"No. They didn't even know about this."
Wulf keyed the lock for his gate, then pulled toward the house slowly, expecting the worst. As he neared the front door, he stopped suddenly. There in the shadows beside his house, he saw movement. The mist from the lake was thick, swirling. He cut the lights so that his vision wouldn't be impaired by them and reached for the retractable sword under his seat.
There were three very tall men dressed in black walking toward them slowly, arrogantly, as if they had all the time in the world. They were united in power and strength, and their eagerness to fight bled from every pore of them.
All of them were blond.
"Stay here," he warned Kat as he got out, ready for battle. The fog swirled around the three men as they came closer.
Probably no more than six feet three, one of them was dressed in trousers, sweater, and wool overcoat. One side of the coat was pulled back to show an ancient scabbard and sword of Greek design. The one in the middle was two inches taller. He, too, wore wool trousers and a sweater along with a long black leather coat.
The third one had short hair, a shade darker than the other two. Dressed all in biker leather, he had two braids that fell down from his left temple.
And in that instant, Wulf remembered him. "Talon?"
The biker broke into a wide grin. "From the way you're holding that sword, I was wondering if you were going to recall me or not, Viking."
Wulf laughed as his old friend drew near. They hadn't seen each other in over a century. He gladly shook the Celt's hand. Wulf turned to the man in the middle and remembered him, too, from the brief time he had spent in New Orleans over one hundred years ago during MardiGras.
"Kyrian?" he asked. The ancient Greek general had changed quite a bit since the last time he had met him. Back then, Kyrian's hair had been cropped short and he had worn a beard. Now it was shoulder length and his face was clean-shaven.
"Nice seeing you again," Kyrian said, shaking his hand. "And this is my friend Julian of Macedon."
Wulf knew the man only by reputation. Julian had been the one who had taught Kyrian everything he knew about fighting and battle. "Glad to meet you. Now what the hell are the three of you doing here?"
"They're your backup."
He turned to see Acheron Parthenopaeus joining their group. He didn't know what stunned him most, their presence or the sight of the infant Ash had strapped into a baby harness, facing his chest.
Wulf was aghast. "Kyrian? Is that your baby?"
"Hell, no," Kyrian said. "No way I would bring Marissa into this. Amanda would geld me first and then kill me if I even considered it." He inclined his head to Acheron. "That's Ash's baby."
Wulf cocked a brow at that. "Lucy," he said in a mock Ricky Ricardo accent, "you got some 'splaining to do."
Ash grunted. "Stryker isn't stupid. Your idea of going in with a plastic baby, while admirable, would never work. Stryker would smell the plastic in an instant." He turned the Snugli sack around to face Wulf so that he could see the tiny, dark-haired infant it contained. "So I give you a real baby."
"What if it gets hurt?"
The baby sneezed. Wulf jumped as fire shot out of its nostrils and almost singed his leg.
"Excuse me," the baby said in a sing songy voice. "I almost made Dark-Hunter barbecue, which would be really sad 'cause I ain't got no barbecue sauce with me." The baby leaned its head back to look up at Ash. "You know fried Dark-Hunter isn't good plain. What you need—"
"Sim," Ash said in a warning tone under his breath, cutting the baby off.
The baby looked up at him. "Oh, I forgot, akri. Sorry. Goo, ga, goo." Wulf rubbed his forehead. "What is that?"
"He told you, Simi's his baby… demon."
All five of them turned at the deep, sinister voice that was laced with a heavy Greek accent. Another man stepped out of the shadows. He was almost as tall as Acheron with black hair and vibrant blue eyes.
Ash arched a brow. "You came after all, Z. Glad you made the party."
Zarek snorted. "What the hell? I didn't have anything better to do. Figured I might as well come kick ass and take names. Not that I really give a damn about their names. I'm just in it for the bloodlust."
"So you're Zarek," Wulf said, eyeing the notorious ex-Dark-Hunter who had once been exiled to Fairbanks, Alaska.
His nasty attitude not only bled from every pore, but was apparent from the lip he kept perpetually curled. Billy Idol and Elvis had nothing on this man.
"Yeah," Zarek said, sneering even more. "And I'm freezing, so can we rush this little get-together so I can kill some assholes and get back to the beach where I belong?"
"If you hate it here so much," Talon asked, "why did you agree to come?"
In a subtle gesture of flipping Talon off, Zarek scratched his eyebrow with his middle finger, which was covered with a long, sharp metallic claw. "Astrid wants me to make friends. I don't know why. Some weird woman thing. She's trying to make me more sociable."