A Warm Heart in Winter(40)

Every time he blinked, he saw Balthazar in the snow, white face turning to him, eyes rapt and yet unfocused, that haunted voice like something from the other side.

The demon is back.

Z rubbed his eyes and turned away, walking farther down to the pool. Those four words that had been uttered across that cold air had been unconsciously spoken. Z knew this because when Doc Jane and V had come out, assessed Balz, and cleared him to be moved back inside, the real Bastard had returned.

What had spoken those words had been someone halfway back, a ghost with a corporeal shell, the message eerie because it emanated from a place other than mortal consciousness.

When they’d gotten him into the library, he’d jerked again and then glanced at the tree that had broken through one of the sets of doors.

“Who put that in here?” he’d mumbled. “It doesn’t fit.”

There had been such relief at that point, a bubbling happiness for everybody as the stabilization and recovery had presented itself. Balz had still been taken down here, of course. And his fellow Bastards were inside the exam room with him. He was going to be fine, though—no lingering aftereffects anticipated, according to the doctors.

Except they were wrong about that. Although not with respect to Balz.

Z stopped at the glass entrance of the pool area. Those four words were causing a rift in reality for the male they’d been spoken to.

But Z’s demon was not back. He’d been through this before. His rational side knew this.

And yet . . .

The decision was made before he was aware of coming to any kind of crossroads of choice. His feet were clearly committed to a new course of action, however, turning his body away from the pool’s enclosure and taking him to the office, through the office, into the supply closet.

He fought the direction he was headed. He didn’t want to go into the mansion’s cellar, to that corner far, far in the back, to the cardboard box that he had brought down there—

As Z stepped out into the tunnel, he happened to take a deep breath, and that was when he smelled something that made no damned sense.

Looking to the right, to the darkened void at the far end, he frowned and took another deep inhale.

Fresh air? What the hell?

Given the number of things that had gone haywire tonight, he pivoted and headed in that direction. As he continued along, motion-activated ceiling lights illuminated his way, his footfalls echoing around. God knew there was pelnty of distance to travel. The tunnel connected four things: the Pit, which was one terminal; the mansion and the training center in the middle; and at the far, far opposite end, there was a hidden escape hatch that dumped out on the mountain a quarter of a mile away.

No one should have gone in or out of it.

So why was the scent of the storm, of the night, of evergreens, in this part of the Brotherhood’s complex?

As he got close to the steel hatch, the lineup of emergency weapons, survival packs, and outerwear put in an appearance, everything ready to get grabbed in the event of a dramatic departure. And on the other side of the triple-locked portal? There was a shallow cave with a blacked-out Chevy Tahoe and several snowmobiles, the vehicles sheltered from the elements and camo’d from prying eyes and trespassing.

Glancing around, he frowned.

Nothing was out of place.

No damp footsteps were drying on the concrete floor.

No empty pegs were in the collection of equipment. No scent of gasoline, either.

Weird. But maybe V had decided to check everything. Considering how things were going tonight, who could blame him for the paranoia?





The classroom was the last one in the training center’s lineup, and as Blay pushed through its door and turned on the light, he looked to the place where he’d once sat as a student with John Matthew and Qhuinn. Back in their pretrans days, when they’d been in the Brotherhood’s training program here, they had stuck together. Part of it had been protecting John Matthew from Lash. More of it had been the simpler, enduring ties of friendship.

As Qhuinn followed him inside, the male had a curious expression on his face. Like everyone else, they’d waited outside Balz’s examination room and had been relieved to get confirming good news—and not just about the patient, although that was the most important thing. Tohr had also announced to everybody that even though the storm was in full rock and roll, all of the shutters up at the mansion were locked down, the tree in the library had been removed, and there was plywood covering the French doors the evergreen had broken open.

So considering the way things had started out?

Qhuinn went over to the blackboard—no dry-erase for the Brothers, none of that fancy new stuff—and picked up a piece of chalk. The heart outline he drew was yellow, the color of a lined legal pad. In the center, he wrote: “Q+B = 4EVA”

As he put the chalk back, he clapped his palms clean. “So I’m twelve, okay? Sue me.”

“I think you’re romantic.”

“Do I hit on you too much?” Qhuinn pivoted around. “I mean, am I—”

Blay answered that question by taking the bottom of his cashmere sweater and lifting it up and over his head. Then came the button-down shirt, the one that he’d chosen because it was blue and coral checked and complemented the blue sweater.

Qhuinn froze where his stood. Then his eyes flared.

“I locked the door,” Blay said. “And no, I don’t think you hit on me too much—” He put his palms out to stop his mate. Then he pointed forward. “Oh, no you don’t. I want you to sit there. Where the teacher would.”