Dangerous Dalliances (Maxwell Investigations) (14 page)

Casper
looked around as he waited for someone to answer. He inhaled when Dylan’s voice
came over the small device. “Dylan,” he acknowledged. “I have someone here
you’ll want to talk to.”

Jimmy
frowned as Casper handed him the cell phone. When he put the device to his ear,
he heard Dylan saying something to Crispin. “
Dyl
, you
alright?” he questioned.

“Jimmy?”
Dylan replied carefully.

“Yeah,
it’s me. I’m fine.” He looked at Casper and shrugged. “There was a portal into
the Wyldlands in the shop. Athol reached through and saved me before his sister
destroyed everything.”

“So
you’re okay?” Dylan asked.

He
smiled at her concern. “Yes, Dylan, I’m fine.”

“Good,”
she said reasonably. It was only a split second before she erupted. “I’m going
to kill you the next time I see you! Do you have any idea how worried we’ve
been?”

Jimmy’s
face fell as his little sister chewed him out. “I’m sorry
Dyl
.
I’m just getting back and really, it feels like I’ve only been gone for about
10 minutes.”

“That’s
because time in the Wyldlands is different than here!” she snapped. Dylan
slowly inhaled before she continued. “Sloane just called. He and Eric want us
all to meet up with them, Barry and Lily. Casper knows where. Get there as soon
as possible. I’ll tell Mom you’re okay.”

Jimmy
frowned as Dylan disconnected the call. “Well, she was happy to hear from me,”
he mocked.

Casper
shrugged. “You can’t really blame her,” he countered. “There’s been too much
going on, and not enough of it has been going our way. To say that she’s
stressed would be an understatement.”

Athol
approached the pair. His eyes raked over Casper and he was barely able to hold
back a sneer. “I was asked by my uncle to come aid you. Since the Gate you are
talking about is one to Abaddon, it would only be fair I come.”

Both
Nico
and Casper looked at the Fae Royal with wide
eyes. Casper looked at Jimmy and unlocked his car doors. “Get in. We need to
have a sit down with everyone else.”

* *
* * *

Madison
released Troy’s hand once they appeared in the back of Dennis’s home. She
looked around and ignored the frown Troy was giving her. After a moment, she
turned to her husband with one of her own. “Where are the kids?” she asked
coldly. Her mood hadn’t improved from her chat with Pan.

“Madi,
I don’t think it’s a good idea for you to see them like this,” Troy said
quickly. They both fell quiet when the light on the back porch came on.

Her
head tilted to the side. “I think now is a perfect time for me to see my
children,” she said quietly. She took two steps toward the house when Troy
stepped in front of her. A low growl escaped her as she stepped back away from
him. “You said we could get them whenever we wanted. Did you lie to me?”

Troy
held up his hands in a placating manner. “Madi, listen to me...” Whatever else
he was about to say was cut off when Madison’s fist went flying towards his
face. He grabbed on to her jacket sleeve and held her arm captive. “You’ll
scare them the way you are now,” Troy shouted into her face.

Madison’s
features took on a more skeletal appearance. “They’re mine!” a demonic voice
roared back. “You have no right to keep them from me!” Without thinking, she
swung her hand, cutting Troy across his face. As he stumbled back, Madison
looked around wildly. She could hear the wolves closing in around her. A look
of disgust crossed her face. “I want my children,” she growled.

Her
magic whipped through the area. Troy screamed in pain when the gashes on his
face started to widen. He waited until Madison approached him before he tackled
her to the ground. His heart tore into pieces as he raised his fist up and
slammed it into her face. Tears filled his eyes as he felt her cheekbone crack
under a second blow.

Madison
disappeared and reappeared behind her husband. Tears fell from her eyes as the
trees in the area quickly aged and died. She rubbed her broken cheekbone as it
quickly reset itself and healed. “So this is how you really feel, huh?” she
asked quietly.

Troy
felt his blood go cold. Madison’s voice was completely back to normal, but
something in her eyes looked completely broken. “Madison,” he whispered. Her
hand flashed out. He fell back and looked down at the dagger in his chest. Troy
reached his hand out to his wife. If she realized what she had done, it would
kill her once all of this was over.

Madison
slowly approached Troy’s blurred form. Tears rolled down her face as she
reached for her blade.

“Get
away from him!” twin voices shouted.

Madison
looked up in time to see Kayin and Aiden run out of the back door. Her eyes
widened as they ran to her and jumped between her and their father. “Boys,” she
whispered.

Aiden
growled as he looked at his mother. “Stay away from Daddy!” he yelled. When
Madison walked over to him, he held his ground. “You killed him! You’re killing
everyone! I feel
your
magic! You want everything to
die!”

She
slowly shook her head. “No, Puppy,” she said in a whisper. “Not you. Not your
brother or sister either.”

Aiden
was shaking with anger as he looked at his mother. “Yes you do! You hurt Alex,
and now Daddy. You left us! I never want to be like you!” he yelled. Magic tore
through the yard as his eyes slowly turned from gold to red. “If being a
Necromancer means I have to hurt my family, I don’t
wanna
be one!”

Madison
sucked in a breath when his magic slammed into her. If she had been a normal
person, or even a lesser Mage, he would have killed her easily. Tears rolled
down her cheeks as she looked from one son to the other. “Take care of your
father,” she whispered before vanishing.

They
moved without a second thought. Kayin placed his hands on Troy’s chest as Aiden
ripped the blade out of his chest.

A
lone figure in the shadows watched as they worked in tandem. Little Aiden did
his best to push death away, while Kayin healed Troy. Leigh moved around the
perimeter and stopped when a leaf fell on her shoulder. “You should stop this
madness,” she said softly.

“I’ve
gone too far,” Madison whispered back. She appeared next to Leigh, but kept her
eyes trained on her sons. “I have to see this to the end.”

“Why?”
Leigh asked. When Madison looked at her, she motioned to where Belle was just
coming out of the house. “What could be worth all of this?”

Madison’s
eyes glowed. “The still beating heart of a bitch that’s lived far too long,”
she answered. Before Leigh could question her again, she vanished into the
night.

Dylan
walked into Lily’s penthouse with a determined expression. Her eyes quickly
found her mother sitting with Eric. Tina had taken the news of Jimmy’s return
better than she originally expected. “What do we know so far?” she asked
sitting across from her mother and brother. She frowned when a box on the table
caught her attention.

Eric
saw the way Dylan’s eyes became fixated on the box holding the dagger, and
quickly reached forward to grab it. When she looked at him, he shrugged. “This
little trinket has the power to seduce or kill
a Horsemen
.
Lily could have gutted all of us with it, but Barry was able to get it away
from her.”

Crispin
looked around as he sat next to his wife. “Where are Lily and Barry?”

The
door to Lily’s bedroom opened. Barry walked out followed closely by Lily. Dylan
looked at the pair. “What do you have for us?” she asked.

Lily
pulled the small book out of her back pocket. “Michaela Crow’s journal,” she
said simply. She blinked when Barry pulled her into his lap. “This explains
what happened when Scott Maxwell died.”

Tina
held out her hand. “May I?” she requested.

Lily
gave the book over without a second thought. She then glanced at Barry. He
still looked tired, but he swore he was well enough to sit in on this meeting.
“Long story short, the Gate Madison wants to open is a gate to Abaddon. If
history is repeating itself, Pan has a wife that’s trapped there and he’s
trying to get to her.”

Crispin
frowned deeply. “He orchestrated Scott’s death?” he asked darkly.

“No.
He was able to get Scott to open the Gate. He had the other Horsemen there, but
the two he really needed were Conquest and Death.”

“Why
them?”

“Because
Demons will bow to a conqueror, and they are all scared of Death.” Lily’s eyes
went round when she thought of something. “Give me a minute,” she said before
she jumped up and ran upstairs to the master bedroom.

Sloane
carried a tray full of drinks to the table and took the seat between Eric and
Barry. “While we were calling all of you, Lily read as much as she could of the
journal. The little bit that we heard made us wary enough to call you in.”

“So
tell us what you heard,” Dylan said darkly.

“Everything
is repeating itself,” Eric answered. “Michaela and Scott had twins that were 4
and another baby on the way, Pan setting everything in motion, and a Fae being
around to open the gate. There are too many things that were in that journal
that are also happening now.”

Lily’s
face was pale as she returned to the top of the stairs. “Dylan, when you were
given your seal, how did you know it was an actual seal?” she asked.

Dylan
frowned as she moved away from the table and started for the stairs. Her eyes
widened when she felt the low hum of power coming from the cross hanging from
Lily’s fingers. “It felt a lot like that,” she answered as she approached the
stairs. “When I first touched it, it was a small shock. Like what happens when
you stick your tongue to a 9-volt battery.”

Lily
nodded. “That’s how they hid away the demons. The Fae have always been ruled by
the strongest, so Conquest was sealed away in an ancient diadem. War was sealed
away in the body of a dragon.”

“Because
a wise man would never look for War,” Dylan said remembering Jimmy’s words. She
then frowned as she gently touched the thick gold and onyx medallion. “Why a
cross?” she questioned.

“Human nature.
When you’re
starving, or homeless, or generally in need of something, don’t you pray?” Lily
countered. She gave the necklace over to Dylan and rubbed her hands on her
pants. “I’m also thinking that Madison’s seal may have been a coin of some
sort.”

Tina
frowned as she went to Dylan’s side.
“Why a coin?”

“To
pay Charon,” Crispin answered. When various pairs of eyes looked at him, he
frowned. “He was the boatman that would carry the dead across the Rivers Styx
and Acheron into Hades.”

Dylan
carried the missing seal over to where her husband sat and kissed his cheek.
“You’re cute when you’re being smart,” she said lowly. When he chuckled at her,
she placed the cross on the table. “So, now we have two seals and Chinese New
Year is tomorrow. We need to find out where Madison is going to be and how to stop
her.”

Barry
pulled Lily back into his lap. “The Gate in the journal is somewhere on
Theodore Roosevelt Island.” He shrugged when everyone looked at him. “What? I
pay attention.” When Eric chuckled, Barry sighed. “We all know that this all
went down in the 1800’s. Back then, it was owned by the Mason Family. But now
it’s a monument to Theodore Roosevelt. It’s the perfect place for the Gate to
be.”

Dylan
looked from her husband to the various members of her family. “That still
leaves the question, how are we going to stop her?”

Before
anyone could answer, Crispin’s cellphone started to ring. He frowned when he
pulled it out of his pocket and saw his brother’s name. “Where are you,
Cas
?” he asked as he turned on the
speakerphone.

“I
just got a call from Belle. She’s frantic and ranting about Troy almost dying,”
Casper
said lowly.
“According to Leigh, Madison and Troy had a fall out over the kids
and now he’s hurt bad. I’m heading to Dennis’s house.”

Crispin
looked at Dylan and nodded. “We’ll meet you there,” he said quickly. “All of us
are going to want to make sure the boys are alright.”

Dylan
jumped to her feet as he disconnected the call. “We’ll finish all of this when
we get to Dennis’s,” she said as she grabbed her coat.

Tina
stood as well. “Dylan,” she called as she removed her diamond earrings and two
bracelets. She placed them carefully around the cross and forced herself to
stay calm. “Secure this first. Then we can go and deal with whatever’s going on
with the boys,” she said.

Dylan
looked at her mother for a moment. She knew Tina was right, but that didn’t
make the urge to run out of the penthouse to her nephews any easier to turn
away from. Dylan walked over to the table and easily snapped her fingers and
crafted her magic around the items.

Lily
stood silent as everyone watched Dylan. It was rare for Mages to keep their
magic after they were
Turned
. But for whatever reason,
Dylan kept her alchemy after she had been changed into a vampire. Lily glanced
at Barry as the diamonds and gold of Tina’s jewelry started to form a seamless
box around her cross. Her heart was torn as she slowly started to realize that
there was no way they could stay together. She would stop aging soon, but he
would continue to do so. No matter how much longer they had together, it
wouldn’t be enough for her.

Crispin
frowned as he looked at Lily. When her jade colored eyes locked with his, he
shook his head.
“Don’t think about that now. Everything will work out just
fine,”
he told her mentally.

She
wanted to scoff. That was easy for him to say. He already had his wife. And as
far as she knew, Succubi didn’t mate.

Barry
noted the way Lily’s posture changed and frowned. “You alright, Baby?” he
asked.

Lily
painted a smile on her face and nodded. “I’m fine. Just a little worried for
the boys,” she said lowly. “There’s no telling what they saw. And if Troy’s
hurt, knowing Kayin, he’s trying to heal him.”

Dylan
ran her fingers along the corners of the box she just created. Her mother’s
jewels were old enough to be a perfect strongbox. Even with gold entwined in
the actual crystal of the diamond there was no way anyone would be able to get
into it. She handed the sealed cross over to Lily. “Put it someplace safe. It’s
indestructible, but not infallible,” she warned.

Barry
frowned at her wording. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

Lily
shook her head. “It doesn’t matter,” she said quickly. “When all of this is
said and done, I know exactly where this is going.” Lily then moved away from
Barry and started for their bedroom. “But for now, this will do,” she said
before disappearing inside.

* *
* * *

Siobhan
walked into the kitchen area and paused when she saw Madison sitting in the
dark. Her eyes quickly scanned the area. “Where’s your Troy?” she asked lowly.

“He
wouldn’t let me see my children,” Madison answered in a whisper. Her crimson
eyes glowed as she looked at the Irish Fae. “Why are you doing this?”

Something
dark passed over Siobhan’s eyes. “The same reason you are.” Siobhan walked over
to the fridge and grabbed a bottle of beer. “There’s someone on the other side
of the Gate I need to kill.”

Madison
nodded slowly. “As long as it’s not the Succubi Queen,” she said reasonably.
“She’s mine.”

Siobhan
laughed as she sat next to her sister in arms. “No. I want the
Unseelie
King.” She opened her bottle of beer and took a
long drink from it. “He and I have some unfinished business.” They sat in
silence for a moment before another laugh escaped the Royal Fae. “After what
he’s done, I can’t stop until I have his head.”

Madison
raised her own bottle of beer. “May we kill everyone we need to, or die
trying,” she said softly.

“You
amateur,” Siobhan laughed. “Watch a professional.” She settled next to Madison
and held her bottle up. “When the sun arises with the first signs of dew, may
our vengeance be swift and our blades fly true. Once blood is spilt and debts
repaid, we can finally shed these villains we've portrayed. With battles won,
on the setting sun, blessed be the one that finds more rum!”

Madison
laughed as they touched bottles and drank. She had to admit at first she
thought Siobhan was nothing more than a spoiled brat. But the more she learned
about the Fae princess, the more she liked her. Madison was about to say
something when the door to Siobhan’s bedroom opened. She watched curious as Dori
came out of the room wearing a set of bright pink Hello Kitty pajamas.

Siobhan
sat up straighter and placed her beer on a near table. “What’s the matter,
Sweetheart?” she asked.

Dori
looked at Madison and took a deep breath. “You have to split up. There are two
Gates that need to be opened for you to get what you want,” she told them.

Madison
joined Siobhan in sitting towards the edge of the sofa.
“Two
Gates?
Where?”

Siobhan
saw the indecision in Dori’s eyes and gently pulled her close. “We’ve talked
about this. Whatever you see, I won’t let anyone hurt you.” Siobhan’s eyes
widened when Dori wrapped her little arms around her neck.

“You
have to go to the big park. Death was the last person to open that Gate, now
it’s your turn. Aunt Madison has to open the one in Chinatown. It’s never been
opened before, and that’s where
Morrigan
is hiding.
She’s waiting for the Gates to open so she can escape.” Dori looked at Madison
and carefully reached out a hand to her. “I don’t know if either of you make
it. I can’t see it.”

Madison
held the girl’s hand and kissed it. “You don’t have to see anything else for
me, Dori,” she said easily. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw the way
Siobhan wiped at a stray tear and painted a smile on her face. “In fact, I’m
going to take you someplace safe.”

Dori’s
hold tightened on Siobhan’s neck. “I don’t want to leave you,” she said lowly.

Siobhan
shook her head as she slightly pulled away. “And I don’t want you to go. But
you just said you can’t see our futures. That probably means we’ll be in
danger, and I don’t want that for you.”

Dori’s
eyes were full of tears as she shook her head wildly. “I don’t want to leave,”
she said again. She closed her eyes tightly and tried to call on her magic.
“I’ll make myself see something.”

“No.”
Madison grabbed Dori by the shoulder and made her look at her. “Listen to me.
Do not try to alter fate. Ever,” she ordered. “When you try, what you saw only
comes out worse in the end. Promise me that you won’t try to force your
visions.” Madison looked into the girl’s stunned eyes and frowned when Dori
quietly reached forward and touched her cheekbone. “What?”

“Your
eyes,” Dori whispered. “I didn’t know they were brown.”

Madison
blinked as she stood and moved away from the child. “Let’s not worry about that
right now,” she said lowly.

Siobhan
nodded as she looked at Dori one last time. “When all of this is over, I’ll
come and see you again, Sweetheart. I promise.”

Before
Dori could do anything to stop her, Siobhan waved her hand in front of the
child’s eyes. The Fae felt her own eyes filling with tears as Dori fell over
asleep. “I didn’t know we were developing hearts,” she said quietly.

“I
didn’t either,” Madison said in the same tone. “Maybe between being trapped in
Seals and then in us is finally taking its toll on these demons, spirits, or
whatever the hell they are.”

Siobhan
nodded as she brushed Dori’s hair away from her face. “It’s possible.” She was
silent for a long moment as she watched the child she had quickly grown to
love. “Where are we taking her?”