Vicious Minds: Part 3 (Children of Vice 6)

“Nothing,” she whispered, moving to get out of bed when I caught her wrist, pulling her back next to me. She did not meet my gaze.

“Since the auction this morning, you’ve been in a haze. Are you all right?”

She was silent for so long I thought she had forgotten I was here. Slowly she turned to me, her face confused, “I don’t remember the auction.”

“What?”

“I remember getting into the car, arriving, then all of a sudden, I was back.” The frown on her face deepened. And I could see the sweat on her neck. “I think I blacked out. Why would I blackout? Something is wrong. I know myself. I’ve missed something.”

Reaching over, I placed my hand on her forehead. “You have a fever.”

“A fever?” She reached up to touch her pulse and looked over to me, eyes wide. Quickly she broke free from my grasp, rising to go to the foot of the bed. There she lifted the ottoman, digging through it as quickly.

“And what are you doing?”

“I think someone poisoned me!” she snapped angrily, opening a small music box and pulling out a glass vile of some yellow liquid.

“Calliope! It is just a fever!” I hollered when the madwoman drank whatever the hell was in that bottle.

“I…I do not just get blackout fevers.” She gasped before her body started trembling so badly that I rushed over, grabbing her right side to hold her up. “If I vomit red, I’m wrong, if it’s black, I’m right…care to bet?”

“You are insane,” I muttered to her, helping her up. She could speak; instead, she collapsed in my arms. “Calliope!”

Trembling, she turned over, coughing out black blood onto the side of the bed, upon seeing it, smiling, gasping out for air, her hands balled into fists as she spat out curses. “Fucking Melody.”

So, it wasn’t her that was insane.

It was me.

Me for briefly forgetting exactly the type of woman my mother was. Picking up my phone, I dialed one number.

“What is—”

“Get here now!”

3

“Stab the body and it heals,

but injure the heart and the wound lasts a lifetime.”

~ Mineko Iwasaki

ETHAN

“What the fuck did she take?” Wyatt asked, cleaning his hands as he rose from Calliope’s side.

She’d passed out almost immediately after coughing up that black vomit. Now she lay on the bed, shivering, her face so red it looked as if she had broken out into hives from the base of her neck all the way to the top of her head. It was clear she was in pain.

“Since I’m not an expert in poisons and the bottle was not labeled, I don’t know,” I replied, gripping my wrist only to stop myself from putting my hand through the fucking wall. “How is she?”

“Fine, or at least as fine as one could be after being poisoned. A fever is the body's way of fighting off whatever it is that attacked her system. I gave her some general antibiotics, seeing as I don’t know what she took. I’ll know more in the morning,” he whispered, glancing over his shoulders. “And here I thought she was nearly indestructible.”

“Are you amused?” Because I fucking wasn’t.

“That is not what I meant—”

I grabbed his shirt, bringing his face close to my own. “Little brother, even now, almost a year later, I know you still dislike her, and you do not trust her. So, do not lie to my face and tell me that was not what you meant. Fix her and then go back to pretending you trust me.”