Page 84

PULLED BACK HOME

Nick avoided lookingat Morley as they climbed the next set of stairs.

He did that at first because he worried his eyes might have flushed scarlet.

Now he did it because he could tell Morley was wondering about him again, and Nick didn’t want to have to explain what was going on with him.

He kept his eyes trained elsewhere as they climbed the narrower flight of stairs, making their way up to the third floor. Nick still fought with the flood of blood lust that had risen at the thought of his mate’s ex. He wanted that completely gone before they got to Jordan. He didn’t want to alarm his friend, or his boss for that matter.

He definitely didn’t want to give either of themmorereasons to worry he might be going off the deep end.

For the same reason, he’d kept his head tilted down, his eyes on the carpeted steps.

They didn’t have the electronic versions here.

Which made sense. They seemed to be about old things here.

There was also an elevator that went up and down all four floors.

Again, Nick forced his mind back to the job, to why they were there.

He knew it was partly to distract himself from thinking about Wynter with that old seer, but the fact that his mind kept wanting to go to those places was maddening. Why the fuck was he thinking about this shit now? They needed to find this fucker first.

He couldn’t do anything before that.

Nick needed to find him, and take him down.

Prison or death. He had no preference as to which one it was. He knew prison would mean death for a vampire like this anyway. It would more be a matter of who killed him, Nick or someone in the I.S.F., or possibly the H.R.A., if they decided to make an example of him internationally for some reason.

Regardless, killing this vamp was his only priority right now.

He needed to deal with that first, keep his mate and his friends safe. He could think about old seers and interdimensional wormholes after that.

Nick could deal with his jealousy and his rage at the old seer and his wifeafterthat.

He couldn’t even remember exactly why he was so angry at those two seers.

But that wasn’t entirely true either.

You know why. Because they hurt your mate. Because they hurt Dalejem.

The thought came through to him so clearly it shocked him.

It also felt absolutely true.

But all of this was still beside the point.

He couldn’t be this distracted right now. He’d been distracted for days, before the dead bodies even appeared. He’d been too distracted to do his job correctly. He’d been distracted by Wynter, by those fucked up dreams of death, by the bodies of children and parents, by visions of wormholes and half-returning memories. He’d been distracted worrying about Jordan and the baby, and knowing every word he said would be picked up by the racial authority.

Nick was letting all of this get too personal.

Being arrested by his own people hadn’t helped.

Getting head-fucked by the I.S.F. hadn’t helped.

He needed to find that piece of shit “Stranger” before the murderous, crazy fuck got anywhere near someone he truly cared about.

Because Nick already suspected that was next.