Free Bittersweet Seraphim by Debra Anastasia Page A

with Violent and Dean in his SUV. That left Jason as Jack’s passenger. Things were awkward around that one, to say the very least. Jack avoided talking to him.
    Jack started the beautiful car and closed his eyes briefly as the engine roared like a hungry tiger. He pulled out behind the SUV and followed, hoping the next scattered memory Violent produced would be more fruitful.
    “We’re not getting any closer to finding Emma.” Jason gave Jack a hard stare.
    Jack maneuvered the car with one hand and lit a cigarette with the other, cracking the window. “I think Violent’s mind is shot. I just don’t have a clue what else to do. I don’t even know what she’s looking for.” He punched the steering wheel. “You remembering anything yet? Because that would be fucking helpful.”
    Jason looked out the passenger window. “You know I’m not. That part of my memory is just…gone.”
    “Well, you have to try harder. I don’t know if anyone even understands how bad it is down there for her. It’s just horrible.”
    “I don’t see how you manage to blame everyone but yourself. If you hadn’t screwed my girlfriend and broken stuff in Heaven, Emma would be fine. Even better? Don’t flop around in Purgatory like a pussy so she has to go up there and convince you to make a choice.” Jason turned fully in his seat to glare at Jack.
    “I didn’t want her to come to see me. I didn’t even believe it was her at first.” Jack was too good at lying not to know when he was doing it to himself.
    “That’s bullshit.” Jason shook his head and sat back. “You whined up there until you got your way.”
    There was only the sound of the sports car’s engine for a nice chunk of time until Jack answered. “If you remembered Emma, you wouldn’t blame me for wanting to keep her.” Jack blinked back his emotion, picturing her golden hair in waves holding the sunlight, her looking at him as if he was her every wish as well. “You should be thankful you don’t.”

    Vittorio knew it was time. The three chosen descendants needed to procreate. He looked around the room. His half-minion army looked limp, to say the least. They had no fire in their bellies once they were satiated on blood. That’s what his group lacked: vision. They had no appreciation of the fact that they were mythical beings with the very world at their fingertips.
    But that would change with their twentieth generation. Twenty was Vittorio’s favorite number. If everything he’d studied, hoped for, and lusted after came to fruition, the offspring of Dean, Jason, and Seriana would be full-blooded minions at last. They each just needed to lie with one of the half-minions among his ranks—he had some very choice partners picked out—and the product of those relationships would be unstoppable.
    His great-grandchildren would find themselves under his command as soon as they opened their eyes. And they’d become the ultimate fighting machines. Vittorio smiled at his daughter, Rebecca. She did not smile back.
    “Daughter, you know it’s time to bring the children back to the herd.”
    Rebecca was chained to the wall in his living room as if she were some sort of decoration. “Father, you’ll never find my children. This dream you have? It’s going to die.”
    Vittorio felt determination burn within him. “Oh, but you see, I’ve the best bait for those children,” he told her with a sneer. “Which one of your three wouldn’t come back to visit their long-dead mother? It’ll be touching—for a few seconds anyway.” He stepped closer to her and various half-breeds scurried out of his way. Rebecca had been chained to the wall for so long, they scarcely acknowledged she was there.
    “I’ll never help you,” she whispered. “You should kill me while you’ve all these assistants. Because make no mistake, I’ll fight for my children’s freedom until my last moment.”
    Rebecca barely existed any more, but the mention of her children started a fire