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John glanced at the silent blond female who sat on Phury’s other side. Boy, the Chosen was beautiful…beautiful in the ethereal way of angels, with an unearthly glow emanating from her. But she wasn’t happy. She picked at her food and kept her eyes down.

Well, except for when she glanced at Phury. Which was usually when he spoke to or looked at Bella.

Wrath’s voice was hard from the head of the table. “The Directrix has to die.”

Phury cleared his throat as he took the butter plate back from Bella. “You can consider that…taken care of, my lord.”

Holy shit. Had Phury—

“Good.” Wrath nodded as if understanding perfectly and approving. “Who’s going to replace her?”

“The Scribe Virgin asked who I wanted in the role. But I don’t know any—”

“Amalya,” the blond Chosen said.

All heads turned in her direction.

“I’m sorry?” Phury asked. “What did you say?”

As she spoke, the Chosen’s voice was lovely in the manner of wind chimes, sweet and melodic. “If it would not offend, may I suggest the Chosen Amalya? She is warm and kind and of appropriate seniority.”

Phury’s yellow eyes went over the female, but his face was reserved, as if he wasn’t sure what to say or do with her. “Then that’s who I want. Thank you.”

Her eyes lifted to his for a moment, a flush running pink in her cheeks. But then Phury looked away and so did she.

“All of us are taking the night off,” Wrath said abruptly. “We need some regroup time.”

Rhage snorted from across the table. “You’re not going to make us play Monopoly again, are you?”

“Yup.” A collective groan rose up from the Brotherhood, one that Wrath ignored. “Right after dinner.”

“I have something I have to do,” V said. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

“Fine, but you can’t be the shoe or the dog then. They always go first.”

“I can live with that.”

Fritz came in with a massive baked Alaska. “Dessert, perhaps?” the doggen said with a smile.

As a universal, “Yes, please,” filled the room, John folded his napkin and asked to be excused. When Beth nodded, he took off, heading for the tunnel under the grand staircase. The walk to the training center didn’t take long, especially as his gait was evening out and he was becoming more comfortable with his body.

When he came out into Tohr’s office, he braced himself as he looked around. The place really hadn’t changed since the Brother’s disappearance. Except for the fact that the ugly-ass green chair was now in Wrath’s study, everything was pretty much the same.

John went behind the desk and sat down. Strung across the thing were papers and files, some marked with Post-it notes on which Z had written things in his deliberate way.

John put his hands on the office chair’s arms, running them back and forth.

He hated the way he felt right now.

He hated that he was pissed off that V got Jane back, whereas Tohr had lost Wellsie forever. Except it wasn’t fair. And not just to Tohr. John would have liked a ghost of Wellsie in his life. He would have liked the only mother he’d ever known to be around.

Except Vishous was the one who’d gotten the boon.

And so had Rhage. With Mary.

What the fuck made them so special?

He put his head in his hands, feeling like the worst kind of person. To begrudge someone happiness and luck was a horrible thing to do, especially if you loved them. But it was so damn hard to miss Tohr so badly and mourn Wellsie and—

“Hey.”

John looked up. Z was standing in the office, though God only knew how he’d managed to make no noise coming through the closet.

“What’s on your mind, John?”

Nothing.

“You want to try that again?”

John shook his head and glanced down. Idly he noticed that Lash’s folder was on the top of a pile, and he thought of the guy. Man, the two of them were on a collision course. The only open issue was timing.

“You know,” Z said, “I used to wonder why me and not Phury.”

John looked up with a frown.

“Yeah, wondered why I was the one who got taken and ended up where I did. I wasn’t the only one.