Page 3 of Unleash Hades (Ungoverned Spaces #5)

Hugo

Strathlachlan, Scotland

M erde. Scottish food was derived from the lowest circle of Hell.

I cut off a small piece of the dinner they placed in front of me and took a sniff before I let it touch my tongue.

“For a man who eats fatty duck liver as a delicacy, you’re awfully picky about your food,” Alastair said with a small grin.

The half-Irish, half-English mafia prince was the elated father of newborn twins. His wife and children were banished from the United States when a Mafia war brewed. Now they were in exile, of a sort, on the Caledonia Security Estates.

Alastair was happy to be far from his father-in-law. His wife was not.

The Tudor building was designed like pods, with several suites at the owner’s disposal. It was a holdover from the olden days when the King and other nobles would visit each other’s homes with their family to pass their otherwise useless and mundane lives.

The founder of Caledonia Security was a baron, with a lineage going back to Charlemagne. He had a pedigree that led to the crown of England three times over, high enough to be named in the line succession, but not so high that anyone knew who he was.

Still, his cooking staff were a fucking embarrassment.

The only thing that appealed to me was the pomegranate loaf that they placed right in front of me. The only thing I ate willingly.

Alastair’s wife, Rose, smirked. “Come on, it’s not that bad.”

Her Filipino accent was a refreshing change from the British I was surrounded by.

What’s bad was that I was away from my screens right now. I should be watching her. But instead, they insisted I take a break for a warm meal.

I’d rather eat my protein powder.

I wrinkled my nose at the meat-goo I was supposed to consume. It was covered in something I would generously call gravy, though it did not merit the name.

“Before the Frenchie puts us off our dinner,” Alastair placed his fork down, and stared at his wife with a fond smile on his lips. “What do you say to a stroll with the little ones this evening?”

Rose’s face fell. Her deep tanned skin had been paler recently since they had whelped their twins. Her thin eyes were dragged down by heavy bags, and her fingers trembled with exhaustion.

“I… I don’t think that’s a good idea. I’ll need to start getting them bathed and ready for sleep.” She looked away, past the door, as if she could see right down the hall and into the nursery.

A listening device stood beside them. It was nothing more than a radio we used for work that came with infrared cameras and one-way sound. Now it doubled as baby monitors for the recent boon of children my business partners were dragging into this house.

Callum and Lea also had twins. Which meant that there were four sets of diapers in need of changing at any given moment.

I learned, as I was forced to change one during an evening of surveillance through CCTVs, that babies have different colored shits during the course of their development.

Newborns? It comes out yellow, and oddly grainy.

Which wasn’t so bad, even though it was a bit runny.

But toddlers? The smell was odious and could knock out a charging bull elephant.

She also had twins.

Though hers were almost adults now… just a little bit longer. Then she’d be free.

They’d all be free of him. Free of Dick Davenport.

Rose looked away from her husband, her eyes growing tired and distant, as though restraining a lifetime of exhaustion behind her hazel pupils.

Alastair’s face fell, as his affection went unrequited, his hand stroking hers, as if to coax a response. She did not reach for him.

Trouble was brewing, but it was none of my fucking business.

So I kept quiet.

The bitterness in Alastair’s gaze turned to me. A small hint of mirth returned.

“It won’t be long for Pippa and Geordie,” Alastair said, pensively. “When will you be joining us in the family way?”

Rose smiled, a little.

“Seeing anyone, lately?” Alastair placed an elbow on the table and rested his chin in his palm.

I said nothing and waited it out, letting him get it out of his system.

“Hugo, I know that you care for her, but you haven’t spoken in years…” Alastair began.

This conversation came around like clockwork. Was it his turn to give me the lecture? It must be. Last month it was Geordie that talked to me. Before that, Callum… Yup. It was his turn to check the box. It was almost like maintenance at this point.

“We spoke at Philippa and Geordie’s wedding.” I clenched my fist. He had known that. The news of my last encounter had spread like wildfire.

My vision clouded, as I started to see red.

Less than six months ago, we had been at Geordie’s Venetian wedding. She had been there, dragged by her prison guard, Richard the Dick, who wanted to talk about some proprietary security tech we’d secured the patents for. Dick wanted to get his hands on it… over my dead body.

But Calissandra… in a quiet moment away from her “husband”, she had kissed me.

She begged me to keep her family safe, and I gave her my word without hesitation.

The news of that kiss spread like a fungus on the estate. I had hoped it would stop these habitual lectures, but apparently not

“You've spoken once in over ten years,” Alastair corrected himself without missing a beat. “There’s no reason to believe that she and her husband aren’t a perfectly happy couple that might have an… open marriage.”

He bit out the words as if they were poison. He reached out and gripped his wife’s hand, making it clear that this openness would not be in the cards for them.

He was a possessive fool and would never agree to such a thing.

Neither would a controlling bastard like Dick. I refused to call him her husband. He didn’t deserve the title.

“No!” My fist slammed on the table, sending the plates and glassware rattling. The clatter was replaced by a deafening silence as I breathed through my nose, trying to calm the racing anger that simmered in my chest.

I would not say something I would regret.

“She speaks to me all the time.” I glared at my friend, and visualized punching him in the throat. “All the time,” I said again with extra emphasis. “You know that.”

They all knew. At first, I had celebrated every message from the screen - each time she used my call sign or said something that only I would understand.

The coded messages in her broadcasts, over the screens that I had learned to adore.

I had stored every hint in my memory like a treasure that I had to safeguard.

“You think she speaks to you,” Alastair said slowly, the words cutting deep into my chest. “You must understand how that looks. Secret messages while she’s on television? Really? It sounds…”

Mad. It sounds mad.

I clenched my jaw, feeling the muscle tick.

“I don’t care how it sounds.” My top lip curled, ready to bite his head off. “I know she is speaking to me.”

I took a forkful of the minced meat on my plate and placed it in my mouth.

The taste of it overwhelmed my tongue - pepper, thyme, a bit of lemon and meat that was oversaturated with flavors that did not complement one another.

And the texture? Abysmal. I didn’t even care to know what the hell it was. It was horrible.

But the bitter taste of it in my mouth was better than the words I could not say… should not say.

“I’m concerned,” Alastair finally said, with a small sigh. “You sound like a stalker. And I…”

“I am a stalker.” I admit it freely. I watched every broadcast, every message, and… more.

My evening recreation was my own closely guarded secret.

“Leave him alone,” Rose whispered. “If only all women felt so loved…”

I could have kissed her on the cheek in that moment. I didn’t because my dear friend was a possessive son of a bitch who would stick a fork in my jugular.

Alastair turned his head like an owl, his eyes narrowing at the hidden meaning. Love had made my friend blind to what was right in front of him…

“What business is it of anyone’s?” I finally asked, feeling the tension in the air dissipate with Rose’s intervention. “After all, I pay for the services. I use my own salary to ensure that she is protected.”

That’s why I’m so poor. Why I sleep at free lodgings provided, and dress like a Parisian bum.

I used my vacation days and free time to secure Calissandra. If I couldn’t, I sent a colleague, and I paid them the standard rate for their time.

“It’s not the money,” Alastair said. “I’m concerned about a friend.”

The touchy-feely Brit was a sentimentalist. The man was more heart than brain, which is why he fell in love so fast, and so deep. But he still could see nothing.

“You don’t have to care about me.” I jutted my chin up.

“Save your feelings for her,” I nodded to the dark-haired beauty beside him.

“For your wife, and your…” I shuddered, remembering the number of people in the house who shit their pants.

The number was more than zero, which was far too many. “Your germ-riddled little… spawns. ”

Alastair looked like he would punch me in the nose. He had taken to fatherhood like a fish to water.

But kids ruin everything.

Children were why I could not be with Calissandra. Children were why Alastair’s wife looked like she was on the brink of death and sorrow. Children were why he was blind to it all.

Rose reached out to the water jug at the center of the table, her elbow knocking her cutlery along the way.

Her knife and fork fell to the floor with a clang. The ringing of the metal objects danced in the air, sounding like a bell, announcing the approach of something bad.

“Oh, for fuck’s sake,” Alastair pinched the bridge of his nose.

“Shit.” Rose covered her face.

“It’s not a big deal, I’ll go get you a clean one from the kitchen.” I rolled my eyes at their extreme reaction.

“It’s not that.” Alastair looked up at the ceiling. “It’s not the damn utensils… it’s… something she and her cousin are cursed with.”

I might believe in fate, but I do not believe in curses.

What the hell was he on about?