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Max and Dallas departed immediately.

Loren stood nearby, right where Darien could see her—and jump in front of a bullet for her if need be. She was shaking like a little leaf in the cold, her lips wobbling. It took all his self controlnot to wrap his arms around her again, not sure if that was what she wanted.

But fuck, didhewant it. He wanted to touch her so badly it physically hurt him to resist. He still couldn’t believe she was here with him—still couldn’t believe he’d somehow managed not to lose her during all this insanity.

In one way, at least. He may not have lost her physically, but this stupid rift between them… They might as well be on other planets for how close he felt to her.

Thirty minutes. Thirty fuckingminuteswas all he’d had with her before last night’s argument had come back to bite him in the ass. And now they were barely talking, barely looking at each other?—

“They know it’s the Veil,” Roark replied. Darien tore his focus off Loren—off that perfect mouth he wanted so badly to kiss—with difficulty. “We have a unit that specializes in the research of inter-dimensional threats, so they know their history when it comes to the Veil and Spirit Terra. They don’t know what or who caused it, they don’t know about the Well or the replica. And I can assure you, they know nothing of your involvement, or Loren’s?—”

“Wait—are you talking about therealthing?” Lace interrupted. Quieter, she hissed,“How?Literallyhow?”She ventured two steps closer, arms crossed to keep out the bone-deep chill. “I don’t understand. What happened to you being spelled?”

“I should be back in Angelthene in a few days,” Roark announced, completely dodging her question. He turned his attention back to Darien, whose own mind spun at a hundred miles an hour.

Howwashe talking about the real Well? When the other Devils had made it to Yveswich after surviving an assassination attempt in Angelthene, they’d filled Darien in on what they’dlearned, divulging how Roark and the other members of the Phoenix Head Society had been spelled into silence for many years. What had changed so quickly?

Unless it was all a fuckinglie.

“Noon tomorrow,” Roark repeated, as Darien stared him down—wishing he wasn’t so impossible to read. “Don’t forget.”

The truck pulled up alongside the curb—barely managing to squeeze between other vehicles, impatient drivers blaring their horns. It had survived the blast, just like Lace said, though it was banged up, the windshield and back window cracked. At least it was drivable.

“I want to thank you,” Darien said to Roark, who paused in the midst of turning away. Darien may not trust him fully, but that didn’t erase the fact that Roark had set him onto the path that had saved Loren’s life. He owed him a thanks—and he’d been meaning to give him one for a while. “For telling me about the chamber,” Darien clarified. “If you hadn’t…” He glanced at Loren, who toed at a pebble on the sidewalk, her cheeks flushed from the biting wind that blew flurries into her hair. Darien swallowed. “You’re the reason she’s alive.”

Roark took a moment to respond, his attention flicking between Darien and the mortal daughter he’d adopted—revealing nothing, as per usual. “No, I believe that would be you.”

He walked away, leaving Darien staring after him, his mind still spinning.

Loren made to follow Roark, her lips parting, as if she wanted to call after him. But she stayed put, and soon her father was swallowed up by the crowds.

Darien stepped up behind her. “Let’s go.” He brushed his fingers across the small of her back—stealing a touch he needed like a drug. She shivered—from the cold or the contact, he couldn’t tell. “Get in the truck, please.”

The others were crowding around it. Max jumped out of the driver’s seat while Kylar opened the tailgate at the back. With only five seats—six if you counted the middle seat in the front that he rarely used—three of them would have to ride in the truck bed.

“Someone needs to run back inside and tell Travis what’s going on,” Darien declared as he and Loren joined the group. “If shit goes sideways and we can’t make it back here, they need to know they have until noon tomorrow to get out.”

“I’ll go,” Roman said. “I want to make sure Travis actually listens this time.” He was already moving toward the doors?—

“Hey,” Darien called, stopping him before he could leave. “If you see my Healer, give her a heads up. It’s the least I can do for her.” Not just for mending his hand, but for letting him cut the line—and for taking him to the third floor ICU, where he’d run into Loren. Coincidence and pure dumb luck had caused their paths to cross, and besides the fact that his hand hurt like a motherfucker—even with extra-strength painkillers coursing through his system—he was glad it’d happened.

Roman nodded once and hurried inside.

“Your Healer?” Loren asked, her teeth chattering so hard the words were broken up.

“She let me cut the line,” Darien explained, surprised that she was even talking to him, looking at him. “If she hadn’t, I’d probably still be in there.” With a tip of his head, he gestured to the ER—still crowded, the line-up out the door, all of those people having no clue what was about to hit them.

“Oh.” She stared at the ground, rubbing her arms with the hands that also clutched her food and drink. The pout she wore put him on instant high alert.

Darien dipped his head, trying to catch her attention, but she wouldn’t look him in the eyes. “Wait…,” he mused, frowning. “You’re not bothered by her—are you?”

Those eyes of hers—dark as the ocean at dusk in this lighting—flicked up to meet his. “No,” she said quickly. “Of course not. I think it’s good that you’re looking out for someone who did you a favor. It’s kind of you.”

He studied that beautiful face—the jealousy she was horribly failing to mask. The jealousy he knew she was fighting—a knee-jerk reaction she’d shown toward any female in his life since they’d met. “But you wish it wasn’t ashe.”If only she knew he’d spent most of that first appointment discussing engagement rings with that same Healer.

And if only she knew that when he’d buried himself in her beautiful body later that same night, on the floor of Roman’s training room, all he’d been able to think about, as she’d moaned and whimpered beneath him, was how badly he wanted to marry her. How badly he wanted to make her his in every way possible. Make her a Cassel.

“No,” she breathed. But her cheeks burned a brighter pink, and Darien knew it wasn’t from the cold.