Oblivion

Appetite slaughtered, I pushed the rest of my turkey sandwich and the plate away from me.

Dee had barely touched her sandwich, and I knew without even going upstairs and checking that the food for Dawson was still where I’d left it, sitting on the desk in his bedroom.

Sitting back from the table, Dee lifted her gaze to mine. “Kat…she tried to talk to me when I left her house earlier.”

My gut fisted.

“I’m not ready to go there with her,” she continued as she picked at the edge of her sandwich. “I don’t know if I’ll ever be ready to do it.”

“You will be.”

Dee shook her head slowly. “I don’t know, Daemon.”

I sat forward, resting my elbows on the table. “You’ve forgiven me, haven’t you?”

Anger tightened the lines around her mouth, and I thought that might not have been a wise statement. “I haven’t really forgiven you. Let’s be clear about that. You lied to me, and you let Blake go.”

So not touching the whole Blake issue right now. “But you’re talking to me.”

“You’re my brother. I have to talk to you.” Her eyes rolled as she crossed her arms. “And you didn’t kill Adam.”

“Neither did Kat.”

Her lips thi

“Kat never wanted that to happen, and you know that, Dee. You think she doesn’t feel guilty about what happened?” Bitter anger turned the turkey sour. “You think it’s not eating away at her? She didn’t tell you the truth because she didn’t want you to be involved, and she tried to get you two to leave her house. Both of you made that choice to go in there, and you know if Adam was here today, he would do the same thing again.” I paused as Dee looked away. “And so would you.”

Pushing away from the chair, I stood and grabbed our plates. “Right now, we all need to be unified. We need to stick together, because we have no idea what is going to happen next, but we know something is.”

I dumped the leftovers in the trash and then stalked out of the room, stopping just outside the doorway. “I’ll be back later.”

In other words, don’t leave. Keep an eye on Dawson.

Heading outside in the frosty, snow-scented air, because I needed to patrol, my senses sharpened when I felt the warm tingle along the back of my neck. I looked next door and stopped moving. Maybe even stopped breathing a little.

There was a snowman in front of Kat’s house, a lopsided snowman with no arms or face that hadn’t been there when I’d left earlier. Beside it, Kat sat in the snow, her back to my house.

A small smile pulled at my lips as the anger eased away. Mindful of the huge icicles hanging off the roof of the porch, I walked down the steps and over to her, my footfalls cushioned by the thick layers of snow. Kat appeared unaware of me, which was pretty amazing considering the bond between us.

“Kitten, what are you doing?”

She jumped a little and then twisted around. “I was making a snowman.”

I glanced at it. “I see. It’s missing some stuff.”

“Yeah,” she said morosely.

The small smile faded. “That doesn’t tell me why you’re sitting in the snow. Your jeans have to be soaked.” I thought about that for a moment, and then I gri

Kat laughed.

Loving the sound of it, I dropped down into the snow beside her, crossing my legs. A few moments of silence passed between us and then I leaned over, knocking my shoulder against hers. “What are you really doing out here?”

“What’s going on with Dawson? Has he run off yet?”

Her avoiding my questions was as subtle as a dump truck at six in the morning, but I let it go. For now. “Not yet, because I followed him around today like a babysitter. I’m thinking about putting a bell on him.”

She laughed softly. “I doubt he’ll appreciate that.”

“I don’t care.” A little bit of anger seeped into my tone. “Ru

“Daemon, do you…”

I waited. “What?”

“Why haven’t they come after Dawson? They have to know he’s here. It would be the first place he’d come back to if he had escaped. And they’ve obviously been watching.” She gestured back at my house. “Why haven’t they come for him? For us?”

I stared at the lopsided, incomplete snowman. “I don’t know. Well, I have my suspicions.”

“What are they?”

“You really want to hear them?

Kat nodded.

“I think they were aware of Will’s plans, knew he was going to arrange for Dawson to be released.” I paused, giving voice to my thoughts. “And they let it happen.”

She drew in a shallow breath as she picked up a handful of snow. “That’s what I think.”

I looked over at her. “But the big question is why.”

“It can’t be good.” She let the snow sift through her gloved fingers. “It’s a trap. Has to be.”

“We’ll be ready,” I said, because there couldn’t be any other option. “Don’t worry, Kat.”

“I’m not worried,” she replied, and we both knew that wasn’t true. “We need to stay ahead of them somehow.”

“True.” I stretched out my legs, ignoring the cold, wet bite of snow. “You know how we stay under the humans’ radar?”

“By pissing them off and alienating yourselves?” She gave me a cheeky grin.

“Ha. Ha. No. We pretend. We constantly pretend like we’re not different, that nothing’s happening.”

“I’m not following.”

I lay down in the snow. “If we pretend like we’ve gotten away with Dawson being released, that we don’t think anything’s suspicious or that we know they’re aware of our abilities, then it may buy us time to figure out what they’re doing.”

She watched me throw my arms out with a tiny grin. “You think they’ll slip up then?”

“Don’t know. I wouldn’t put money on it, but it kind of gives us the edge. It’s the best we have right now.”

Our eyes met, and I gri

“You should try it,” I coaxed, closing my eyes. “It gives you perspective.”

There was a pause, and then I felt her lie down beside me. “So I Googled Daedalus.”

“Yeah?” I continued making the sexiest snow angel known to man. “What did you find out?”

“Well, there was no ‘Welcome to Daedalus: Secret Government Organization’ website to be found.”

“No shit?”

She smacked me with her hand. “Did you know Daedalus is tied to Greek mythology? He was the guy who created the labyrinth the Minotaur lived in and he was the father of Icarus. You know, the kid who flew too close to the sun on wings—wings fashioned by Daedalus.”

“Huh.”

“See, the legend says that when Icarus got too happy from flying, it was a form of passive punishment by the gods, and they caused him to lose his wings, which made him fall from the sky and drown, because, you know, that’s how the Greek gods rolled. They didn’t like that Daedalus had created something that gave mortals godlike abilities like flying.”

“I can basically fly,” I told her, and then gri

“And your arrogance is so vast, it brings me to my next point,” she retorted, and I smirked. “See, Daedalus created things that bettered man. He did so at all costs, just like the government—just like Daedalus we know today. They named themselves after a Greek myth about a man who could give others godlike abilities. Just like this Daedalus. You know they did that on purpose.”

“It wouldn’t surprise me—the ego behind that.”

“You’d know,” she said.

“Hardy har-har.”

Kat gri

I chuckled. “Wait for a couple more seconds.” When I stopped, I reached over and grasped her hand, pulling her up when I stood. I brushed the snow off her back and my hands lingered a bit on her rear, because of reasons.