Page 24 of The Clash of the Damned (The Titan Syndicate Saga #2)

Dominic

W ith my fathers death, in the space of one moment, I went from party boy heir, to the leader of an empire and surrogate father.

I don’t have time to grieve or be sad; I have a business to run and people that rely on me.

Not fucking it up means more to me now than it ever did before.

It’s for this reason that I couldn’t ignore her invitation and the underlying threat it involved.

If there is danger on the horizon, I need to know what it could mean to my family. What’s left of it anyway.

“Mr. Hart, it’s wonderful to finally meet you.

” The red head offers her hand in welcome, like we’re colleagues about to conclude a business deal.

I pause, knowing that once I start working with her and accept her offer, there is no undoing it.

I’m betraying everything the empires have ever known.

But, if this keeps my sisters safe, I will find a way to live with it.

I accept her hand, and she motions for me to take the seat opposite her.

“After my father’s passing and the challenges with inheriting my empire, I would have been a fool to ignore your message and potential dangers that come with it, even if I have…

reservations.” Turning to look around the dingy coffee shop to make my point, I add, “Why here though? It seems…odd, considering the nature of our conversation.”

A server brings our coffee, and the redhead smiles at him before she answers. “Let’s discuss those reservations. I’m assuming your father told you about my kind?”

“I found his notes, but he wasn’t specific about your kind, just that there was a fifth.

Your message said there was more to the Supernatural world than we thought we knew?

” I have no idea why I’m spilling our secrets to a practical stranger, but she knows about the Supernatural so that’s enough for me to throw caution to the wind.

She takes a long sip of her coffee. The silence after my question would make most people uncomfortable, but luckily, I’m not most. I’m willing to play her game and wait patiently if that’s what it takes.

As I maintain eye contact with her, I try to ignore the beautiful hue’s of her gray eyes.

“I chose here because there is less chance you will attack me in a public setting.” Alert, I sit up, my hand at my side and magic at the ready to defend myself.

“Put your magic away, Dominic. If you can listen, instead of thinking with your ego, you will find this relationship to be quite beneficial to us both.”

I disperse my magic. “Why should I listen? Or trust you?”

“Trust has got nothing to do with it.” Disbelief colors my face.

In response, her hand moves and glows slightly, magic crackling around us for those that know what it feels like.

I feel my magic draining before she lifts her hand and creates a small flame in it.

“You felt your magic leave. Believe me now?”

“You’re asking me to abandon everything I’ve ever known as our truth and accept the truth of a virtual stranger. Most people wouldn’t be handling this as well as I am.”

“You’re not like most people, Dominic.” She finishes her coffee.

“We have that in common. I’m Supernatural, like you.

Except, I’m a Siphoner; we’re the fifth, the fifth family more specifically.

We were created first, not the Undead, but we were seen as a failed experiment.

Our two families have remained connected, a topic for another day, but I would like to continue that arrangement if you’re willing. ”

My fingers tighten around my mug, the people around us irrelevant as I learn this life changing news. “No, we’re doing this now. If we’re working together, I need to know what I’m getting involved with.”

“Very well.” She tilts her head towards me in respect. “Your family and mine have an arrangement. One I would like to continue after your father’s untimely death. I believe it will benefit us both.”

The shock must show in my face as she continues laying out her terms. “My kind are coming for the rest of the empires. There is no stopping that. While I can’t guarantee all the Sorcerer’s will come out alive, I can help protect your sisters.

How does that sound?” I want to ask if there is another way, but I don’t, since my sisters and their safety is at risk. Resigned, I accept her offer.

Instinct drives me into the office that was once Dad’s and is now mine. I haven’t been able to pack his stuff away yet, and now, as I hunt through his things, I’m relieved there is one less thing to do. I throw his boxes behind me as I look for his notes on the Siphoners.

Except, I can’t find them.

Sloane taking those notes with her before she left is exactly the kind of thing she would do.

Of course she knew about them, even though I hid them from her.

How many hours did she have to search our estate on her own?

And she would have been able to siphon any spells I set.

Even as I try to shake off the ghost of her memory, I can’t help but miss her.

Everything she’s done, from the moment we met to our fake engagement, means I should hate her, but I don’t .

“Dom!” One of the twins shouts as they both storm into the office.

“You don’t want us to go out, but you’re going to this frat boy party?

” Reece motions to my tux. She is always the one to call out double standards, and it’s good to see that the uncertainty for our empire doesn’t change who she is.

Knowing we can remain consistent in times like this is what creates leaders that the Supernaturals want to follow.

Ignoring her, I keep hunting through the boxes to find the black leather journal.

“Yes, I’m still going. Our empire needs representation, especially now. There is less of a chance Sloane will hurt me, and I’m better equipped to defend myself from her if I need to.”

Looking up, I see Reece’s eyes narrow. “You’re lying.”

“I wasn’t referring to magic. I was referring to her feelings for me.”

There was one place that Sloane couldn’t have known about, a loose floor board next to the shelf.

I lift it and breathe a sigh of relief as I find what I’m looking for.

Grabbing the leather bound journal, I flip through the pages, looking for a dated entry I didn’t pay attention to before, but now it feels important as I try to connect everything.

“What are you looking for, Dom? This place looks like a train wreck, and you’re holding that journal like it has all the answers. ”

“Well, I’m hoping it does. These are Dad’s notes on the fifth family.

I didn’t understand what it meant at the time, but now, I think I overlooked something important.

” Stopping at the page in question, I tap it.

“This entry is dated about twelve years ago, and it talks about a female assasination, noted next to the fifth. I think this was Sloane’s mother. ”

Reece grabs the journal and reads the entry out loud.

“The Vance’s came across them in New Orleans during Mardi Gras.

They enacted the automatic assassination order on them, and I tried to warn the fifth, but I was too late.

Helene, the leader, William’s wife, was executed, and they ran.

I believe they had a daughter not much older than my girls, and I need to see if I can find her and make sure she’s okay. A girl needs her mother.”

Reece looks up, tears shining in her eyes, and snaps the journal closed. Remi hugs her sister, and I follow suit. It’s moments like this that remind me why I’ve done all this, and why there is nothing I won’t do to protect them.

“If Sloane ever needed a motive outside of the obvious, we now have one. I would be pissed and on a warpath if someone killed you, Dom. I wouldn’t stop until I murdered them all.” Reece’s chest heaves from the passion of her statement, and Remi tries her best to diffuse the growing tension.

“Aren’t you late for the party, Dom? I still can’t believe the Druids are going through with it, or that you got an invite.

We all know you’re their least favorite person.

” Glaring at my sister until she gets the message, I fix my cufflinks and grab my wallet.

What my sisters don’t understand is that as the head of the empire, things like love are irrelevant.

It’s about power, protection, and longevity.

“Wait! I almost forgot! We didn’t show you what we’ve been working on. I know it’s only been a few hours, but you have to look before you leave.”

Intrigued, I follow the twins back to the living room, and I find Jax’s golden hair bobbing behind a whiteboard.

Next to him is another family pouring over the periodic table and more families reviewing a grimoire.

Walking over to Jax, I hold my hand out in a show of solidarity.

“I know we haven’t always seen eye to eye, especially with what happened at the sit down, but I appreciate you being here. ”

He pauses for a moment before he takes my offered hand.

“I liquidated the fortune teller business; you were right. So I have a lot more free time than usual on my hands, and the twins convinced me I could help here.” I smile at my sisters.

“It doesn’t help that I don’t trust humans right now, even if they come from Ryder.

We have no idea who’s one of the cults and who isn’t.

We’ve never needed to check before this.

Once we’ve dealt with them, we can go back to hating each other if needed.

” This is why I went to him for help after the sitdown in the first place.

“Take a seat, Dom,” Reece instructs, pointing to a dining room chair, while she wheels one of the whiteboards over for show and tell.

Pointing to the first diagram, Reece maps out their work, the same way a school teacher would.

“First, we had to go back to the beginning, The Sorcerer Tome of Origins.” I spot the book laying in the corner, discarded.

“We thought that was our truth, and it clearly isn’t, but it’s still better than knowing nothing.

” She purses her lips as she considers something before resuming her explanation.

“While we debated doing another seance,” she shoots a sharp look at her twin, “we decided that despite our ties to necromancy through our Goddess, we weren’t going to risk her wrath by messing with death again, and some things should still follow the natural order of life. Even if she left this mess for us.”

Remi rolls her eyes at her twin as she takes over the explanation. “The Siphoner’s were the first. So we can assume there were four bloodlines that appealed to her, not three as we were led to believe. Why did the spell not take the first time?”

Remi jumps back into the fray. “When we could come up with no conceivable answer, we turned to the human’s way of comparing data.

Siphoners versus Sorcerers. So similar, yet so different.

We can generate magic on our own, but they can’t and need an outside source, kind of like a lightbulb.

It won’t work on its own, but if attached to electricity, it will.

If you apply plastic or any form of insulation to said lightbulb, it blocks the energy absorption. ”

My mind races as I look over the equation before I complete her sentence. “Sloane is the transformer, and you need to create the magical insulation?” Reece’s face lights up in confirmation.

“We think if we can block magic in one of us, it should work in a Siphoner too, but we don’t have a full proof way to test it. This is the best we’ve got, so we’ve got to make it work.”

They see my face and quickly add, “We promise we’ll be careful. Jax has offered to be our test subject.”

“If it works, call Jude and give her the blocker. Sloane has been controlling her for weeks, and I would like to consider it a peace offering to the Druids.”

“Consider it done,” Jax adds.

“Don’t die, Dom. Life would suck without you.”

Giving a sly smile, I respond, “I don’t plan on it.”