First Episode

The Cost of Power is set in an alternative universe from the main Martiniere Legacy series. In this book, I take a closer look at the mind control technology and…the relationship between Gabe and his father Philip ends up being different.

Additionally, Gabe tells Ruby who he really is much, much earlier than in the main Martiniere Legacy series.

Most of all, I’m freeforming this story. I somewhat know where it’s going to go, but how it unfolds depend on what happens with Gabe, Philip, Ruby, and Justine once they get on a roll in this particular setting.

Enjoy! This is part two of Chapter Three. There will be five parts to this chapter.

July, 2033

GABE

His true name, from her mouth, in that pleading tone, froze him for a moment. Gabe couldn’t think, couldn’t speak. He kissed her forehead, her eyebrows, tasted the salt of the tears on her cheeks before kissing her lips.

“I half-expect to have Nathan Bonham and Jesse Rivers showing up here at any moment,” he said. “Who knows what they’ll do? Gabe Ramirez has no fucking power or influence against whatever they’ll pull. You and Ron aren’t safe if they decide to send a SWAT team out here. Or if my cousin Joey brings his security crew and joins them. We could all end up dead.”

Ruby half-laughed, half-choked. “But Gabriel Martiniere just might have that power.” She brushed back an errant strand of her bright red hair. “Gramps is loading the guns. It’s not the first damn time we’ve acted in self-defense.”

He tensed. “What do you mean?”

Ruby swallowed hard. “The Barkley family has hated me since I was six.”

“What?” He knew her parents had died then, apparently a murder-suicide, and Ruby had been present. “How could they blame you—”

“I killed my father.” She stared at him, her face suddenly blank. “My parents were zoned out on meth, talking about selling me into indenture so they could have more money for drugs. They got into a fight. He beat my mother to death—she had a pistol ready to use on him, he knocked it clear and I picked it up. Ran and hid. But I heard every bit of what happened as he killed her. Then when my father found me in the closet, raised that bloody tire iron to use on me—I shot him. Emptied the pistol into his face—just like Gramps had taught me.” She shuddered and buried her head in his chest again.

“Oh God, Rubes. Oh fuck.” Gabe held her tight, stroking her back. This was much, much worse than anything he had undergone in his uncle’s house.

Learning to shoot before she was six? Learning how to kill at that young age, and then doing it? That made the horrors he’d undergone at Philip’s hands during mind control programming at age twelve seem like nothing. And it explained one hell of a lot that he hadn’t understood so far.

Like those hideous, screaming nightmares of hers, that sometimes matched his. Like Ron and Ruth Ryder’s protectiveness of their granddaughter. He’d known a little bit about the deaths of Tony and Beth Barkley. That Ron and Ruth had gained custody of Ruby when she was three because of parental neglect and drug addiction. But all this—no.

Thank God Ron Ryder had taught Ruby to protect herself. But for a child her age to face that necessity—damn those worthless parents.

Ruby lifted her head. “My aunt Grace screamed at me during the funeral. Told me that someday I would pay for her brother’s death.” She gulped. “Her sons—my cousins—raped me when I was fifteen.”

“God damn her. God damn them.” Rage simmered in him at that. “Those fuckers. They’ll pay.” And for Grace Barkley to scream like that at a six-year-old who had killed her father in self-defense? Oh, she would learn what Martiniere vengeance was. He’d make sure of it before he left Thunder County.

“They already have. Jesse Rivers didn’t do a fucking thing about it, he was just elected sheriff then. I think Gramps—and Mike Chandler, Monty Montgomery, Jim Reed, and some others—made something happen. I don’t know. We kept loaded weapons in the house for some time, and my other cousin Andy Barkley kept close to me when I was at school. For my protection, he said.” She sniffled. “He’s one of the few good Barkleys.”

Gabe nodded—he had met Andy. Hired him as occasional help on the ranch.

“Granma made sure I had the morning-after pill,” she continued. “Took me to Portland to be checked. Winning the Thunder County Days rodeo queen title the next year was my fuck you to Grace and her family.”

“What happened to your cousins?” He hadn’t met any kids of Grace Barkley, except for her skanky daughter Jeannie. Ruby and Jeannie had almost come to blows during a Thunder County Days dance, when Jeannie drunkenly came on to him and wouldn’t listen to Gabe saying no. His love was almost as volatile as him when it came to getting into fistfights. Especially when it came to her Barkley kin, at least Jeannie.

“Dead. I just know that Gramps came home after being gone for a couple of days and told me and Granma that it was over. We were careful after that, but the guns went back into the safe.” Another sniffle. “So damn it, Gabe, this isn’t the first time we’ve needed to be on guard.”

“Dealing with the Martinieres is one hell of a lot bigger than Grace Barkley, Jesse Rivers, and Nathan Bonham combined.” He exhaled. “And I think my identity as Gabe Ramirez is pretty much shot. Once they ran that trial footage, that was it. I’d hoped it wouldn’t be that clear.”

“You watched?”

He nodded. “Up to the trial footage, and it was too damn—I couldn’t.”

“That was fucking awful to watch. Seeing you convulse like that—” She groaned and buried her head in his chest, once again holding him tight.

“Even if only a few people here in Thunder County saw it, I’m screwed.”

“Can you resurface as Gabriel Martiniere? How complicated is it going to be?” She pulled back a little, studying him closely.

He sighed. “I talked to my cousin Serg today. Vygotsky.”

“He’s part of Vygotsky Security?”

“Yeah. His father Piotr is in charge, Serg second-in-command. Serg and Piotr rescued me after I damn near got killed in the witness protection program. Serg says the sooner I get Vygotsky Security around me, the better. But Ruby, there’s one hell of a lot that happens if I do that. Serg says there’s problems with the Family. That they want me back.”

“What does that mean?”

He released her and picked up a brush from the storage rack to groom Ranger because he needed to do something with his hands while they talked about—this. Ruby took another and brushed the big horse’s other side. The gelding stretched his head out, wiggling his upper lip happily as they worked.

“I’d hoped to have a quiet life on the ranch with you. Build a lab, make biobots together. Eventually marry. Have kids, if that’s what you want.”

Ruby choked. “That—may be happening sooner rather than later, Gabe. I think I’m pregnant. Got a test to use tomorrow.”

“I’d wondered. Hadn’t wanted to push, figured you would tell me what was going on when you were ready.” He leaned on Ranger’s back, watching as she bent over to brush the gelding’s belly. “That news speeds things up quite a bit. That is, if you want to keep the baby.”

“I do.” She straightened up and another tear rolled down her cheek. “It scares me because of what my parents were, but I want our baby. You’re saying that we just can’t run the ranch if you become Gabriel Martiniere again?”

He shook his head and resumed brushing. “Serg said the Family thinks that the presence of a clear heir—me—will be a check on Philip. Something nasty is happening within the Family. That means—” he sighed heavily. “It’s a totally fucked-up power structure. The leader of the Martiniere Group and the Martiniere Family is called the Martiniere, and it’s always a man—French royal tradition, my ancestors were royalty at one point. My father was the Martiniere; my uncle Philip is the current Martiniere. That means I’m in line to follow him.”

“Your family was royalty?”

“It’s been a few centuries. Minor nobility now.” Gabe shrugged. “That part doesn’t matter to me, though—if I go back to the Family, you’ll end up meeting distant cousins who are royal—the Spanish cousins.”

“Wow. So you’re kind of like—the crown prince or something?”

Gabe snorted. “Nothing that elaborate. But. The Family will want me to officially become the designated successor, the Martiniere-in-waiting, if not the Martiniere myself. That means a lot of responsibility. Travel.” Another heavy sigh. “That is, if I survive. Joey has the incentive to kill me because he’s a candidate to become the Martiniere-in-waiting, too. I’m surprised he hasn’t been put in that position by now. And with you expecting a baby, I need to move fast to protect you. Ron. The baby. Serg says Joey’s in Pendleton. That’s too close for comfort.”

And yet—his cousin Justine. She was in a powerful position right now. If the Family wanted him back badly enough, maybe he could demand that they allow her to share the title of Martiniere-in-waiting with him. The job was big enough these days that it might just work.

Justine was Philip’s daughter, after all. Was already holding a significantly responsible position in the Group.

It was an option. One he needed to consider further.

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So a new book in another facet of the Martiniere Multiverse, the A Different Life subseries—where Gabe’s parents survive, and he meets Ruby as himself—is now out!

A Different Life: Now. Always. Forever. is about the romance of Ruby’s college friend Linda Coates and Gabe’s cousin Armand. Of course, when Martinieres are involved, things aren’t always that simple….

You can buy it in the usual ebook places, or request it in paperback from your favorite bookstore.
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