"I think you have the wrong house!" Roger yelled from the top of the stairs. "We gave at the office."
I twisted around to glare at him, wondering what I"d ever seen in him. Spineless twit. No wonder he couldn"t even manage a cash register.
"You the Drakaina?" a deep voice asked.
The question turned me back to face the things in the lower foyer. Men from the waist up, bulls from the waist down, which included hairy legs, cloven hooves, and oversized bull bits. Each of them had a strap across his chest with an emblem engraved in gold. One that looked suspiciously like Achilles"s chiseled jaw.
"What"s a Drakaina?" Barbie whispered, and the Bull Boy at the front pointed his sword at her.
"Back away, puny human. The Drakaina is a dangerous beast full of poison."
"Actually, poison is not quite right. Venom would be correct if you"re referring to my fangs." I took a breath and backed up a step.
Bull Boy raised an eyebrow at me. "You the Drakaina?"
I shrugged as a niggling fear began to gnaw at the base of my neck. Achilles had sent his goons after me. I went with coy. "Maybe."
"What do you mean, maybe?" He pointed his sword at me.
"She"s a human, not some draco thing," Roger said, though his words wavered at the end. "Right, Alena?"
Bull Boy grinned up at me. "That"s her. Alena. Boss said it was her name."
He took a step, his large hooves tromping onto the bottom stair. The wood groaned and I lifted an eyebrow. "I don"t think that was a good idea."
"Drakaina, we"re taking you to Achilles."
I glared at him. "What is it with all the men in my life trying to make me do what they want?"
Barbie snickered. "Because you haven"t learned yet to make them do what you want them to. Idiot."
I didn"t want to think she had a point. But maybe she did.
Bull Boy let out a snort, leaned forward to step up . . . and went straight through the stairs, the old wood busting out underneath him with a monstrous screech of breaking lumber and rusted nails letting loose all at once. His hands flung up as he went down, and he bellowed as the house seemingly swallowed him whole. The remaining six Bull Boys stared at the hole, their hooves shuffling on the wooden floor. Their furry legs twitched as they backed away from the pitch-black hole.
"You"d better leave. I can"t guarantee the rest of you will make it out alive." I took a step forward. They backed up farther, their eyes trained on my every move.
They were afraid of me.
A wild urge gripped me, a power like I"d never known. Not magic, but the realization that just by existing, I frightened them. Gathering myself, I leapt the rest of the way down the stairs and over the hole the lead bull had opened up in the floor. I landed in a crouch on the main floor. Achilles"s goons scattered to one side, the clatter of the hooves filling the air.
"Holy s.h.i.+t, she is a supernatural," Roger breathed.
The bulls snorted, shaking their heads and holding their weapons out in front of them, though they were far less certain without their leader. Like a real herd of bovines, they weren"t about to step away from the group and face me on their own. I grabbed the front door, opened it, and moved to step through. Hanging beside me on the wall key ring was a set of keys with the name Barbie in bright-pink crystals. I scooped them up along with my set of keys from Vanilla and Honey. No way was Colleen getting her hands on these.
"Alena, you can"t leave us here with these things!" Roger yelled. I glanced up at him, the dark sheet he held to his waist highlighting how pale his skin was.
Barbie glared at me. "Don"t you dare touch my baby!"
I didn"t think she meant Roger. My husband took a step and I pointed a finger at him, freezing him as if that were a new power of mine.
"Go to . . . h.e.l.l, Roger." The word quivered on my lips, but I said it. His jaw dropped and I slammed the door behind me.
I strode out to the s.h.i.+ny black sports car, opened the door, pushed the junk off the seat and out onto the ground, and slid in. Key in ignition, I revved the engine, s.h.i.+fted into reverse, and hit the gas pedal. The tires peeled in the loose gravel, spitting rocks everywhere. The sound of pebbles. .h.i.tting the sides of the car gave me a wicked sense of satisfaction. Spinning out onto the road, I s.h.i.+fted into gear and hit the gas again. From the side mirror, a rampant group of bull men chased down the road behind me. They gave up when I hit the on-ramp to the highway and opened the sports car up.
The car was light to the touch and responded quickly. It didn"t take long for me to recognize the direction I took. Vanilla and Honey was on the outskirts of downtown, close enough to get good traffic, but not so close that the rent was impossible.
Tears trickled down my cheeks as I thought about the last twenty-four hours, my life, the last few weeks, and the realization that nothing prior to my being sick had been what I"d thought. Nothing in my life had prepared me for what I"d gone through and what I"d learned about those people I thought were on my side. I sniffed several times. "What the heck happened to me?" Not that I expected an answer. So when I got one, to say I was surprised was an understatement.
"Well, this is what happens when you get mixed up with G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses. Or in your case, when your family gets mixed up."
I jerked the car to the side of the road and threw it into park. Beside me in the pa.s.senger seat floated a mostly naked cherub who sported a pair of cream-colored wings and a barely-there loincloth made of pale-pink satin.
"Umm, excuse me?" I had to be seeing things. Naked cherubs didn"t just appear in the air. They were in frescoes and paintings, not real life. He tugged at his loincloth, scratching at his crotch.
"I said this is what your family gets. For meddling."
I rubbed at my eyes. "Wait, are you . . . Cupid?"
"I am not!" He floated up to the ceiling of the car, his face pinking up to match his loincloth. "That miserable interloper has nothing on me." The color in his face bled down his neck to his chest.
"Sorry, I"m not up on my mythological . . . deities." I sniffed back the last of my tears. "Who are you, then, and why are you in my car?"
"Not really your car now, is it?" He grinned, and the red faded from his skin. "Name is Eros. But you can call me Ernie. I like it better. More new-age sounding."
"Ernie. Okay, so . . ." Wrapping my brain around this newest addition to my life was a struggle. "What are you doing here, Ernie?"
"Well, the boss felt like a s.h.i.+t, being as he used to knock boots with your granny and all, and since it"s kind of his fault you ended up like you are, he wanted me to bring you a message and tell you to meet him at the club tonight and he"d tell you everything he could." He drew in a deep breath, his chest swelling. That was a lot of words in a single sentence for such a little guy.
I narrowed my eyes. "So what you"re saying is my yaya gave Zeus what for and he"s trying to make nice now."
Ernie grinned and gave me a big wink with one baby blue. "You betcha. I always liked Flora. She didn"t put up with the boss"s nonsense like the other priestesses. I don"t put up with it either." He let out a sigh and floated to the seat. "Where are you going?"
"To my bakery," I said without thinking. He lit up like a Christmas tree with ten times too many lights.
"I love sweets."
I put a hand on the stick s.h.i.+ft and then glanced at him, my mind working. I couldn"t afford to let the opportunity slide by, which meant I had to embrace the weirdness 100 percent.
"I"ll give you all the sweets you want . . . if you answer some questions for me."
"Sure thing, toots." Ernie settled into the seat and grinned up at me. "What do you want to know?"
I pulled back into traffic and picked through all the questions I had.
"Tell me about what I am."
"Ahh. A Drakaina. Interesting choice of monster for Merlin to make you. I heard what you said to the Bull Boys; you"re right about the venom-versus-poison thing. Venom in the fangs, but you are not poisonous. Your venom will kill anyone, including heroes. Including G.o.ds and G.o.ddesses." He s.h.i.+fted in his seat. "It"s why Zeus fell over trying to get back from you when you showed off your fangs."
"You saw that?"
"I was sitting in the rafters eating my lunch. Got a good view of the whole encounter."
I took the next off-ramp, clutched the steering wheel, and made myself ask the next question. "That"s not all being a Drakaina is, is it?"
"Nope. You"re a s.h.i.+fter. Should be able to turn into a giant snake. Big as a house. And you"re sensitive to vibrations and smells. You can see in the dark, and of course being something of a siren, you can seduce men and women right out of their clothes if you put your mind to it."
Wonderful.
"Okay, what else have you got, beautiful?"
"Don"t call me that. I"m a monster."
"A beautiful monster." He grinned. "That"s got to count for something."
I hunched my shoulders. "Okay. Who in my family is a Super Duper?"
He laughed, falling onto his back and flas.h.i.+ng me in the process. "A Super Duper? Are you kidding me? That"s not what you call supernaturals, is it?"
"Stop laughing. That"s what we called them in the hospital."
"Say that to the wrong Supe and you"re going to have a fight on your hands." He grinned and I glared at him. "Okay, okay. I don"t know who in your family is a Super Duper"-he half choked on the words-"but you"re right. Someone is supernatural, or you never would have caught the Aegrus virus."
"What do you mean?"
Ernie cleared his throat. "The virus only attaches to those who carry some amount of supernatural blood. It can"t attach to pure humans. So Flora, being a pureblood, and your mom, being a pureblood, would never be able to pick up the virus. A pure-blooded Super Duper"-he snickered-"can pick it up but just gets sick. It"s you halfers that get sick and die. The virus is too much for the little bit of each."
The epiphany hurt my brain, and I ran it through my brain twice before I realized what he was saying.
"If my mom is pure human, and I caught the virus, it means-"
"That your papa is most likely some form of supernatural. You got it." He s.h.i.+mmied deeper into his seat.
Fricky d.i.c.ky, that was a revelation I"d not been ready for. Dad was a Super Duper? How could we not have known?
"Don"t beat yourself up for not knowing," Ernie said. "Most Supes hide from their families too. It"s better that way with the current atmosphere."
I counted my breaths in and out as I did my best to calm myself. Nothing I could do about Dad right now. Though a little honesty would have been nice. I frowned. "Why wouldn"t he have said something when we went home?"
"No idea."
Me neither.
"Okay, back to the other stuff. The halfers who get sick, they"re the only ones, right?"
"Yup." He fluttered his wing tips over his head as if egging me on. "Keep going."
I scrunched up my face, the thoughts coming together in bits and pieces. "That"s why the government hides away those who are sick in places like Whidbey. They don"t want everyone to know how many halfers there are out there? Because if they knew how many halfers there were, people would realize how many supernaturals there were?"
"You got it now. You"re a smart one. In the whole wide world, at least half of the population has some amount of Super Duper blood. They don"t have to be halfers like you and your brother. Just a speck of the supernatural, down to I think something like a sixteenth the last time I asked, was enough to make you vulnerable. That"s about half the population in the world. And that"s a big kill zone. Imagine what would happen if half the population keeled over. Or became . . . Super Duper like you and your brother." He grinned again.
"Wow," I whispered as I pulled into my parking spot at the back of the bakery. "Ernie, thank you."
"Anytime you want info in trade for food, you"ve got it."
I stepped out of the car and he followed, flying near my shoulder. I glanced at him. "Do you mean that?" He"d been more honest with me than anyone else so far.
"Sure. I like you. You remind me of Flora when she was young. Feisty and full of life. Nice rack too."
I rolled my eyes as I walked to the back door. I pulled my bakery keys out and held them in front of the k.n.o.b. No need to use them, though; the door was cracked open.
The bakery hadn"t been open since I"d gotten sick; I"d closed it down thinking I"d be back soon enough. Before I"d known it was the Aegrus virus. My main helper, Diana, was supposed to be checking on things every day, making sure all the fridges and such were running so nothing spoiled. But that was an early-morning task.
There was no way Vanilla and Honey should have been unlocked this late at night. I held a hand up to Ernie, motioning him to be quiet.
The back of my bakery was the kitchen, pantry, and cold storage as well as my office. Even though my office wasn"t sealed off, I didn"t mind. When I was doing the numbers I liked to feel I wasn"t separated from the rest of the bakery and goings-on.
Behind my office desk, three men dressed in black pried at my wall safe, their backs facing me.
"John, get that pry bar. We"ll take the whole thing."
One of the men turned around, saw me, and froze. "Boss. We got a problem."
"I doubt it, Johnny. Get the d.a.m.n pry bar."
"We got company."
The other two men spun around so all three were facing Ernie and me. The cherub floated up to the ceiling. "You got this. Kick their a.s.ses so we can bake some cake!"
"I don"t know how to fight." Who was I kidding? This was my bakery, my baby, and they were ransacking it. I wasn"t going to just stand there and let them take what they wanted.
"You don"t have to, your instincts should ramp up and help you out." His blue eyes twinkled down at me. "Here they come."
What did he mean, I didn"t have to know how to fight? I tore my gaze from him as the first thug approached me, grinning from ear to ear.
"Here I thought we were taking cash, and we"re going to end up with a beauty prize as well." In his hands he held a length of rope he slowly spooled out in a loop, like a la.s.so. I took a step back, my b.u.t.t b.u.mping up against one of the countertops.
I reached behind me, my hand gripping something familiar and solid. I swung the rolling pin, catching the goon on the side of his head. He dropped like a sack of potatoes.
"Atta girl! Now the other two!" Ernie cheered me on and a rush of adrenaline zipped through me. I"d never felt so . . . alive.
I strode toward the next would-be thief and brandished the rolling pin. "Get your friends and get out."
He pulled a gun from his lower back and pointed it at me. "This is our heist. Get out or I"ll shoot you right in your pretty face."
I didn"t even think. I dropped to my knees and lashed out with the rolling pin, catching him in the knee. A rather satisfying crunch of bone filled the air. He let out a scream as he fell and the gun went off, firing into the ceiling. Goon number three-a.k.a. Johnny-let out a yell and ran for the back door.
"Throw the pin!" Ernie yelled.