“Basha,” he greeted with a condescending smile, and anger whipped up through her like a snake.
“I don’t answer to that name, Abaddon, and well you know it. My name is Divine and has been for a good century. You should be used to it by now.”
“You can call yourself what you like, but in your heart you will always be Basha,” Abaddon said with a shrug.
That just made her furious, perhaps because in her heart she knew it was true. She could give herself any name she wished, but would always be Basha, daughter of Felix and Tisiphone, granddaughter of Alexandria and Ramses, and niece of the great and powerful Lucian Argeneau, a man she used to adore but had learned to fear. In her heart, she was still Basha, but she was trying hard not to be, and loathed that the young woman she’d been so long ago still clung to the woman she’d become.
Knowing he could and probably was reading her thoughts, Divine shifted her attention to the room she was in to clear her thoughts. She noted the torn, old-fashioned wallpaper and scarred hardwood floors. There were holes in the walls and a large one in the floor as well, telling her where she was—the derelict building on the edge of town that her son had settled in for his brief stay in California.
“I don’t know why you choose to live in such horrible places, Damian,” she said unhappily.
“Where should he live?” Abaddon asked dryly. “Should he run away? Join the carnival like you?”
“I didn’t run away,” she snapped.
“Basha, my sweet, you’ve been running from yourself since—”
“Get out of here, Abby,” Damian interrupted. “You’re just upsetting her.”
Abaddon hesitated, but then nodded obsequiously. “As you wish.”
“I don’t know why you allow him in your life,” Divine growled as she watched the man leave.
“He has his uses,” Damian said mildly.
“He’s an animal like his master was before him,” Divine snapped, and then turned to her son and said with frustration, “It took me ten years to get us away from that man and remove his influence from your life, and then when you turned eighteen and set out on your own, you just welcomed him back in like a long-lost uncle.”
“Do you really want to argue about this again? Now?” Damian asked.
Sighing, Divine shook her head and closed her eyes briefly. She’d given up arguing about Abaddon two and a half millennia ago . . . after more than two hundred years of useless attempts to get Damian away from the man, she’d acknowledged that it was his life, he could do what he wanted with it, and have who he wanted in it. That was also when she’d started spending less time around her son, leading her own life and leaving him to lead his.
“I don’t want to argue, Damian,” she said finally, “But he—”
“Saved your life,” he interrupted, and then added chidingly, “Again. Surely you can cut him some slack?”
“He saved my life?” Divine asked with a frown, now trying to sort through her memories to find how she’d got here. She remembered coming back from town, dropping off Marco by the bunkhouses, returning to her RV intending to put the motorcycle away and . . . she’d heard a noise from inside the RV, Divine recalled. She’d gone in to investigate and— She raised a hand to feel her head as she recalled the pain crashing through it.
“Abby was concerned about this business of Lucian sending out spies to look for you.”
Divine blinked her memories away and peered at her son when he said that. She’d found that out on her last visit here, the day before. Divine had been surprised to learn on arriving in town with the carnival that Damian was in the area. Even more surprising was that he’d wanted to see her. While they’d been close when he was a boy, he’d grown distant as he aged and she rarely saw him anymore . . . unless he needed something. This time he’d wanted to see her to warn her. Damian had got wind that her uncle Lucian wasn’t only looking for him, he had sent spies out to look for her as well. It seemed he’d somehow learned that she lived. Their guess was that Damian’s son Ernie had revealed it when he was caught and dragged up in front of the Council.
The little fool, Divine thought on a sigh. She’d raised Ernie for Damian, at least for the first five years. The immortal boy had been a sweet child, but somehow had grown into a weak and sometimes foolish adult. He’d always seemed to be trying to prove something to his father, and had apparently gone north to Canada with some harebrained scheme of performing some “derring-do” to earn his father’s respect.
The little idiot had gone about it all wrong though. He’d kidnapped someone connected to the Argeneau family, Lord knew for what purpose, and then he’d got himself caught and executed for his efforts. If anything, Ernie had only made matters worse. Lucian had begun searching for her son in earnest then . . . as well as for her. Knowing that, Divine had suspected Marco might be a spy, but hadn’t had a chance to find out for certain or do anything about it.
“Abby was worried about you all alone at the carnival, so he sent a couple of the boys to check on you and make sure you were okay,” Damian continued, capturing her attention again. “They found you unconscious in your RV, with a head wound, and brought you back here. You’re at the house.”
Divine just nodded. She’d already worked out where she was and the knowledge was depressing. She loathed that her child had to live like this, always moving, always hiding, trying to evade her family. They both did, but she at least had the carnival and her RV. Damian refused to settle into such an existence and preferred avoiding mortals and immortals alike altogether, making do with abandoned houses and derelict buildings. He didn’t have a real home and never had, really. They had always been running . . . because of her damned family.
“Abby has some suspicions about who knocked you out.”
Divine glanced to him. “He does?”
Damian nodded. “One of Lucian’s spies is working at your carnival.”
“What?” she asked with surprise, and then her eyes widened as his mentioning the carnival recalled her to her responsibilities. Sitting up, she swung her legs off the bed. “What time is it? How long have I been here?”
“Mother, lay down. You took a bad blow to the head. A little rest—”
“I’m healed,” Divine muttered, and glanced at her wristwatch. Dear God, it was almost noon. The carnival would be opening soon and she would be expected to be there. Saturdays they opened at 10 A.M., but weekdays and Sundays they didn’t open until noon. It was too slow to bother before that on those days. But even when they didn’t open until noon, they were up early, cleaning up from the night before and checking that everything was in working order and ready for the busy day ahead. She’d missed helping with that, but absolutely could not miss opening. “I have to get back.”
“Mother,” Damian said with exasperation as she stood up and peered down at her bloodstained blouse. She looked like she should be working the Haunted House ride rather than her own fortune-telling gig.
“How is your head?” he asked, catching her arm and drawing her attention away from her stained top.
“I’m fine,” she assured him. “I heal quickly, we all do, and I have to get back. We open at noon.”
“Yes, but I don’t think you should go back,” he protested. “You aren’t safe there. One of Lucian’s spies has joined your carnival. He must suspect you and we think he’s the one who hurt you. If the boys hadn’t found you . . .”
Divine paused to stare at him as his words sparked a memory in her head. When the boys said she was cavorting with that Argeneau spy I had to order them to bring her in. The words played through her head in what she thought was Abaddon’s voice.
“You see you can’t go back there, don’t you?” Damian asked.