Page 68 of One Bad Knight
“Sorry I’m late, girl,” Viet said. “The traffic was crazy. There was an epidemic of flying demons downtown. I even passed by those demon exterminators you talked about. Whack A Ghost?”
“Whack A Ghoul,” I corrected.
“Yeah, they have that big black van, like a goth Scooby Doo ride. And there were a bunch of people running by with flame throwers and shotguns. Seemed like a four-alarm fire.”
“I’m glad you’re okay,” I said, wondering if Gatsby’s brothers were on the scene, helping manage it too. Then I turned to Molly. “How about you stick with me and Viet, and we can gossip about the latest trash television or who got their Botox botched.”
Molly’s eyes lit up. “Oh, I just heard Jacinda got rejected by her plastic surgeon because he says she’s had too much work done already.”
We laughed our way back into the party and I began to enjoy myself for the first time.
* * *
When it was 11:45,I made my excuses and headed back inside the house to my uncle’s study. He said he had a birthday gift he wanted to present to me in private.
Pushing open the door, I was surprised to see Dave and Gabe standing at his desk. They spoke in low, serious voices and they were all… holding hands? That was weird.
“Everything okay?” I asked.
They hushed and turned to me, unlinking hands.
“Of course not.” My uncle smiled. “I’m afraid we were guilty of talking shop at your party. My apologies, Katherine.”
The tension in the room seemed thick, though my uncle was all at ease. Dave and Gabe wore serious expressions.
“Aren’t you going to wish your cousin a happy birthday?” my uncle prompted, annoyance seeping into his voice.
“Happy birthday, Katherine,” my cousins mumbled, but neither of them came and hugged me. It was usually one of the two times a year I got hugs from them. On my birthday and Christmas.
Then without another word, they left out the French doors that led to the back yard.
“Are you having a good time?” my uncle asked as he went about locking the doors after them and pulling the curtains.
“Yes, thank you for the party,” I said, doing my best to seem grateful.
“I really hoped it would be the best one to send you off on,” he said, coming to stand by behind his desk chair.
“Send me off on? Is this present of yours about sending me to Europe?” I asked, with a nervous laugh.
The smile faded from his face. “Katherine, you care about this country, don’t you?”
The sudden change of topic made me uneasy.
“Of course I do.”
“And you know our family has dedicated our legacy to serving the greater good.”
I shifted my weight; my palms grew sweaty for some reason. “Yes.”
“Today, you are going to be a part of that legacy.” Despite the inspirational words, my uncle seemed as serious as a heart attack. My own heart sped up as panic set in.
“What is this?” I asked, needing clarity right now. “What’s going on?”
“Before…” he started and then switched directions. “For your birthday, I’m going to give you the truth. When you spoke of the demon in this very study, the night of your father’s death, I’d known what you saw was real all along.”
The room stilled and a chill spread out from my center to my fingertips. “What?”
My uncle took a seat and steepled his fingers. “You see, Katherine, in order to serve the greater good, this family has been getting help from a power greater than ourselves for quite some time. While you were dallying with that boy all those years ago, you failed to notice your father’s campaign began to go poorly. His prospects for reelection were dwindling fast, so he did what all of the influencers in our ancestry have done. He called upon this entity for help.”