Page 18

In one of the many unused, empty rooms in the coven’s mansion, Zuri paced the worn pine floors.

“I’m pretty sure rule number one thousand and eight is no pictures.” Candela ran the lethal point of her comb through a new section of Avani’s hair to separate it. “Fucking vampires,” she muttered, her freshly buzzed cut waiting to be dyed firetruck red.

“Or just drop this shit altogether,” Avani suggested. “She probably just wanted to fuck off with some pretty new face.”

“I’m not trying to find out if she’s dating someone else,” Zuri reminded them, but stopped short of explaining that new faces were never the problem. Those were the fun parts. “I need to find out where the fuck she is so I can kill her.”

Avani laughed. “Yeah, right. Kill her with that ass.”

Zuri glared at the best friends she loved more than sisters. “There’s no way on this planet I’m getting mixed up in Elena’sshit. I only want to find her so she can grovel for my forgiveness.”

“Creepy,” Avani decided before reconsidering. “Kinky?”

“Doth protest, bitch.” Candela didn’t bother to look up from her task. “You want to find her because you’re worried and you still love her so much,” she added in a mocking baby voice.

“Shut the fuck up.” Zuri crossed her arms over her chest. “Did we complain when you wanted us to make Mike’s dick lose two inches?—”

Avani cackled. “That was way at the end of the messed-up scale.”

“That was like twenty years ago,” Candela said in self-defense, but her face wore her amusement. “We can’t be held accountable for the shit we did when we were eighteen.”

Zuri cocked her head to one side. “Pretty sure that’s categorically false, Del.”

“Ugh, whatever.” Candela tossed her hands up, leaving half of Avani’s hair unbraided. “What do you want us to try?”

“Just a simple locator spell.”

“You can’t do that on your own?” Avani complained, palm running over the side Candela had finished.

“I’ve never actually tried it on a vampire,” she admitted.

“What? Did you used to have a GPS on her when you were together?” Candela moved from the chair to the floor next to Avani. “There’s no way you never snuck a little peekie-peek to see where she was.”

Zuri didn’t tell them that she’d trusted Elena blindly. That she’d never made her regret that until now. She left the room, returning with a worn leather-bound atlas, its pages brittle and yellowed with age. The scent of ancient paper and sea spray drifted from its spine when Zuri laid it open on the floor. Beside it, she placed a silver bowl filled with water, its surfaceshimmering with the reflection of the single flickering candle illuminating the room.

Candela and Avani sat on either side of her on the floor, their expressions shifting from playful teasing to focused concentration. The air in the room thickened, charged with anticipation and a subtle hum of magic.

Zuri pulled the garnet ring from her pocket. It pulsed with a faint energy, a lingering echo of Elena’s touch. She held it over the bowl of water.

“Elena,” she whispered. “Show me where you are.”

Closing her eyes, Zuri channeled her magic, letting it flow through her veins, down her arm, and into the ring. Warmth bloomed in her chest, spreading outward like a sunbeam, filling her with a sense of power and purpose. The air crackled with energy, the candle flame dancing wildly as if caught in a sudden wind as soon as Avani and Del added their power to hers.

Zuri knew the weight and contours of her sisters’ magic. She let it fuse with hers, pouring more into the bowl while they searched hundreds of miles. Not by sight, but feeling.

The water in the bowl rippled, the reflection of the candle distorting into a swirling vortex of light. Elena was as hard to find as Zuri feared.

Pain and simmering rage slithered over Zuri’s left side. Gritting her teeth to ignore the discomfort, Zuri chose relief that Elena really was alive.

Avani gasped. “Jesus, who knew vampires could feel so sad?” she muttered, her voice straining in a way that made it obvious how hard she was pushing to catch Elena’s energy. To zero in on it until she revealed herself.

Focusing on the ring, Zuri painted as vivid a picture of Elena in her mind as she could produce. Unintentionally, she drifted to the night Elena had given her the ring. Before she’d had it modified to conceal the small blade.

They’d been tangled in Elena’s sheets, limbs intertwined and bodies slick with sweat. Insisting on leaving her penthouse balcony door open, Elena’s bedroom was warm and thick with the scent of the ocean beyond.

Elena, propped up on one elbow, traced lazy circles on Zuri’s bare stomach with her fingertips. Her touch, always electric, didn’t let Zuri relax.

“Did I ever tell you how I acquired this?” Elena asked, her voice husky and soft. She held up the ring, the garnet catching the moonlight streaming in through the window. “I took it off a dead pirate captain in 1818.”