Sweet Venom (15 page)

G
retchen turns and stomps down the steps to the sidewalk below, a boiling look on her face. I hurry down after her. This was not exactly how I imagined our sisterly reunion turning out.

“We can't leave her,” I insist, grabbing Gretchen's arm to make her stop and listen. “She's in just as much danger as we are.”

“She's a snob,” Gretchen says, looking like she wants to spit.

Okay, that's true. I can't deny the blinding reality that she looked at us like we were peasants come to beg favor from the queen. But that doesn't change the facts of the situation.

“She's our sister.” I'm still kind of reeling at the thought that, in less than a week I've gone from having no blood relatives to having two as-close-as-you-can-biologically-get sisters. I can't let either of them get away. “We have to make her understand.”

“We don't
have
to do anything.” Gretchen sneers up at the dark-gray door of Greer's house.

It's an absolutely gorgeous building, one of those three-story gingerbread Victorians you see in postcards, with a big round turret in one corner and classical details trimming every inch. The main color is a pale gray, almost identical to today's overcast sky, with bright white trim. The architectural details are highlighted with touches of black and gold. Kind of old Hollywood. Everything about it screams classical glamour.

Just like Greer.

I can't imagine anyone more different from me and Gretchen. Greer is poised and elegant and reminds me of photos I've seen of Princess Grace of Monaco. I'm pretty sure her sweater was cashmere. Her high-heeled shoes probably cost more than my entire closet. She is delicate in a way I could never be.

There's no chance she could hold her own against a monster. I may not be a super-athlete like Gretchen, but Greer looks like a porcelain doll. A minotaur would shatter her into a million tiny designer pieces. She needs help even more than I do.

At least I wear sneakers. Greer couldn't even run away in those shoes.

“We have an obligation”—I try again, appealing to Gretchen's sense of duty—“to train her, like you're training me. What if something happened to her? You'd feel awful.”

She mutters something that sounds like “Hardly,” but then she says, “Look. Nothing's going to happen to her.”

“How can you know that?”

“You heard her.” She jerks her head up toward the house. “She doesn't see monsters.”

“So?”

“If she doesn't see them,” Gretchen explains, “then they won't see her.”

“But what if—”

“Monsters don't know who we are.”

“What about the basilisk thingy that attacked me at the bus stop?” I can't believe Gretchen is being so stubborn about this. It wasn't this hard to convince her to train me. “She knew I was a huntress.”

“It knew,” Gretchen says with a heavy dose of sarcasm, “that you saw it. You must have reacted to its true appearance in some way. That's how it knew what you are.”

I want to argue, but I think she might be right. About that night, anyway. That doesn't mean she's right about everything.

“What about the ones who've seen us,” I press. “They could tell others what we look like, and could mistake Greer for one of us.”

“Unlikely. It's not like they're uploading pictures to Flickr or passing around wanted posters with our pictures and a big reward offer.”

“But there
is
,” I cry. “There's a bounty on our heads. You heard what the satyr said. They've been promised eternal freedom in exchange for our lives. Greer is just as valuable to them as we are.”

She hesitates. Good, hopefully I've gotten through. Hopefully she'll—

“You saw her,” she snaps. “We could be standing side by side and no one could guess we're triplets.”

Now she's just being deliberately difficult. I think part of her is jealous, resentful of the obvious advantages Greer has in her life. I think Gretchen's worried too—she just doesn't want to admit it. I need to push the right buttons.

“You said yourself, things are getting weird,” I say, trying another tack. “More monsters, monsters at different times. What if other things change?” I grasp for anything that might change her mind. “What if they can start smelling us the way we smell them?”

That gives her pause again. I can see—and almost feel—her considering that possibility. Which only makes me more nervous. Gretchen is a keep-it-together girl. If she thinks that might happen, we could be in really big trouble.

She finally shakes her head. “It doesn't matter—”

“Doesn't matter?”

“We can't make her accept the truth.” Gretchen clenches her jaw. “She made her choice. She doesn't want anything to do with us.”

“But Gretchen—”

“Forget it,” she says, walking away to the street where her Mustang is parked at an alarming angle. “If you want a ride home, let's go. Otherwise I'll see you tomorrow.”

I watch, helpless, as Gretchen disappears down the steep hill. How can she be so heartless? I look back up at Greer's house—at our
sister's
house. A curtain on the first floor flutters back into place.

Greer might be a bit of a snob, but that doesn't change our blood. She's obviously been given everything she wants her entire life, so it's not surprising that she has a superior attitude about things. She probably needs to see the proof that we're triplets. Next time I'll bring the records.

At the moment, though, I feel like I need to stay close.

Gretchen might be able to walk away, but I can't. I've only just found my sisters, and I'm not going to leave one of them at the mercy of whatever monster crosses her path. And Gretchen can obviously take care of herself.

Acting like I'm walking away, in case someone is watching through that window, I head around the corner. The house behind Greer's on the side street has a big, six-foot-high brick wall around the property. As soon as I'm clear from view, I break into a run. Circling around the block, I head into the hilly park across from her house. It's scattered with dense bushes and shaded by lush trees. A perfect hiding spot.

I climb the concrete steps to the path that gives me a perfect, unobstructed view of Greer's house below.

As I sink down onto the grassy hillside, next to a thick-leaved bush, I'm not sure about this plan. I'm not sure I even have a plan. I just know I can't abandon her. Greer may not want anything to do with me, but I'm going to watch out for her anyway. That's my job, isn't it? What kind of guardian would I be if I let my own triplet get eaten by a griffin or something on the day we meet?

Besides the fact that Gretchen and Greer are my sisters, there's a lot more at stake. According to the book, we are the only three girls of this generation of Medusa's descendants. Always girls. Now I know that we inherited our mythological genes from our biological mother, but I've never been able to find out anything about her. There could be aunts or cousins out there somewhere too, I suppose, but the book clearly said there are only three girls born in a given generation.

That means we're it. We're the only ones who can carry on the legacy.

There's a whole mess of pressure that comes along with that realization. The three of us are the only ones standing between this world and the monsters. There is no way I can leave one of us unprotected and in danger.

As I settle in for however long this security stakeout is going to take, I reach into my backpack for my phone to text home about the delay.

Instead, my fingers brush over the rough cloth surface of a book.

In the craziness of discovering our triplet and the rush to meet her, I must have tossed the Medusa book into my bag. I'd stopped reading at the sentence about three girls in a generation. Maybe there are clues about our other relatives or more specifics about the legacy.

And it looks like I'm going to have plenty of time.

I turn back to the page I was on and continue reading.

 

When the time to break the seal draws near, a time predestined by the fates at the moment of closure, the Key Generation will arrive. It will be a generation born in the same moment of the same womb.

 

The same moment? The same womb? That must mean triplets.

 

The Key Generation is safe from neither the forces of supposed good nor those of confirmed evil. It must be protected at any cost, by any measure, separated to prevent their discovery by those who wish to render the scales unbalanced.

 

Separated? Is that why Gretchen, Greer, and I were sep-arated at birth and adopted out into different families? Our mother must have known we were special—the Key Generation—and that we would be in danger. She gave us up, leaving us with no knowledge of our true heritage in order to protect us. I've always wondered why my mother gave me up. Now I guess I know.

 

Only when the Key Generation has reached maturity will it be able to join together to break the seal, thus restoring the natural order. There are those on both sides of this war who would prevent this occurrence by any means available.

 

What on earth does that mean? The only seal Gretchen has mentioned is the one that keeps monsters locked in their realm. If we are the Key Generation, then we're supposed to break the seal? But why? It's supposed to be our job to keep monsters away. Breaking the seal would have the opposite effect.

I skim the rest of the chapter, looking for anything more about the seal and why anyone would want to break it, but it's just more about the danger to all descendants of Medusa. Especially the Key Generation.

Maybe that explains the bounty. But who is it that wants us gone?

There are two sides that don't want us to break the seal, which I'm pretty sure we don't want to do anyway. But I have a feeling they won't pause to ask before going to “any means available” to stop us.

While I sit, the cold of the ground seeping through my jeans, I keep cycling the thoughts through my mind. Triplets. Danger. Key Generation. Two sides. Break the seal.

It doesn't make any sense, but I know one thing for sure. Protecting Greer and keeping her safe is my top priority. Whatever the Key Generation is supposed to do, I doubt we can do it as two out of three. Gretchen and I need Greer, as a member of the Key Generation and as a sister.

I
can't stop myself from watching as the two girls—my sisters, apparently—stand arguing on the sidewalk. Most of their words are lost to the soundproof windows and heavy velvet drapes, but I manage to catch a few. “Duty. . . .” “Sister. . . .” “Snob. . . .”

As Gretchen, the military-looking one, stomps away, I can imagine which of the words were hers. Her disgust was apparent.

Which is fine with me. I'm not a fan of
her
personal style, either.

She's obviously one of those girls who look down on those who have more opportunity in their lives. That giant chip on her shoulder is only going to keep her in her disadvantaged place.

Grace looks up at the house, her face a mixture of helplessness and determination. She seems nice enough, despite her insanity, and more the type to envy someone who has advantages than to despise them for it. The type to work hard to gain opportunities of her own. Why she's let herself get sucked into this crazy delusion is beyond me, but at least there's hope for her.

Finally, after what feels like forever, Grace leaves too, heading around the side of the house. I resist the urge to sprint to the living room, to spy out the side window and see if she is actually leaving.

Greer Morgenthal does
not
spy.

Frozen to my spot, staring out the window—at the drapes, actually, since I've let them fall back into place—my mind plays over everything they said. I would like to reject the idea that they are my sisters. I'm not adopted, as far as I know, but it also seems unlikely that Mother and Dad would have adopted out my two sisters if we were actually triplets. Not that Mother has ever been the most maternal sort. Quite the opposite. Still, I've always had the feeling that Dad wanted more children. I've spent my life trying to be
enough
for both of them. To be mature and classy and successful enough for Mother. To be loving and childlike and daughterly enough for Dad. If they were around more, I might have a schizophrenic break from the opposing efforts.

In any case, the idea that they would have given away my siblings doesn't make sense.

Assuming I believe that Grace and Gretchen are my sisters—and I would have to be delusional myself to deny that physically obvious fact—that leaves me with only one logical conclusion: I am adopted.

I am surprisingly unaffected by the realization. Maybe Mother has trained all the emotion out of me. Maybe I truly am the ice queen my social enemies and ex-boyfriends so often claim. Perhaps I should cry or scream or feel betrayed in some essential way. A normal person would. Instead, I feel . . . relieved.

A surprising emotion. At least it is an emotion. I suppose, if I had ever analyzed my relationship with my parents in the past, the possibility might have occurred to me. I have never felt the elemental connection many of my friends have with their parents. Even when my friends claim to despise their parents, I sense the underlying indelible links. I've always felt like more of an accessory than an expression of love. I finally understand why.

The ever-present pressure lifts off my chest, and I feel like I can truly breathe for the first time since I took third place in the fifth-grade spelling bee and Mother punished me by sending me to my room without dinner. I'd disappointed her, and I have spent every day since trying to keep that from happening again. All this time, all this pressure, and the feeling of distance. It all makes sense. And it isn't my fault.

I don't know why the realization that I'm adopted clarifies everything in my mind, but it does. It's like a frosted window has been removed from my vision.

Perhaps I should feel that my world has been rocked. And perhaps I should feel a little more off-kilter, considering the second startling claim my sisters made.

“A descendant of Medusa,” I muse, then immediately chide myself for even entertaining the thought.

What an absolutely ridiculous notion. As if such creatures of myth actually exist. They are nothing but stories, fables made up to help ancient man understand the inexplicable. To keep children obedient, lest they be fed to a dragon.

“Monster hunters.” I snort. “How ludicrous.”

But that resurrected memory floats into focus.

When I was a small child, four or five years old, I slept alone in my turret bedroom, as I do now. I had been tucked in by my nanny some hours earlier and had fallen asleep easily. I remember that I dreamed of ponies and rainbows. In the middle of the night, something woke me.

I don't remember if it was a sound or a smell or some kind of subconscious feeling. I only know that I opened my eyes, my room illuminated by the faint glow of moonlight, and screamed. My closet door stood wide open. Creeping carefully across my room, its hooves tapping quietly on the hardwood floor, was a centaur.

At the time, of course, I didn't know the creature by name. I only knew that a horse with the torso of a man was clomping toward me. And the look in his dark eyes left me with no doubt that he was not interested in making friends.

My scream startled him. I scrambled out of my four-poster bed, getting tangled up in the frilly lace ruffled bed skirt. Certain I would be easy prey, I looked up. Only to find my room empty.

Still terrified, I ran downstairs to the second-floor master bedroom. I burst through my parents' door, flipped on the lights, and stood sobbing in the middle of the room.

“What is it, Greer?” Dad mumbled, half asleep.

“A-a-a monster!” I wailed.

My mother sat up in bed and called me closer. I was hoping for a hug and a kiss and maybe an invitation to sleep with them for once.

“Listen to me very carefully,” she said, making no move to touch me. “Monsters do not exist.”

“B-b-but—”

“No!” Her bark startled the fear right out of me. “Monsters. Don't. Exist.”

I knew better than to argue again.

“You did not see a monster,” she insisted, calm once more. “And you will never see one again.”

Still shaking with fear, I nodded and backed away toward the door. Mother slid her sleep mask back into place. As I turned off the light, my dad mumbled, “Good night.”

I climbed the long, eerie staircase back up to my room. Standing outside my door, I took a deep breath. I told myself my mother was right, as she always was. Monsters did not exist. I hadn't seen one that night, and I would never see one again.

After the series of hypnotherapy sessions Mother started me on the next day, I never did.

Now, considering what my sisters said, I almost wonder if maybe the centaur was not a figment of my imagination after all.

“Ludicrous.” The news of my adoption must have shaken me more than I realized, if I'm even pondering the possibility that mythological monsters actually exist, or that I might
actually
be a descendant of a hideous monster myself.

My phone rings in the hall.

“Thank goodness,” I say, relieved for the distraction.

Shoving thoughts of monsters and sisters and other nonsense from my mind, I straighten my spine and go answer the call. Even Veronica would be a welcome interruption at the moment.

“Greer Morgenthal.”

“Hey babe,” Kyle's surfer-boy voice says. “What's up?”

I close my eyes and mentally count to eleven. I've asked him not to call me “babe” more times than I can recall. I'm not sure if he thinks it's charming or if the sun has actually cooked so many of his brain cells that he can't remember I don't like it. Either way, I've decided to ignore the transgression for the most part, and make him pay in other ways. Jewelry is always welcome.

The surfer-boy thing is mostly an act. He does surf, but not very well, and he's the son of an internationally renowned oncologist and a tire heiress. He's as likely to attend a benefit dinner in a tuxedo as he is to hit the surf in a wetsuit. It's all about image.

“Hello, Kyle,” I answer, turning on girlfriend mode and trying to sound warm and affectionate. “I'm waiting for Henri to arrive with the petit fours for the tea and—”

“That's great, babe,” he says, cutting me off. I'm about to forget my ignore-now-pay-later strategy when he asks, “How'd you feel about dinner at the Wharf tonight?”

I pause. “Where?” I ask cautiously. Last time we dined at the Wharf when he was in surfer-boy mode, we ate clam chowder from paper cups while standing at the end of the pier. I appreciate a good San Francisco chowder as much as the next Bay Area native, but standing up to eat is not my idea of a dinner date.

“Ahab's,” he says.

I can hear the smile in his voice, like he knows he'll impress me with his choice. And, to be honest, he has. Ahab's is an iconic institution, and their cuisine is first-rate. Five stars. Their view is even better.

“Sounds delightful,” I reply, grinning to myself.

“Great,” he says. “Meet me there at seven?”

“Meet you—”

“Yeah, I'm at the beach with the guys.” Shouts echo in the background as the guys clamor to be heard. “Gotta go, surf's up. See ya at seven, babe.”

Before I can say good-bye, he's gone.

I set my phone down, close my eyes again, and remind myself of why I put up with Kyle. In the year we've been going out, I've gotten a lot of practice with what my personal trainer calls aggression-reduction techniques—an elaborate name for counting to ten. Or, in Kyle's case, eleven.

He can be very sweet sometimes. Like last Valentine's Day, when he skipped school to bring me two dozen red roses in French class, or when we drive down the coast and park on the beach, watching the sunset from the hood of his Jeep. Those days mostly make up for the other ones.

He's also very handsome, in a lead-actor way. His brown hair is usually too long, but after he spends all summer surfing, the tips bleach to an amber gold that matches his tanned skin, making it hard for me to complain.

And he's the most popular and powerful student at St. Stephen, the all-boys partner school of Immaculate Heart. As I'm the most popular and powerful student at Immaculate Heart, it's as if we're destined to be a couple.

Still, sometimes—like when he's been spending too much time “at the beach with the guys”—he becomes a little less than the ideal boyfriend. I'm not the kind of girl to meekly accept inattention and negligence. Kyle should know that by now.

“That's all right,” I say. “I will give him a reason to pay attention.”

With a cool smile on my face, I head upstairs to select the perfect outfit to carry out my plan. An outfit designed to tempt and tease, with no promise of fulfillment. By the time the night is over, Kyle will be desperately begging me to forgive him for anything he's ever done.

“I will be in my room, Natasha,” I call out as I mount the stairs. “Buzz me when Henri arrives.”

Her muffled reply comes through the kitchen door. “Yes, Miss Greer.”

Now, should I wear my new strapless shantung silk cocktail dress, in the perfect lilac shade that makes my silver eyes pop, or the silver sequined tank that is cut a touch too low, and that Kyle can never keep his eyes off? Ah, decisions, decisions.

I will make tonight a date to remember.

Kyle holds out my chair, like the gentleman I know he can be. He's been an ideal dinner date since I crested the stairs into Ahab's lobby a fashionable fifteen minutes late. I do believe I chose the right outfit.

I smile demurely and nod, carefully collecting myself as I sit and he slides the chair in under me. Hands still on the chair, he leans down and whispers, “You know how I love that top, Greer.”

I allow myself a brief pleased smile. Success. I knew the silver sequined tank would do the trick. It always does. Only Kyle doesn't know there will be no discovering what I'm wearing underneath the top this time.

Not that I've ever let him get much farther than that—we haven't been going out
that
long—but since I had to manage my own transportation tonight, he will be lucky to get a good-night kiss. It would take a complete transformation into future-president mode on his part to get any more than a quick peck.

He slouches into the opposite seat. So much for transformation. It takes all my willpower not to ask him to sit up straight. But I don't want to sound like his mother or a nagging girlfriend, so instead I lean forward over the table as if I want to whisper something naughty. As expected, he sits up and leans in to hear.

“Thank you,” I whisper. “This is my favorite restaurant.”

His grin is all cocky arrogance. “I know.”

The waiter arrives to pour our water and Kyle slouches back against his chair. I can't exactly lean across the table all night, whispering. Sometimes I think Kyle isn't worth all the effort. Maybe he's not future-president—or even future–state senator—material after all. I could be wasting my time on a boy with no greater ambition than following the surf season around the globe.

His parents are wealthy enough that he never has to work a day in his life. I suppose I have been hoping that he
wants
to earn his own way. I don't want to be hasty, though. I've already invested a great deal of time and effort in him. Maybe I shouldn't cut my losses yet.

Gazing out the window, I decide to give him a few more weeks to prove himself.

The view from Ahab's is amazing. A practically un-obstructed wall of windows on the Bay. Depending on how thick the fog is at the time, you can see Alcatraz just offshore and Sausalito across the Bay. The brilliant orange Golden Gate stands out against the rich, green foliage of the parks at either end of the iconic suspension bridge. At times I've seen seals, sea lions, and even a dolphin or two. And there are always plenty of seagulls, usually flying beak-first into the glass.

The waiter takes our drink orders—mint iced tea for me and orange soda for Kyle—and then disappears. Our table is right up against the window, and with my back to the rest of the dining room, it feels like we're all alone in the place.