died for you. I’m not some replacement of yours waiting in line, Gage. I don’t want you weeping into your pillow, lamenting all that could have b
een with the woman you love—the woman who bore your children. She is your wife, Gage.” He says wife so caustic and fast it sounds like knife. Right now, knife feels a bit more accurate—the blade protruding from my aching, bleeding, weeping heart is indeed Skyla. But I’m the one that planted her there. I take full responsibility for this fiasco. “Do not give up.” He softens. “Do you hear me? Or does that thick head of hair prevent you from listening to the truth? Fight.” He smacks me hard on the arm.

  A ripe anger burns through me like a flash fire. “I am fighting.” It takes everything in me to grit the words out. “I’m fucking fighting with more than I have to offer. Yes, I’m fighting for my wife. But I’m fighting for my boys, too. She has to understand that.”

  “And she will. You and I will work hard to make sure she hears the truth and understands that your arms were tied.”

  A dull huff of laughter pinches through the pain. “I sound like a pussy.”

  “A pussy would have let his own kid take the fall.” He slaps me over the back as Mia and Melissa come screaming in with excitement, shouting something about it being midnight and that all presents from Santa are fair game. “Let’s get out of here, dude.”

  Logan and I walk out into the navy velvet night. The sky is marbled with a mixture of boiling clouds and fog—not a star in the sky is able to make an appearance. A storm is brewing overhead, one that my mother swore earlier would be one for the ages. Just as we’re about to part ways, the sky lights up with apocalyptic promise as lightning decorates the heavens in a show of electrifying brilliance. The sky growls and roars, but I’d swear on my quickly waning life that Paragon just growled back with all the scathing anger that Skyla happens to hold.