chez_jae

Deathwish by Rob Thurman

My rating: 5 of 5 stars

Knocked back Deathwish in one day. It's the 4th book in Rob Thurman's "Cal Leandros" urban fantasy series. This time, Cal shared the 'main character' spotlight with his brother, Niko. The story was told in first-person point of view, but it alternated between them. It was...odd. Interesting, but odd. I'd wished, after reading the first book, that we could have seen some of this from Niko's pov, but the reality was...odd. In Cal's eyes, Niko is an infallible hero, and that comes through when he's telling a story. But Niko is far less kind to himself, although I enjoyed his unwavering faith in Cal.

Niko's vampire girlfriend, Promise, introduces the brothers to another vampire, Seamus, who wants to hire them to find out who's been following him. It should be a simple enough job, but things get complicated when Promise's daughter, Cherish, bursts onto the scene bringing her own drama with her. Worse yet, Niko had no idea Promise had a daughter, and truth and trust are incredibly important to him. Compounding the problem is that Cherish's brand of drama involves a pissed off immortal who wants to kill her. When Seamus turns up dead (as in, missing his head dead), it seems that Niko and Cal can concentrate on pulling Cherish's chestnuts out of the fire. The only problem is, Cal's other family is back, and they are hellbent on revenge. They have plans for Cal, but first they want him to suffer through seeing everyone he loves die, and they'll stop at nothing to accomplish their goal.

Hoo, boy. This one was one helluva rollercoaster ride. Cal and Niko got so little downtime that I was exhausted just from reading about it. The alternating povs was a tad jarring, but it was refreshing in its way. It was touching to learn just how utterly devoted Cal and Niko are to one another. We've always known it, from the first book, but seeing things from Niko's perspective was sobering and uplifting at the same time. Certain scenes had my stomach in absolute knots. Fortunately, there was plenty of Robin screen time to add some humor. In addition to Robin, we got to see more of Ishiah and finally learn why the two of them were at one another's throat so often. *cough*UST*cough* Unfortunately, that sort of popped my little Robin/Niko bubble, but so be it; I can always dream. :D

Fight scenes were frequent and violent, and both Cal and Niko were badly injured at times. There were some astonishing twists and sweet retribution, and maybe (hopefully) an end to Cal's endless torment. Characters were magnificent, from the heroes to the villains and everyone in between. Amazing story!

♦ The running--it always came back to that. A pity, because I was an inherently lazy son of a bitch.
♦ My brother was at Washington Square Park, waiting for me. We were supposed to spar. "Spar" was a word Niko used when he meant he was going to beat the shit out of me for my own good.
♦ "This lost its entertainment value as of yesterday." Niko folded his arms and leaned against the wall. "Kick in the door."
♦ "Oh good, the Hardy boys are here to show me the light."
♦ Niko leaned in, planted a hand on each side of Robin's head, looked down at him, and asked silkily, "Did I or did I not just say 'now'?" // Yeah, the tough love. Niko was all about it.
♦ The Auphe nature wasn't mine. I wouldn't let it be. And if I said that to myself over and over and sprinkled enough frigging fairy dust around, maybe it would be true.
♦ He stopped when he saw Niko's eyes narrow fractionally, effectively ending the subject. When your overprotective big brother carries a sword, people tend to pay attention.
♦ Yes, Robin Goodfellow, Puck, Pan, the Goat in the Green, did have his own business that he ran with a ruthless hand. He was worse than any monster. Worse than any beast from a mythical hell. Like I'd said, he was a car salesman. Worse still, a used-car salesman, the type of man that bragged that he could sell a condom to a eunuch or life insurance to the undead.
♦ "There is no I in 'team'," Robin pointed out, starting to get up. "There's an I in 'intercourse', 'iniquity', 'illegal', 'intoxication', and did I mention 'intercourse'? But there is no I in 'team'. And I'm all about the I, which means that I will see you later." // "There's also an I in 'I'll kick your ass', so sit down," I ordered darkly. "Maybe if you're lucky and finish sobering up, we'll tag your ass and turn you loose in the wild."
♦ I glanced sideways at Niko to see a perfectly blank face. I shook two painkillers into my hand and then offered him the bottle. He bared his teeth for a fraction of a second, and I took that as a no.
♦ Promise didn't look amused by the exchange, and Goodfellow didn't help things any. "Men fighting over you. It's like old times for you, eh? Or it would be if both of them were dueling with their walkers."
Ooh, Robin roasted Promise but good on that one!
♦ Promise sat on the couch and Niko stood. Niko usually stood. You never knew when the couch might come alive and try to eat you. You had to stay alert. Constantly vigilant.
♦ Robin, unable to help himself, jumped in to haggle Seamus up to an outrageous fee. It was a wonder he left the poor bastard with the tartan boxers on his ass.
♦ I kept my eyes on my book as I tossed my dagger up into the air yet again and caught it blind. One: because it was good practice. You always know where your weapon is, whether you can see it or not. Always. Second: it annoyed Cal, as he couldn't do it. I smiled to myself. Being an older brother wasn't always about protection.
♦ I closed my book and stared at the peri with a gaze as empty as my brother's. And if my dagger did embed itself in the table this time, it wasn't anger, it wasn't a loss of control. It was incentive.
♦ Fall leaves are brilliant with gold and red. You can cup them in your hand and wonder at them, be amazed at their uniqueness and glory. But eventually they are gone, brown, crumbling, and scattered on the wind. But the tree remains. The tree is what is important. The tree lives on.
♦ I was about to step forward to shake Robin's shoulder when I noticed the snoring had a subtly different quality, and his hand was moving inch by slow inch across the bar. When it made it to the plastic container, I threw the dagger. It slid between his index and middle fingers to punch a hole in the plastic. "That is a tip jar," I observed mildly, "not an ATM."
♦ Robin was at the very least as good at lying as our mother, but with his trickster race it was genetic. I couldn't hold his DNA against him, and his lies were never meant to actually deceive us. Annoy us, entertain us, convince us to change our sexual orientation, but never to actually deceive us.
Did I miss the part where Robin convinced Niko to change his sexual orientation?! Damn it.
♦ If Nik didn't think we were going to like it, I really wasn't going to like it. It'd be up there with a Drano enema.
♦ "Read a comic book or color if you can't handle that. There are crayons in the desk drawer." He disappeared down the hall to his bedroom. Crayons. Smart-ass bastard.
♦ "Goodfellow's informants always try to kill us. It's tradition."
♦ If the myths were true, she'd dragged many a warrior kicking and screaming off to Valhalla. And if the myths weren't true. she was strong enough to take a cab from the museum curb and beat us to death with it.
♦ "Okay, we'll go." I sighed and scratched my ass absently. "Should we take Robin?" // "I don't know. What does the Magic 8 Ball that is your ass say?" he asked dryly. // We took Robin without any input from my ass, thanks for asking.
♦ "I don't think a present and some Get Well Soon balloons are going to do the trick," I snorted. "He's going to be pissed. I cut off his damn hand. Only Darth Vader gets away with shit like that."
♦ Hank had gone from homicidal maniac to crazy cat lady.
♦ That's when we heard it. Loud and clear. The purr from beyond the grave. It was like the rattle of bones, but that's what it was, all right. Rough and coarse and rapturous. // "No." Robin shook his head. "Absolutely not. The blade fell way. "Absolutely not. I don't like cats. Even live ones. They're demanding and annoying, they imagine themselves to be so very superior, and they shed." // "That one won't shed," I grinned. "As for the rest...sounds familiar, doesn't it?"
♦ Nik was the only person who'd give you a lecture on the monster you were fighting during the fight itself. // "...and is well-known for the barbed poisonous tail." Duck and slice said tail from body. "It also builds a nest of mud and clay, and lays eggs in the chest cavity of its dead victim as a means of procreation." A thrust of steel and a jet of dark blue blood comes spurting from its heart. "Are you paying attention, Cal?"
♦ "If I hear voices, it's because of whatever freaky-ass vitamins you put in my morning coffee when I'm not looking," I muttered as I scanned the short article. // "If you hear voices, it's because you only eat irradiated nitrates and have grown a microwave-spawned tumor in your frontal lobe." He took the paper from me. "Assuming you have a frontal lobe or a lobe of any kind. My latest theory is your skull hosts a hamster running in a wheel that keeps you upright and less coherent." // "Don't you mean 'more or less coherent'?" I snorted and continued reading over his shoulder. // "No." // I thought about a light punch to his kidney, thought about the elbow I'd get jammed in my diaphragm before I got halfway through the punch, and decided to finish the article instead.
♦ "Okay, Cyrano. Spoon-feed it to me. Bruce Willis was a ghost. Darth is Luke's father. The Crying Game chick is packing sausage and it's not for a picnic."
Geez, Cal, warn for spoilers!
♦ "I'd find you," Niko said, watching the water. He had his hair pulled back in a short ponytail, and was in a long black coat, gray shirt, and black pants, and had his sword lying across his lap. He looked every bit as deadly as he was and every bit as confident. I missed his long braid. It had hung to his waist and been good for annoying him with a tug. It had also been a sign of simpler days.
♦ "We're going to need a bigger beach," Niko murmured.
♦ "You did teach him well. No one else could have brought him through it all as you have. Sane, intact, his soul clean." // "Clean soul and the filthiest mouth around," I mused. "Where'd I go wrong?"
♦ "There's my brother." My lips twitched. "I was afraid you'd taken all my Zen." // "Like I'd want it," he retorted. "Jesus. I'd need a pack mule for all the granola."
♦ "Exaggeration served up with a fine whine. Entertaining as always."
♦ "Promise could go off the wagon any time. Then it's just you, her, and a giant twisty straw."
♦ The first step would be to stay together as much as possible. Robin would take some persuading, but I was rather in the mood for some persuasion. I'd missed my workout this morning. Dragging him kicking and screaming from his den of debauchery could be a substitute.
♦ "Being smacked by a she-wolf," he muttered, "it gives new meaning to 'bitch-slap'."
♦ "Just don't tell us the cat is involved as well," I said. "There's a line to be drawn, and necrophiliac bestiality would be it."
♦ He turned and walked away, waving us off with a, "Thanks for visiting. Drop by any time. My best to the family. Pick a platitude and leave with it." // "I don't think so." I tapped his shoulder with the blade of my katana, stopping him in his tracks. "Pack. You're coming with us. We're all staying at Promise's until the Auphe situation is resolved." // He looked in the direction of the bedroom and then back at me. "I most certainly am not." // I gave him a smile sharp as my sword. "Yes, you most certainly are." // Twenty minutes later, Goodfellow, still not at peak performance after his drunken three days, was in a cab on his way to Promise's penthouse apartment. His playmates had left fifteen minutes prior to that. Apparently, a sword fight in the living room wasn't the aphrodisiac one might imagine.
♦ We stayed away from the park this time and used a dojo where I'd once taught. One student had offered to spar with Cal during one of our breaks. Cal, sweaty and tired, had given him the highly pissed-off reply of, "Niko can keep me from killing him. You can't. Go away." Not precisely tactful, but true. His form was virtually nonexistent, the results undeniably deadly. He wasn't as good as I was--there's only so much inherent laziness one could overcome, but he was good.
♦ "When you're neck-deep in it, what's one more dollop of manure?"
♦ He was always on watch. He'd taught me, and I was good enough. But there was good enough and there was Nik.
♦ "He's good." // That's what Niko said in the aftermath of the fight while mopping the small amount of blood from his chest with a washcloth. "He's good." Like he'd say, "It's hot today," or "Darn, I'm out of tofu."
♦ "Issues?" he echoed incredulously. "Jesus, Nik. People on Dr Phil have issues. We have atomic-powered, demonic-flavored, fresh-from-the-pits-of-hell, full-blown fucking neuroses. Freud would have been in a corner sucking his thumb after one session with us."
♦ Family--it can be the making of you or the breaking of you. If it had been only me as a child with Sophia, with no one to protect, to stand with, to share that cold, empty life...Sophia could've been the breaking of me. Cal...Cal had been the making of me.
♦ Cal wasn't the most social of creatures. Very few people had his number, especially since he'd convinced Robin to stop writing it on bathroom walls.
♦ "Pity party for yourself?" Niko asked dryly, but behind the sarcasm I could see the shadow of worry. // "Like you wouldn't believe," I exhaled. "BYOA. Bring your own angst. It's festive as hell."
♦ He loomed. Niko could loom like nobody's business.
♦ That wasn't just crazy talk. That was Hannibal Lecter eating his own foot with Dijon mustard wacko.
♦ "No. Make that hell no. Fuck no. Any goddamn no you want. I'm not doing it."
♦ Robin had Ishiah so frazzled that he was actually molting. The puck was one gifted son of a bitch, I had to give him that.
♦ Niko had a freakish attachment to his beat-up old car. So obsessively neat in every other way, he always drove a piece of shit. When I asked him why he was so fond of something that didn't work half the time, he'd answered, "I'm fond of you, aren't I?" And he called me a smart-ass.
♦ "You could've kept silent and she would've stepped backward through the gate, but you took her hand. You closed the gate and you kept her safe. You were sleepy, annoyed, about two hours away from real consciousness, and you still ignored instinct and kept her safe. You have an unbreakable will, Cal." It was true. The Auphe had once broken his mind, but they had never broken his will.
♦ "Afraid of you?" I leaned back to drape an arm along the back of the bench and cross booted ankles. "I'm still waiting for your testicles to drop so we can buy you a cup for sparring."
♦ Green eyes turned brightly sly at the sight of us. "Niko." He knocked on the chair to his left. "We have room for one more." // "I think you already have three at the table," I said. And if I walked even faster, I wasn't the slightest bit ashamed. I, usually the hunter, in Robin's case knew very well what it was like to be prey. And as prey, you do what you have to to survive. Run like the wind.
Oh, Niko, you never run from a predator! Now you're screwed...hopefully. Heh.
♦ "And now you're trash talking about Scooby. You are one evil bastard."
♦ I took his hand, got to my feet, and dusted off the jeans I'd borrowed from him. Black, of course. "It's hard to be a ninja-slash-samurai-slash-Buddha-loving bad-ass in regular blue, huh?" I muttered.
♦ I knew Nik could fight. I knew he was better than I was, that he was better than nearly anyone or anything you could name. But sometimes when you saw him in action, you almost couldn't believe it--that a human could be that fast and that lethal.
♦ I didn't think he'd not gotten anywhere with anyone he wanted except for Niko.
Damn you, Niko!
♦ "Survival of the fittest. And that walking feather duster is fit." His left eye twitched. "Very fit." This had to be the longest Robin hadn't gotten laid in, damn, at least the span of human existence. "Desperate" didn't begin to cover the shape he was in. I was so locking my door tonight.
♦ I don't know why they wear the stethoscopes looped around their necks. It just made for one convenient strangling temptation.
♦ Nurse Bitch on Wheels walked in the room. She did have a real name printed nice and neat on her name tag. I'd read it and forgotten it instantly. It hadn't said Satan's Bedpan Pusher of Despair, so it was wrong anyway.
♦ "Hell, that's probably on your discharge instructions. No traveling through rips in space for at least a week. The hospital cannot be held responsible for unnatural horrors of the supernatural world."
♦ "Some people are born warriors. He's one of them. What it takes some creatures hundreds of years to learn, Nik was born knowing. Every once in a while the world comes up with a natural-born predator. We're lucky nature screwed up and gave Cyrano a conscience along with it."
♦ I coughed and said hoarsely, "I never thought my dick would save our asses." // "You had to say it, didn't you?" Niko studied the sky with me. Blue and clear--a good day to still be alive. "But in this case, you're an idiot whose penis did save our lives. And I hope I never have to say or think that again."
♦ I sat up, reached over him to take his right hand that still held his gun, and placed it on his chest. "If the time comes and we can't win," I said steadily, "you go first." I'd done all I could to protect him his entire life. I would protect him at the end of it, as well. // He looked at me with eyes unutterably exhausted and far older than they had any right to be. "Together." // "Together," I promised. I held up a hand and he let go of the gun to clasp it, hard and desperate, then he pulled himself up to a sitting position. // He let go and rubbed his face. "I think we have codependency issues." // "There's no one I'd rather have them with, little brother."
♦ "All my life I've only survived. With you, I've actually lived. That is worth dying for."
♦ Niko and I had split up. It had to be one of the hardest things I'd ever done. I knew the Auphe wanted him, almost more than they wanted me--because of me. Walking away from him--"tough as shit" didn't begin to describe it. And for him to let me go? He almost couldn't do it. Literally. He'd spent his life making sure I kept mine, and to not be there to watch my back now? I didn't think he could take that first step away. He didn't think so either. Walk away? Now? I saw it in his eyes. Impossible conflict. My big brother, who'd guarded me since my first breath, and he couldn't do it. Not even if it meant saving us all. He believed in me--he did--but when belief runs up against a lifetime of habit, belief can be kissing the canvas in a heartbeat. Just that one step...I took it because I knew he couldn't. I grinned before turning and merging into the crowd on the sidewalk. If it was the last look he ever had of me, I wanted it to be of the same cocky, cynical, stubborn bastard I'd always been. That thanks to him, I'd lived long enough to be. When I finally gave in and glanced back, he was gone. It was the right thing to do, but I'd never felt more alone in my life. Your brother watched your back and you watched his. Always.
♦ My mouth was still moving, but nothing was coming out. I'd run out of curse words to say. Me. That hadn't ever happened in my life.
♦ He had come back, though--his mind somewhat slower than his body, but he had come back. No one else would have had the will--the absolute stubborn hardheaded will. No wonder I could never get him to pick up his dirty clothes.
♦ Buddha had no teachings I knew of on domestic disputes with vampire partners, so I went with silence and a raised eyebrow.
♦ When they'd investigated me, and I'm sure they had, they must've thought it was a good thing they had Nik to fall back on. I was one of those guys who didn't look too good on paper, or while being possessed, or creating mass chaos going undercover in the Kin.
♦ "I know I'm a moody, whiny, sometimes possessed, killer genetic monster freak with mommy issues, but do you think Scientology could honestly be the answer to all that?" // Glass bottle held in front of his lips, Nik froze, then laughed. Yep the Buddha-loving bad-ass actually cracked a smile and laughed.

Well, that was fun, but I think I'm going to actually try to read something a little more lite to cleanse my palate. That's the plan, at least. We'll see how successful I am. Oh, and yes, this one gets 5 stars! As if you had to ask...

cal