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October 31, 2030

“ D o something with your son! I’m at my end with him!”

Thorn arched a brow as Karma met him at the front door of her house, shrieking loud enough that it stopped two pedestrians on the sidewalk behind him. Once they realized she wasn’t yelling at him per se, they quickly walked on.

Wow. No preamble. Just another denouncement of E.T. and his stubbornness. Which Thorn could understand. E.T. did enjoy being pig-headed.

Just like his mom.

And his father.

“Where’s the boy? I’ll take him out back and beat him forthwith.”

Karma glared at him with the full weight of her wrath. “Just don’t, Thorn. This is serious. He’s been slipping out at night and?—”

“He’s a grown man, Karma. Almost thirty. I doubt he’s slipping out to meet his friends.”

“Have you met him? He might look like a grown man, but he has the instincts of a five-year-old! I don’t like the people he’s hanging out with. They’re trouble.”

Could they really be worse than his father, and the demons Thorn called friends?

Trying not to say that out loud, Thorn entered her house so that the people on the street would no longer have a free show. “Are you talking about Val and Annabelle?”

Karma locked the door and gave him a hot, furious glare. “My niece and nephew aren’t the problem … much. Annabelle could be a little more circumspect, but given her mother and father, she’s remarkably stable.”

She wasn’t wrong. Annabelle and her brother, Valerian, were the children of Karma’s sister, Tabitha, and the ex-Dark-Hunter, Valerius Magnus.

They and their cousins had been virtually inseparable since they were born and could get into more than their fair share of trouble. Thorn suspected it had a lot to do with the Devereaux blood mixing with whatever Artemis did to create a Dark-Hunter.

Just a bad combination all around.

“He’s not hanging out with his cousins, Thorn. Not since he found out about you .”

Oh …

That made his blood run cold as it opened the door to a much lower class of entities the boy could be seeking out to befriend. “Then who?”

“Demons.”

Like father, like son. Shit. He dreaded the next question, but he needed clarity. “What do you mean?”

“It started with them hanging out at Club Charonte and that other place where demons gather. Next thing I knew, he wasn’t coming home. I don’t know what they’re doing. But I’m worried.”

She had every right to be. While E.T. was a good kid, he had enough of Thorn’s blood in him to make him a target, especially for those like Paimon who wanted to control him.

“Is he at work?”

“He quit his job two weeks ago. Don’t get me started on that!”

Thorn ground his teeth. “What’s he been doing?”

“That’s what I’m saying. He hasn’t been doing anything. Just hiding out in his room or off with who knows what until all hours of the day and night. Being evasive every time I ask him where he is or where he’s going. Who he’s meeting with. He needs his father.”

The boy obvioudly needed something. Maybe a butt kicking might be the best course.

“All right. I’ll take care of it.”

“Thank you.” She gave him a tight hug. “And don’t kill him. I have earned that privilege.”

Snorting at her humor, he stepped away from her. “You’re welcome.” And with that, Thorn left her alone in her house so that he could track down their errant child and see what E.T. had gotten himself into.

Simi left the dance floor so that she could head to the bar and get something to drink. Dancing always made her thirsty.

Raising her hand, she motioned the green-and-yellow Charonte over to her and did her best not to laugh at the humans who all assumed their waiter was wearing a costume and makeup.

If they only knew …

It was why she loved her bro-bro’s bar so much. Here, she could let her hornays out and even her wings and no one thought anything about it. The humans just thought it was a theme.

Theme demon.

Simi’s favorite.

“What can I get for you, beautiful?” Fiore asked.

Simi smiled at the demon who always flirted with her. Fiore made no attempt to hide the fact that he was most interested in the Simi. Brave considering akri or Rik-rik would gut him if they ever saw it. “Gimme one of them pretty Shirley drinks, please. Extra cherries!”

Fiore laughed, then went to get her drink.

Simi turned around to scan the bar full of dancers. Cocking her head, she frowned as she saw Thorny’s son with a group of demons she didn’t know.

Tall and blond, E.T. tended to stand out even in a crowd. ’Course he looked a lot like his daddy. Eerily so at times, only he didn’t have the same sadness in his eyes that Thorny did.

“Here you go, Simi.”

Thanking Fiore, she took her drink and headed for E.T. and his group of friends.

As soon as he saw her approaching, he stopped laughing and cursed under his breath. Well that didn’t make her happy.

Really?

“E?” she asked.

He tried to shoosh through the crowd.

Now that was just plain ole rude and honestly, it made her angry! Aggravated, she teleported in front of him so that she could cut his path off.

“What are you doing?” Simi asked, tsking at him before she took a sip of her drink through the little red straw.

“I’m out with my friends, Simi. What are you doing here?”

“Dancing in my brother’s bar where I frequent a lot.” Simi glanced over to the dark demons who smelled like they’d just come out of Azmodea. “Why you hanging with lowlifes? I know your mama done taught you better than this.”

“They’re good friends, Simi.” He tried to move past her.

Simi cut him off again. “E …”

“Stop, Simi. I know what I’m doing.”

She arched a brow at his defiant tone. “Why you being so mean to the Simi?”

He had the decency to look sheepish and well he should for yelling at her like that when all she was trying to do was watch after him. “I’m not trying to be mean. I just don’t feel like I belong. You could never understand.”

“Of course I understand. You have any idea how many centuries I was the only Charonte in the human world? But you definitely don’t belong with them riffraff.” She cut a meaningful stare at the demons.

“Who you calling riffraff?” One of the demons sidled up to her.

Simi pushed him away daintily. “You, smelly demon. Why aren’t you in your hole where you belong?”

E.T. pulled him back. “Don’t pick a fight with Simi. It won’t end well for you.”

He raked an arrogant look over her body. “I’m not afraid of a Charonte.”

“Then you’re just terminally stupid, given the fact that her brother owns this club full of them.”

Simi gasped at the sound of Thorn’s deep voice cutting over the music as he appeared behind her.

E.T. cursed again. “What are you doing here, Thorn?”

He swept his gaze over the ones with E.T. and shook his head. “Visiting. And I think it’s time for your friends to leave.”

“I like my friends and I have no wish for them to go.”

Thorn shook his head at his son. “Leave, demons. Or you’re going to regret being stupid. Which as I said is terminal. Stay and I’ll show you exactly how terminal it is.”

They vanished instantly.

E.T. growled. “Really? You’re as bad as Mom.”

Thorn’s eyes turned a vibrant red. “I’m so much worse than your mother. Never forget that, Ian. She’s your sympathetic parent who carried you inside her body. I don’t have that attachment.”

He started past Thorn, who gently took his arm. “What’s going on with you, kid?”

“I want to know more about my demonic kin.”

“I’ll send you a scrapbook.”

Simi bit her lip as she saw the defiance in E.T.’s eyes. He had a lot of his daddy in him.

A lot .

She’d never realized that before because he’d always been such a sweetie baby. What happened to that perfect little angel boy who used to sit on the floor, eating potato chips and playing cars with his Simi sitter?

The man in front of her was angry. Defiant. He reminded her a lot of Thorny when akri-Thorn had been that age.

Except E.T. wasn’t nearly as scary.

“This is such bullshit!”

Thorn growled. “Enough!”

“Or what? You’ll ground me, Dad?”

The look on Thorny’s face was enough to make Simi take a step back. Sadly, E.T. didn’t have the same level of self-preservation.

“This isn’t a game, kid. There’s a war coming and you don’t want to be on the wrong side of it.”

E.T. actually had the nerve to roll his eyes. “You sound like Mom. There’s always the end of the world looming. Since we’re tap dancing on a constant landmine, why can’t I have fun before the Malachai or whatever destroys us?”

Thorn wasn’t having any of it. “Fun comes after you grow up and stop acting like a baby. Go home, E. Don’t make me have to spank you in public.”

The look in E.T.’s eyes said that he was tempted to push his father to that point.

Simi understood. She’d been known to press her luck with akri a lot more than she should. Although, compared to akri sons with akra-Tory …

The Simi was a delight for her akri. Bas and Terry had been making akri crazy since they hit their teens and turned all lippy with their daddy.

Kind of like E.T. and Thorny. Only worse ’cause Bas and Terry knew their grandmother would protect them from akri no matter how mad they made him. Akra-Polly had become exceptionally protective of her grandboys.

Even over akri.

It was funny sometimes. Scary most times.

“You two can’t run my life. I’m grown!” E.T. looked at Simi as if he knew she understood his frustrations.

And she did. “I have the same argument with my akri, too. It okay, E. Growing up is hard and there were times when the Simi hated it all.” She still had her issues with it, but she was getting more accustomed to being an adult … ish.

Thorn sighed heavily. “No one is trying to run your life. We’re trying to keep you from ruining. And keep you safe.”

“No one is going to mess with me. Not given who I’m related to.”

Simi widened her eyes. “Oh, that’s not true, E. Trust the Simi. There are lots of beings out there who will mess with you exactly ’cause who you related to. Even the Simi gets messed with ’cause of akri and everyone knows akri would eat the head of anyone who hurt his Simi.”

E.T. rolled his eyes again. “It’s not the same thing. I want my place in this world.”

Thorn scoffed. “And you think hanging with demons and acting like a two-year-old is going to give you that place?”

“At least they were planning to show me how to use my powers.”

Thorn winced at those words. “Once you open that door, boy, you can never close it again.”

“I want to open it. I’ve been begging to open it and none of you will help me.”

Simi shook her head at his insistence. She knew what Thorn was trying to make him understand. But the boy wasn’t getting it. “E … powers are like taking that first bite of chocolate. Before you understand the nummy, you think you want it. But then you find out that chocolate is really, really good. Then you start to crave it and if you eat too much, it’ll make you sick. Might even kill you.”

He scowled at her. “What?”

“Don’t eat the chocolate,” Thorn said, slowly enunciating each word.

E.T. turned toward his father, “Whatever. I’m going home. But this isn’t over.”

Thorn moved closer to Simi as E.T. headed for the exit. “Should I follow him?”

She shook her head. “It’ll just make him madder.”

“Everything I do makes him angrier, Sim. I wish his mother had never told him I was his father. It was a mistake. All it’s done is make him furious at both of us. And seek out things he shouldn’t.”

Simi shook her head. “He loves you. The Simi feels his heart. He just doesn’t know what he is. You remember that confused feeling, don’t you?”

Thorn went quiet as he considered Simi’s question. He did remember that lost feeling of everything being ripped out from under him. Of the world not making sense because he wasn’t who and what he’d thought.

It was why he’d wanted Karma to keep Ian’s birth a secret from their son. Now that the boy knew, he was angry and bitter. Accusatory.

And he couldn’t blame him. He should have been more active in his life. But how could he?

Had he played Daddy Dearest, others would have grown suspicious and figured out why. Then both E.T. and Karma would have been targets for his enemies.

It was the same reason he couldn’t spend much time with his grandchildren.

No one needed to know he had any weaknesses.

“It’ll be okay, akri-Thorny.” Simi patted him gently on the back.

“I hope you’re right.” Because if they didn’t get E.T. to calm down, there was no telling how much harm the boy could do.