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“Why would you do that?” I screamed, shoving at his shoulder.

He lifted something and the light of the fire behind us glinted off the metal from my laptop. My lip warbled.

“You shouldn’t have done that.” I smacked his shoulder again. Ren only wiggled the laptop toward me. I finally took it, hugging it to my chest. “If you do something like that again, I swear to God,” I whispered.

Arms wrapped around my waist, and I was tucked against a chest. I looked up at Jax. He smoothed his palm down my arm in a rhythmic pat.

I nestled close to him. What sucked the most was, if we had stayed home, we would have been roasted in the fire, especially if it had happened while the sun was out. The attacks kept coming and closed in on us.

And the guys. I studied them all one by one. They seemed stoic, but it was that very stoicism that told me they craved ripping into throats.

Ren revved onto the freeway.

“Where are we going?” Tobias asked.

“A different property,” Asher answered.

“That we have thanks to my insistence,” Ren drawled.

“And what about the pile of ash?” I asked wryly.

“One of the humans we have on payroll will handle everything with officials while we sleep. They’ll package anything that was not destroyed,” Tobias said.

“Already texted Talia to get one of her people on it,” Asher offered. That would have been Maddy’s job if she was still alive. My nose burned with restrained tears.

Jax readjusted me on his lap, so my head nestled on his shoulder. I closed my eyes tightly and breathed his scent in. A slight burn stung my gums, but I restrained my urge to sink my fangs into him and drink.

“Where are you driving to?” Tobias asked.

“You’ll see,” Asher intoned ominously.

TWENTY-SEVEN

catalina

I popped up in bed.A very comfortable, large mattress. I pushed onto my hands, squeezing the plush, flower-embroidered comforter. All I remembered before sunrise dragged me under was Ren putting the car in park in the paved driveway.

A sheer canopy surrounded the king-sized bed placed smack in the middle of the bedroom. I scooted to the edge. Dark brown chestnut colored wood covered the floors. A pair of slippers rested to the side. The exact same as the ones I had back at Crimson Manor, except this pair looked brand new.

I slid the new slippers on and shuffled to the window facing the bed. I moved so fast the sheer black curtains fluttered. They were the same as the sheer of the canopy. Shoving them to the side, I had a clear view through the large, arch-top window framed in black iron.

The same iron framed the lamps interspersed across the sprawling lawn and emitted a soft, yellow light. Past the boundary of them sprawled unending darkness. I inched closer to the window and looked down. The drop was steep. Bone shattering steep. I breathed out and my breath caused fog to condense on the surface.

It looked so quiet and spooky out there. I turned to survey the rest of the bedroom. An archway to my left led to a pristine white bathroom—no door, while the only door was to the furthest right side of the room, on the other side of the bed.

Where were the guys and why was there a pile of clothes next to the door? My heart somersaulted and I hurried to the pile so fast my surroundings blurred. I dropped to my knees. Please, no ash. With my throat excruciatingly tight, I shuffled through the bloody and ripped pile of clothes.

My shoulders lowered, it looked like they just took their clothes off. I exhaled in relief and climbed to my feet. My fingers were a hairsbreadth away from the iron door handle when it clicked down.

“Jax,” I breathed in relief. He quirked an eyebrow. I threw my arms around his waist. Jax tensed and after a beat, his arms pulled me tighter to him. I closed my eyes. I wasn’t sure what I was thinking. That they burned and one of them managed to drag me in here. Or that I’d lost one of them—I didn’t know, all I understood was the gut-wrenching drop of my stomach upon seeing the clothes.

“You okay, Kitten?”

“I’m just happy to see you.” I pulled back to peek up at him. His eyebrows lowered. “What?”

“You’re . . . happy to see me?” He sounded almost offput by my statement. I pursed my lips. Was that bad? I drew back a little more.

“Uh, sorry.” I guess it was a little weird. I hadn’t allowed myself to be soft toward Jax recently. Or maybe affection just made him uncomfortable.