“I apologize for my son’s irresponsibility while he was supposed to be protecting you. Sometimes I wonder why Sophia insists on him having the job. He should really—”
“Oh, no, please don’t blame him,” I quickly interrupted. “That was totally my fault. Owen’s great at his job—when I let him do it.”
Charlotte eyed me. “Hmm . . . well, I suppose I can understand, if you’re anything like your mother.”
“Worse,” Mom muttered. I tilted my head in question. “Charlotte has been my protector from time to time, and she thinks I’m hard-headed and rebellious.”
“Of course you are! I wouldn’t love you if you weren’t,” Charlotte said with a laugh.
Mom shrugged. “So maybe I am.”
“You think I’m hard-headed and rebellious, worse than you?” I wasn’t sure what I thought about that.
“Of course you are. And I wouldn’t love you if you weren’t,” Tristan said from behind me as he placed his hands on my hips. Mom and Charlotte chuckled.
“Alexis, we will have our hands full with you,” Mom said.
I frowned. Charlotte placed her hands on each side of my face and looked me directly in the eye, an impish gleam in hers.
“These are admirable traits, Alexis. There are dark days ahead, and we’ll need your spunk and spirit. Martin says we all need to be prepared, especially you.” With that cryptic message—there was that name Martin again—she planted a kiss on my forehead. What did she mean by dark days ahead? And why especially me? I didn’t get a chance to ask as she turned away. “I suppose I should let Owen kick me out. I’ll see you soon. We have some catching up to do, Sophia.”
Charlotte held her arm out to Owen, and he took her elbow, pretending to forcefully escort her out of the room. She hooked her boot around the door, pulling it shut behind them.
“She’s a handful herself,” I muttered, and her laugh echoed from another part of the building.
Mom laughed, too. “Yes, she is. But she’s a great friend to me, a powerful warlock, and an excellent addition to the council.”
“She’s on the council?” I asked. She acted as though she hadn’t seen Mom for a long time, but Mom had been at the island for nearly a week. She and Rina returned before us so they could debrief the council on the recent events in the Florida Keys—my Ang’dora, Tristan’s escape, the Daemoni’s attack . . . and everything else.
“She is now. Martin, her husband, took Stefan’s place, but Char is a new addition. She’s been fighting in the Middle East and returned last night,” Mom explained. “Rina will swear her in this morning.”
So Martin was Char’s husband and Owen’s dad, and their family was apparently close to ours. Which made everything I’d already “heard” today much more confusing. This meeting may or may not be a farce, but it seemed as though it would certainly be intense, just as Tristan had predicted. I pressed my hands against my stomach, which twisted and turned with anxiety over Rina’s request.
“We’re ready to begin,” announced a low, booming voice.
Solomon stood at the door, beckoning all of us. I tried not to stare at him, but it was nearly impossible. After all, he was a real, live (or real, dead?) vampire. Now that I knew what to watch for, I realized he did look like a vamp, something I hadn’t noticed the other times I’d seen him. His complexion was an exotic ash color—the vampire paleness of someone who’d originally been dark-skinned. His features were broad and beautiful, his hair in cornrows, the front pulled back into a ponytail, and he had an accent I was sure originated somewhere in the Caribbean. He smiled at us, and his fangs were short, barely longer than a Norman’s eyeteeth, much less threatening than Vanessa’s and the other vampires’ fangs had been.
Solomon wasn’t the first vampire I’d seen in person, but he was the first good one I knew. Yet, as he continued smiling, my stomach tightened more with fear.
Rina joined him at the door, winding her arm with his. Mom stepped behind her, and Tristan and I stood behind Mom. Tristan took my hand as Owen led us through the door and down a short hallway. Seeing Mom alone between Solomon and Rina and Tristan and me made my heart ache for her. She’d given up any chance for a real mate—one who could handle her love and passion—to stay with me in the normal world. She’d had a handful of Norman boyfriends throughout my childhood, but none could give her true companionship. Even if she could have revealed her true identity, they would have never understood . . . and never survived.
We stopped at a doorway as Owen stepped inside and announced the matriarch’s entry. Wood scraped against stone—the sound of people rising to their feet—and then silence reigned. Rina and Solomon led us inside. Pillars lined the long sides of the rectangular room and on the walls at each end hung a large, ornate cross centered between two angels. But not peaceful, praying angels or cute cherubs—these angels brandished swords, daggers, and other weapons, their expressions fierce and their muscles large and defined, as if tensed for a fight.
At the center of the room stood a giant, round, wooden table with throne-like seats surrounding it. In front of all but five chairs stood an Amadis council member, their heads bowed. Rina and Solomon led us to the empty seats. Solomon sat on Rina’s left and Mom on her right. Mom and Tristan indicated I was to sit between them. Owen stood behind me. I felt as though I sat at King Arthur’s Round Table right in the middle of Athena’s temple.
As soon as the five of us took our seats, everyone else sat down, too.
Rina launched the meeting with a prayer, followed by swearing Charlotte in as “the second’s chosen confidante.” I’d gone through the Ang’dora and also had Tristan by my side, so Mom no longer needed to give me her full-time attention and protection. She would become a more permanent fixture on the council and, apparently, had chosen Char to be her personal advisor. Rina then introduced me to the council and Tristan officially as a member of the royal family. As soon as she said this, the room temperature seemed to drop a degree or two while the air thickened. I thought I’d imagined it until—
“Ms. Katerina,” murmured a man across the table from me. Well, not a man. A vampire, with dark, shoulder-length hair swept back from his lovely face, and an accent that rolled the “r” in a way that would make most women’s thighs tense.
“Yes, Armand?”
“Are you sure—”
Rina didn’t let him finish. “I am aware of your feelings. You have made them clear to me. And yes, I am sure. Do not forget we have given you a second chance.”
Armand pursed his lips and stared at the wooden table. Rina had effectively silenced him. The tension remained in the air, however, and I had a feeling Armand wasn’t the only one who had an issue with Tristan and his place at the table or in the family. Whoever I’d heard in the village was definitely one of these people at this table. I scanned the unfamiliar faces until my eyes landed on one I had seen before—the first guy, the blond shifter, who had called Tristan a traitor. His dark eyes narrowed at me for a brief moment. It was time I went to work.
But Rina immediately distracted me when she mentioned a coronation ceremony—as in the official crowning of Tristan and me. In front of a crowd of strangers. My insides squirmed. The conversation didn’t last long, but my stomach still spasmed as Rina moved on to the next subject.