Three Trials (The Dark Side Book 2)(35)

Those three were beginning to make me feel like I was as important to them as they are me, yet they didn’t mention any of this.

Jude, of course, doesn’t answer me, since he can’t talk to a phantom his guest can’t see, without being terribly suspicious. Since she seems to be as paranoid as he is with trust, that would be bad.

I decide to make him talk so she doesn’t trust him. I’ll find a way into hell to gather their information. They don’t need her.

“Would they?” I ask him again.

He signs the letters n and o behind his back. Hmm… I can read sign language? Oh, he’s telling me no! They wouldn’t have. I hope he’s not lying.

As she comes to stand closer to him, her eyes raking over him, I move to his side.

“You’re turned on without them,” she says, glancing at his lap.

That has me scooting away, since that’s my effect.

Jude clears his throat as he leans forward, hiding the noticeable erection he certainly shouldn’t be having with another woman in the room.

“If I’m a conduit for your attraction to her, I’ll be forced to make her ugly very soon,” I tell him seriously.

He gives a subtle shake of his head. I’m not sure what he’s telling me, but I think he’s asking me not to kill her or telling me it’s not her effect.

“I mean it. I will not be the little magic gem that offers you an independent boner so you can screw another girl in my presence.”

“I’d never betray my brothers by taking someone without them,” he tells her.

I really hate the way he calls them his brothers. It’s confusing. Which in a sense, they are. But not in the blood-relation sense.

“The Kincaid brothers only share,” she says on a sigh, as though she’s repeating something she’s heard too much. “I remember well.”

“All quads share,” he says dismissively.

We’ll have to circle back to the Kincaid brothers thing. That’s the first I’ve heard of that, and again, they’re not really brothers.

Her eyes close, like she’s relishing a memory. My phantom fists clench.

“You being turned on by her definitely makes you my least favorite,” I mutter under my breath.

Pettiness is my new shade of personality lately.

His eyes dart to me as his jaw tics, but he immediately looks away, unable to say whatever it is he wants to say, since she’s here.

I like that I’m making him want to talk. I need this siren gone before she sings her song and I lose him completely.

“You four don’t have the same last names if you were born to different families. I’ve not even been able to uncover your last names. So why does she refer to you as the Kincaid brothers?” I muse aloud.

“Are we going to hell or not, Lake? Time is very precious right now, and I’ve been separated from my brothers too long. You know how quad bonds work,” he reminds her.

I’m not sure why my stomach unsettles, but it’s not envy this time.

I look back at her as her eyes open, and she gives him a small, sympathetic smile.

“You’re hurting for their presence. Sorry. I really did expect them to be here with you, or I wouldn’t have made you wait for so long. The truth is that I was trying to get out of my latest assignment, which is the main reason I’m so late.”

He cocks his head.

“What do you mean?” he asks as he stands.

She takes a step back, pinching the bridge of her nose.

“This culling is terrifying everyone. Lucifer hasn’t stopped it yet. Forty more escorts were killed this morning. He wants nothing but devout loyalty, and you know where I stand on that fence if I’m willing to break the rules to take you under,” she says, smiling sadly up at him.

“You think you’ll be in the culling?” he asks, sounding concerned.

There’s that damned envy again.

“All of the participants of the trials survived, sans the two you and your brothers killed,” she tells him.

“Everyone survived those trials?” he asks incredulously.

She nods, a huff of a breath escaping her. “Lucifer retrieved the others before their deaths. They never made it past even one obstacle. But he needed them to start a change. To replenish what he’s recycling, because there can be no vacant jobs, obviously. Everyone has a task to be fulfilled to preserve the balance.”

“I don’t understand. No one gets out of the trials without completing them,” he goes on, confused.

Her watery smile doesn’t sit right with me.

“I’m afraid you have no idea what you stirred up by surviving that third trial. It was impossible to complete every task in the three days allotted. Even in a month, no one could have done that. I never believed them. They tried to tell me, but I refused to believe it could be true, because I really like the four of you.”

I step closer, tilting my head. What does she think is wrong with them?

“She thinks something really bad, but she doesn’t know I helped. Tell her so she’ll stop believing whatever it is,” I tell him, not liking the way I’m now worried about her damn opinion of him.

After all, I want her gone.

“What’s going on, Lake? Do you know what Lucifer was trying to achieve?” he asks, not telling her about me even though I’m giving him permission.