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The woman crossed her arms. “I sincerely doubt he had anything to do with it.”

“Can you tell me what you gave him?”

“You know I can’t do that. You know that, while most people come here for fun and to dabble, others come here for more medicinal reasons.”

Medicinal reasons?

“Please. It would mean a lot to me,” Sunny begged.

“I’m sorry, I can’t help you.”

Sunny just looked at her with pleading eyes.

She’d come all this way, but it looked like she would be leaving with nothing but more questions.

“If there’s nothing else you need, I suggest you leave and stop poking you nose in other people’s business.”

Sunny slumped her shoulders. “Of course. I’m sorry to have bothered you.”

Well . . . that was the waste of a trip.

No wonder all of this had slowly driven her father deep into madness. But she had something he didn’t have, a whole team of people who cared about her, a coven.

She needed to go home and tell Asher and everyone else what she found out. Maybe they could help her make some sense of it.

When she got back into her van, she just sat there, the disappointment of a wasted trip washing over her.

When she turned the key, the engine gave a couple chugs, then nothing.

“No! Not now. Come on, baby . . . You can do it.”

She turned the key again, and the engine gave another couple chugs before giving up. When she tried again, the engine finally turned over.

“Thank you,” she whispered into the ethos before she pulled out.

Maybe Asher could help her make sense out of what she’d discovered.

As she made her way down the highway, she checked the time. She was supposed to meet Asher hours ago at the diner. He would understand, and Betty had hopefully told him that she was going to be back. Still, she couldn’t shake the feeling that something was off.

She needed to follow Nox to find out what was going on, but she also knew that Asher might not handle her disappearing well. When she made it back to the Hollow, she could head straight to the mountain. Even after deciding that, she realized something just felt off.

Chapter

Thirty-Two

ASHER

Asher checked the time again before he continued pacing in front of Sunny’s house.

Where is she?

He’d checked the diner, the bar, everywhere he could think she might be in the Hollow.

His wolf was panicking, and he was trying to remain calm. She had said she wouldn’t leave. She had promised, but even reminding himself of that did little to stave the incoming spiral.

The sun was setting behind her house, and with each minute, it sank into the horizon the fear that she wasn’t coming back heightened.

He tried and tried to calm himself, but all he could feel was the panic he’d felt when he woke up the terrible morning all those years ago to a note saying his mate had left.