Page 9 of Alastair

The two of them had first bonded over their mutual love of food. They’d fallen in love with each other’s cooking before anything else.

“Sounds perfect.” Titan took the hat off Raiden’s head and put it on his.

“Hey.” Raiden eyed his hat. “That’s… that’s mine.”

“Oh yeah?” Titan smirked. “Come and get it.”

“Nah,” Raiden said, his smile going lopsided. “You look sexy as fuck in it. You can keep it for now.”

Titan gave him another kiss before stepping over to the pantry, still wearing the hat.

Seeing Raiden so happy warmed my chest. His and Titan’s wedding had been a few weeks ago, and they had completed the mating ritual to bind their life forces. I was the only one out of the eight of us—including Kallias—that hadn’t found his fated mate.

And I didn’t want to.

Love led to heartbreak. I had opened my heart to Joseph, and in the end, I had lost him just like I’d lost every other person I’d ever tried to be happy with. Even more upsetting than his death? Despite our decades together and the intimacy we’d shared, I had still loved myself more.

Pride wouldn’t allow me to place another above myself—with the rare exception of my brothers. No lover had ever even come close to that.

After ending the conversation with Thor, Mason checked the online hunter forum to chat with groups in various parts of the world.

“How’s the situation in Tokyo?” I asked. Two days earlier, attacks had been reported in the forest roughly twenty minutes from Shibuya Station. Three bodies had been found, mauled and with limbs missing. The news claimed it’d been an animal attack, but we all knew better.

“Grim and his crew wiped out the last of the ghouls from the nest late last night,” Mason answered. “A few vamps jumped in to help.”

Once upon a time, Mason would’ve called them leeches or filthy bloodsuckers instead of vamps. His hatred and distrust of all things supernatural had been high when Gray first brought him into our lives. But he no longer saw every non-human as a monster. He’d become one of the leaders of the hunter force and kept things running smoothly among their ranks.

“Grim?” Baxter asked. The fresh scratch marks on his chest told everyone in the kitchen what he’d been doing prior to his descent downstairs. Well, the marks and the obscene sounds and thumps that had originated from his bedroom.

All. Night. Long.

It was a miracle I’d gotten any sleep.

“Another hunter,” Mason answered. “Grim Creeper is his username in the forum, and we all call him Grim.”

“Grim Creeper. Clever.” Baxter snorted and opened the refrigerator, grabbing a handful of blueberries and popping them into his mouth. The scratch marks on his chest began to fade, the little bit of blood drying and the wounds closing. Part of his healing ability as a Nephilim. The male who’d caused those marks snuck down the stairs and exited through the front door—one of the water dragon warriors. “What’s his real name?”

“No idea,” Mason answered. “We usually don’t use our real names. And those of us who do only do so once we trust each other. All that matters is the job.”

Gray yawned so big his jaw popped.

“Go take your afternoon nap,” I said. “You’re no good to anyone like this.”

He stuck out his tongue at me. “Make me.”

I arched a brow, and he grinned.

I had the ability to give my brothers direct orders that they couldn’t refuse, but I only did it when absolutely necessary. Pride was the first of the deadly sins, the one all the other sins derived from. Thus, it was the strongest. They had to obey me. The curse in their blood forced them to.

It was one reason why Lucifer hadcherishedme all those years ago. The reason he’d bothered with me at all, considering how he’d neglected his actual children. By his side, I would’ve commanded an army of Nephilim, forcing the males I now called brothers to do whatever I ordered of them. Set fire to the world. Kill anyone and everyone Lucifer wanted dead.

The thought made me ill.

“Where’s Kallias?” I asked, forcing those morbid thoughts away.

“By the pool,” Raiden answered as he stood at the kitchen sink, filling a pot with water. The window in front of him showed a view of the terrace and the infinity pool beyond it, where our brother sat by himself.

“You can come inside if you want,”I projected into Kallias’ mind using telepathy.