Lasting Fury (Hexing House Book 2) (10 page)

Thea had quickly altered her plan from getting Philip’s laptop and getting out, to questioning him thoroughly. Now that he’d seen her, what was the point of asking Cora to squeeze secrets out of his computer, when Thea might be able to squeeze those same secrets out of Philip’s flesh right then and there?

After all, he might resist. Things might get ugly.

She might be forced to hurt him.

The brief fight had gotten her keyed up, and she could feel something that wasn’t quite wrath roiling around inside her.

Bloodthirst.

Thea had the gun, and once or twice she made a show of pointing it at Marigold, but it wasn’t really necessary. Marigold was a mess of snot and running makeup, shaking and crying over the still-unconscious Philip, wondering if he was dead. For a woman who apparently got off on violence and blood, it was quite a dramatic performance.

Thea’s first order of business was ordering Marigold to put some sweatpants on Philip, and a robe on herself. Not surprisingly, Marigold owned a pair of handcuffs. Thea had her put these on Philip, too, and supplemented them with scarves tying his ankles and the tips of his wings, all before Philip came around.

But what to do with Marigold? Thea could threaten to hurt her, as a way of trying to get Philip to talk. But given that he’d been hurting her himself half an hour ago, Thea wasn’t sure seeing Marigold suffer would be much motivation for him.

Finally she settled on tying Marigold up on the couch beside her boyfriend, and threatening to gag her as well, if she couldn’t get a hold of herself. Luckily, the combination of stress and vodka tonics seemed to have done their work, and it wasn’t long before Marigold sat heavy-lidded, sniffling but otherwise silent.

Things got loud again when Philip woke up.

When his words were intelligible at all among the cries and groans, he seemed to be begging for ice for his balls. Thea decided she could leverage that, and got a bag of frozen peas from Marigold’s freezer.

“Bet this would help, huh?” she asked.

Philip’s glare was made less effective by a whimper.

He didn’t so much as glance in Marigold’s direction to see if she was okay, although Thea supposed he might have while she was in the kitchen. Threatening the girlfriend still might prove useful.

But threatening the balls was almost certainly a better call.

“So, we can go two ways with this,” Thea said. “I can give you the peas, which in my experience make an excellent ice pack.”

“Or?” Philip asked.

“Or, I can pick up that statue and whack you with it again. Not too hard—I don’t want you to keep fainting like a little girl. But hard enough to hurt. Which would probably only take a tap at this point, come to think of it.”

He stared at her. “What the fuck happened to you?”

“I got hard,” Thea said. “Isn’t that what everyone kept telling me to do? You, on the other hand, won’t have that opportunity ever again, unless I get answers to my questions.”

“I won’t tell you anything that could get me in trouble,” Philip said. “It’s not worth having Maggie take my wings.”

Thea nodded. “Fair enough. We wouldn’t want to upset
Maggie
, would we?”

She flicked out a wing and smacked him in the thigh, dangerously close to the source of his pain.

Philip flinched and writhed on the couch. “What do you want to know?”

Somewhere in her mind and heart, some part of Thea—the human part, maybe—was aware of what she was doing, and was sickened by it. But that part of her was too weak, now, to stop the rest.

That part was always too weak.

“That’s a good boy,” she said, and took a step back.

Philip swallowed and tried to get himself under control. To his credit, he managed to blink away tears, and his voice was relatively calm when he spoke again. “Be reasonable, and I’ll be reasonable, too. Let’s just see if we can work this out, okay?”

“Okay. Why Hemlock Heights?”

He blinked at her. “
That’s
what you came here to find out?”

“Among other things.”

Philip shrugged. “Random. Had a lot of the demographics we liked. It was far enough away from the nearest response units for the hex to be passing by the time help arrived, and close enough to you that you might get blamed for it.” He paused for a few deep breaths, still clearly trying to work through the pain. “Especially if we encouraged that blame a little bit.”

Thea raised a wing. Philip tensed. He didn’t cry out, only held his breath, waiting.

She didn’t like that. She wanted him to cry out. She told herself that was only because it was necessary that he be afraid, that it would make his questioning more efficient.

She struck him. He squealed like a young pig.

Beside him, Marigold began to wail and cry. Thea hit her too, right across the face. Her talon opened a gash in Marigold’s cheek.

What the hell am I doing?

With an effort, Thea took another step back and lowered her wings. She was dangerously close to losing control.

Or maybe she already had. She wasn’t sure she cared anymore.

Bloodthirst.

“Wrong answer, Philip,” Thea said. “Let’s try that again. Why Hemlock Heights? Why Boyd Lexington’s neighborhood?” She smiled at the surprise he tried, too late and too clumsily, to hide.

“Didn’t think I’d find out about Boyd?” she asked. “Really? I’m an
Investigator
, Philip. And I was top of my class during transformation training, surely you haven’t forgotten that.” Thea shrugged. “But you never thought of me as anything but a stupid slut. Big mistake.” She raised both wings, ready to lash out.

Philip struggled to free his own wings, but Thea had made sure her knots were secure. He’d have to break a talon off—if not two—to get loose. And even if he managed it, she had the gun. She held it up in a silent reminder.

She saw it in his eyes, the moment he gave up. Thea tossed the peas—very gently—into his lap as Philip began to speak.

“Hemlock Heights had to be neutralized,” he said, then sighed with relief as the makeshift ice pack began to do its work. “Thank you.”

“Why did it have to be neutralized?” Thea asked. “Were you guys using it as a lab? Doing experiments there regularly?”

“No,” Philip said, both a frown and a slight smile on his face. “That’s what you think?” Then he shrugged. “Yeah, I guess I can see how you would.”

“Evidence suggests that the residents there were exposed to the superhex before the day of the demonstration,” Thea said. “Probably more than once.”

“Only Boyd,” said Philip. “When he was at the lab. The real lab, the same one you were at. But that was enough. Boyd was out of control.”

“In what way?” Thea asked.

Philip started to answer, then stopped and grinned at her suddenly. “You seemed to enjoy all that.” He nodded at Marigold, still crying beside him. “Hurting us. Were you always so kinky, or is this a recent thing?”

“Answer the question,” Thea said.

“I
am
answering it.” Philip leaned forward, winced at the pain, then repositioned himself, wriggling until the bag of peas settled into the proper spot. “Maybe he was out of control in the same way you are.”

Thea’s blood ran cold, and for the first time since she came through Marigold’s window, she was afraid. She couldn’t afford to let it show, even a little. Giving Philip any advantage would be a mistake.

And that’s all he’s trying to do
, she warned herself.
Gain an advantage. Mess with your head. Don’t let him.

He smiled again, a nasty, predatory smile. “Are you feeling out of control, Thea? Maybe just a little bit?”

“A little bit,” Thea agreed with what she hoped was a bored nod. “Like maybe I’m going to start torturing you two if you don’t get to the point.”

“Maybe you should take off the amulet,” Philip said. “Let me have a look at you.”

Without any warning—even for herself—Thea struck Philip again. The bag broke and peas flew everywhere. Philip’s face went gray. Then he passed out again.

Marigold cried herself sick. Without untying her or even helping her clean up her face, Thea tossed the girl onto her bed, and closed the bedroom door. Then she sat back down in the living room, gun in her lap, and waited Philip out.

“You were saying?” she asked when his eyes opened again.

It seemed harder for him to talk now. Thea wondered whether she’d done any permanent damage. But it was too late to start caring. And she’d gone too far—let herself go too far—to pretend she regretted it.

“The Ninth Disorder,” Philip said in a weak voice.

“What is that?” Thea asked.

“Named after Hex Nine,” he said. “That was the iteration that caused almost all of the cases, although I think Hex Eight was responsible for a couple of them.” He seemed to get distracted, staring into the middle distance.

“Philip!” Thea clapped her hands.

He blinked at her. “Thea. I remember you. I hate you.”

She had gone too far, after all. He was half-delirious. She would have to be patient. Not for his sake, but for the sake of her answers. Thea took a deep breath to calm herself, then said as matter-of-factly as she could, “Do you remember that I’m the one who caused all the pain you’re in right now? Because I’ll cause more if I have to. But I’d rather not.”

Fear passed over Philip’s face, then his eyes went almost blank. “What were we talking about?”

“The Ninth Disorder.”

“Right. They thought they caught them all. The cases of it, I mean. Before the lab broke up. But they didn’t know about Boyd.”

He seemed like he might be losing consciousness again. “Philip.” Thea tapped his cheek with a wing—gently this time.

“What didn’t they know about Boyd?” she asked.

“That he’d contracted the Ninth Disorder,” Philip said. “Aren’t you listening?”

“Tell me about the Ninth Disorder,” Thea said. “What is it?”

“Did you really think it would be consequence free?” Philip asked.

“What would?”

“The
hex
,” Philip said. “Try to keep up.”

Even when he was out of it, he was an asshole.

Philip shook his head. “You think you can just toss around a hex that powerful, that uncontrolled, over and over and over again, and it’ll just go away? That it won’t leave something behind?”

“So this Ninth Disorder is like, what, some kind of residue?” Thea asked. “A side effect of being exposed to the superhex?”

Philip shook his head again. “Not a side effect. A
disease
.”

Thea’s stomach twisted.

No. He’s lying. He has to be.

Langdon said there were no sin diseases.

But Langdon hasn’t had a chance to study the superhex. He hasn’t spent time with it the way Philip has.

The way I have.

“Only a small percentage of people exposed to the hex got it,” Philip went on. “And then they developed this thing they gave everyone. Kind of like a vaccine, I guess, except you inflicted it more like a hex. But that only worked if you didn’t have it yet.”

Thea found her voice again. “And what if you did have it?”

“They never found a way to counteract it. They eliminated it by more brutal measures.”

“Meaning they killed everyone who had it, or seemed like they might have it.”

“Everybody but Boyd. He would have been the first case, I guess. At least, they didn’t find out about it until he was already gone. Guess nobody thought of him.”

“So why not just kill him a simpler way?” Thea asked. “Arrange a car accident, a fake robbery? Something you could be more certain would end with his death, for one thing? Plenty of people survived what happened at Hemlock Heights.”

And plenty of people didn’t.

Philip started to say something, but it came out as gibberish. His eyes were closing again.

It didn’t matter. Thea had already answered her own questions. Or rather, Talbott Lexington and his Aunt Laurel had answered them for her.