Hidden Scene #7

"We have company." Adrian's heart thudded, but he didn't pull back the full alert order. If it was Conner out there in the darkness, he would expect high security. "How do you want to handle this?" Adrian ignored Kenn's question, searching with his heart. He didn't need magic to nd his children. Angela followed Adrian's turning head and picked up the thoughts of the desperate man on her left. "I'm sorry. Please. I'm here now." Silence. Adrian stiffened as a blast of hatred ew over the table, but didn't avoid it like Angela. He absorbed the rage and pain, and allowed it to coat his heart, where it would fester. He deserved no less.

Kyle and Doug missed it, already moving to join the other Eagles on the perimeter at Adrian's call. Kenn, however, was also struck in the blast. He gripped the table in misery at the sensation, but didn't leave Adrian's left. Angela stood up, moving around the warped table, and the waves of menace immediately stopped. She stared at the furious shadow, easily able to see her own son in that hurt boy. If she'd waited much longer to leave Cincinnati, Charlie might have carried some of this resentment, too. Angela stepped in front of Adrian as Conner moved into their perimeter. Seeing a teenaged kid had the Eagles backing up, hoping this was who Adrian had come for. The sense of things about to go wrong was too clear to miss. Angela's Witch had already come forward. Her eyes roiled in crimson warning. "Those kids will die here. We won't follow you in." It was the only thing she could have said. Conner slowly lowered his hand and his shield, the rippling gold tinged in black. "On the edge of switching sides," the Witch warned. "Proceed with care." Adrian stared at the son he'd forsaken to save his herd. How would he ever x the damage that had been done?

Conner snarled in rage. "You can't, and when my kids are out..." "I won't ght it," Adrian said slowly, mind starting to blur with panic. He was going to lose leadership right here. So long as his son was alive, did the when and where matter? He expected the camp to lynch him anyway upon discovering his secrets. He'd always known Arkansas was the line. Conner would tell them everything. His hatred and pain would allow little else. Angela spun around in denial of Adrian's next thought. "We won't..." Conner lunged by Angela and leapt across the table, knocking Adrian from the seat. "I hate you! I hate you!" They landed hard, with Conner holding a knife to his father's throat. "Where is my mother?!" Adrian had been under a lot of pressure, for a long time. But he didn't have to keep carrying it, did he? Angela was ready now and she certainly didn't love him. His son would never forgive and his herd was about to be taken. Why keep breathing? Adrian opened his mouth. "Dead, I hope." "Ahhhh!" Conner's arm thrust sharply downward. 2

Angela kicked the boy off of Adrian and followed it up with a solid punch that sent pain into her shoulder and him to his knees. When she advanced, Conner scrambled back, but the Witch and Angela were both pissed that he'd gotten by them at all. Unlike Adrian, they had no bond to the boy. Thud! "Stop!" Conner shouted, ducking. Angela took up the nose-breaker stance. Kyle and Kenn rushed forward to grab her before she could hurt him. "Stop." "He's okay." Angela saw Adrian had only a small slice across his shoulder, where the blade had landed when he automatically inched. She was sure he hadn't meant to, but self-preservation was ingrained. Adrian was sitting up, staring at his son in agony, and Angela shrugged free of the hands holding her. Only one thing would give them their leader back. Angela met the eyes of the men around them, the Eagles who understood the choice she had to make. For Kyle, it was the moment that he'd hoped would never come. He stuck to his deal. "Take over the herd."

All of Kyle's team nodded their agreement, and more than half of the others did, too. The hardasses only gaped in shock. Angela asked the Witch, and received the same answer as in her dream. "Brady will be the rst one to die if you cross this line against Adrian. Fate has intricate plans for your idol's downfall." There was no choice. She wouldn't allow Marc to become a sacricenot everand if that meant giving him up, she was strong enough to do it. "I'm going to put Adrian back together, as much as I can. See to the witnesses." Angela didn't say anything else, and no one protested. It was her choice to make. 3 Angela knelt in front of Conner. "Give him a chance to atone." "Never!" "We'll leave your kids if you don't." "Okay." "We'll kill them if you ever expose him." Conner glowered, trapped. Once they were out, he'd planned to shout it to the decayed rooftops. "I'll never forgive. He's right about that." "Can you pretend, to save all those lives?" Conner was too much like his dad to be able to say no. "If you keep him away from me."

"I can do that." Angela held up the keys to the cuffs. "Ready to talk or should I hit you some more rst?" Conner glared, hating them all. "I don't have anything left to blast him with. And you've got my knife." Angela blinked at the quick thinking under pressure. Denitely Adrian's boy. She unlocked the cuffs from around Conner's thin wrists, noticing he didn't inch back from her, even though she'd just delivered a beating. Yep. No doubt. "Go sit at the table and start telling the Eagles whatever they ask you. I'll send him over in a minute, and you two will work something out." Conner stomped toward the tables and Angela shook her head, going to sit by Adrian. What a mess he'd left for a successor to clean up. She didn't want this anyway, but damn! He could have at least warned her. Adrian didn't look away from Conner, but he registered Angela's warm arm coming to rest against his. Even in his misery, the sensation of being skin-to-skin was arousing. Angela leaned closer, letting her wild hair brush his cheek. She rested her head against his big shoulder and stayed there, trying not to enjoy it.

Adrian was being distracted against his will. He wanted her too much to be able to ignore the feel of her, and she knew it. "Mmm..." Angela closed her eyes as he stiffened. The sound was real and so was the guilt. She'd known it would be this way. Adrian felt her hand come down his arm to twine through his, her energy shoving its way eagerly into his cold body. "We'll keep the camp from nding out. It's not time yet." Adrian watched that blinding blue light up their hands. "Marc is like us." Angela frowned. "How so?" Adrian indicated the glowing of their merged lifeforces. "That happened before we left, when you drew from him." "How is that possible?" she demanded, raising her head. "It comes with birth." "When our kind choose a life-mate, sometimes things get shared, passed on." Adrian's inner torment came to the surface. "You'll always love him." "Yes. Perfect match or not, he's mine. I claimed him decades ago." Adrian drew in air. "And you'd give that up to keep me in control."

It wasn't a question, didn't require an answer. Adrian gently pushed her back. "I won't take you this way." He stood up, staring down at her. "Thank you for the loyalty you've shown." Angela couldn't say how relieved she was. "It's my honor to serve on your right. It's where I want to be." "But not at my side." Again, it wasn't a question. Even the faint dreamlike ashes that had come back in South Dakota were gone. She would never be his. Adrian turned to look at the sullen son giving curt answers to Eagle queries. What about Conner? Would they have to exist together under threats and reluctantly made deals? "Yes, for now," Angela afrmed. "Let him observe what he was sacriced for, from inside your Safe Haven. It may help." Angela was counting on that. She'd already sensed enough in Conner to be sure that he held Adrian's values. "Go talk to him, work something out." Adrian looked back at her, dying for any small bit of affection he could glean now. It would never happen again. Angela stood up without fear of what he wanted. Whatever it took to keep Brady safe.

Adrian stayed still as she came to him. He closed his eyes as her hand stroked his jaw. "Would you change your choice?" Adrian wanted to, but the leader couldn't deny his pride. She had to be willing. "Never." Angela leaned forward. "Thank you. Take your reward." Adrian kissed her. And then snapped awake with a horried grunt. The windows of the semi were dripping steam from the heat he'd been putting off, and Adrian rolled a window down, trying to calm his heart. Unlike Angela's live ashes of what was coming, his only revealed themselves through dreams, and the future he'd just seen had to be stopped. He wouldn't break her that way, or allow her to be hurt so badly. The agony he felt when he watched her and Brady together was far better than knowing he'd turned her into himself. Adrian stepped out the semi to nd a sleeping camp. Not quiet, though. The mutters and growls from his men said he wasn't the only one being shown things. Had they all just watched it, been a part of it? Adrian thought that was likely. Adrian turned to make eye-contact with the uneasy guards, then swept the darkness. "Conner?"

Silence. And then a blast of hatred to rival the one from the vision. There were no words in it, only a deep depression and an endless rage. Adrian's terried heart began to ease, despite everything he'd seen and sensed. Conner had survived. Adrian let the happiness of it well up inside, building until he thought he would explode. Then, he sent that feeling out to the lonely, scared child he'd left behind long before the War, lending his strength. Adrian's open magic rippled through the dead city, sweeping over bodies and into dens, where survivors jerked awake in shock at the sensation. It said help had nally come. Refugees began gathering themselves and their thrown-together families, sending word with homemade devices and signals. It was time to leave.