Page 67

“We’re almost there, my lord,” Cormac announced.

Aidan already knew, but he felt Rae tense beside him, her heartbeat quickening along with her murmuring.

Easy, Witch,he told her, letting a little of his abilities wash over her, calming her.

I’m a little busy, Vampire,she snapped, but her heartbeat steadied.

If you can pull magic from other sources the same way you can conceal it, I want you to do it. Understood?To pull from him, if she needed it, like he knew she had before.

Rae didn’t answer.

Farren.He needed to hear she wouldn’t put herself in danger, but the thought almost pulled a harsh laugh from his chest. Rae was a fucking magnet for danger.

Shut up and let me concentrate. We’re almost there and your power still feels like a fucking beacon.

He could feel the effects of her spell like a veil had been dropped over his magic, knew that whatever she’d been doing had been successful.

They’re coming,he told her, and Rae’s murmuring ceased as the vehicle slowed to a stop.

Aidan let his chin slump to his chest, feigning unconsciousness just as the doors flew open.

“Get your fucking hands off me,” Rae seethed, air moving around them as someone yanked her from the vehicle. The sack was removed from her head, and she let Aidanin, let him see exactly what she could: the male that greeted Cormac and the two that pulled her from the vehicle.

The familiar signature of the hybrids stung Aidan’s senses, these three slightly different than the two quickly approachingthem in another vehicle. Five of them, already, and Aidan could feel more nearby. Many, many more. He relayed everything to his units, but his attention remained on Rae. No matter how much he wanted to let his Provident powers loose over the hybrids, he couldn’t, not yet. They needed to get inside the facility, as deep as possible if they were to pull this off.

“What are you doing?” Rae asked as she watched the blond one, a Hoof, open a case. “They’ve already been administered twice their body weight in sedatives.”

The Hoof shrugged. “Can never be too careful.”

Rae tore her arm from the other hybrid’s grip, slamming her weight against the case, the contents smashing at their feet. “Oops.” The Hoof backhanded her across the face, and Rae’s warning came sharp and fast in Aidan’s thoughts.Don’t you fucking dare blow this, Vale.She spat at the Hoof’s feet. “That tickled.”

He was the first one of them Aidan would kill. The other two hybrids arrived, leading Rae, Cormac, and the driver away and into a warehouse, the mountain range looming over it. The blond Hoof dragged him out of the vehicle, and it took Aidan everything in him not to lash the bastard’s brain there and then. But he played along, his body slack, Orion’s falling against him as they were moved onto something with wheels, the flimsy thing shaking beneath their weight.

Aidan focused on Rae. On communicating everything to his units. On the two hybrids wheeling him and Orion into the facility, which, thanks to Rae, he knew to be a factory the humans used for building their larger machinery. Rods of metal sat floor to ceiling in towering stacks. Rae’s gaze roamed over everything. For her benefit, as well as his, but every bit of information she gave him he passed back to his team.

He wasn’t interested in Cormac’s thoughts or his driver’s, and he couldn’t get a firm hold on the five hybrids, but that cameas no surprise. Instead, he cast the net of his abilities further, deeper into the facility, feeling out the minds of everyone inside. Too many of them were afraid. Too many were close to death.

A door swung open and Rae’s gaze snapped to Weyland, taking in his greying hair and the stubble shadowing his face. The whites of his eyes were tinged grey, a telltale sign of xion use. Rae’s attention slid to the tremor in his left hand to confirm it.

“A human, Cormac,” Weyland said, his tone bored as he circled Rae. “She was the best you could do?” Rich, given that he was probably one of the most worthless humans Aidan had ever encountered.

Someone tore the sack off his head, but he kept his eyes closed, continuing to watch everything from Rae’s perspective.

“Not just any human,” Cormac said with something like pride in his tone. “She’s his Odalik.”

The human stared; Aidan was already deep enough into his mind to know he didn’t have the first clue about Vampire traditions. Why would he? Weyland’s desires required only power, not knowledge.

Rae’s sigh filled the silence. “I’m his wife, asshole.”

It was the first time he’d heard her say it, a deep sense of pride stirring in his chest at the words, but he focused on Weyland. The human had never met Rae, though she’d followed him closely; her Omnia recruits had been tailing him for months. Aidan sifted through Weyland’s mind for answers as quickly as possible, the human none the wiser.

“And this is Orion,” Cormac continued, “commander of his First Unit, also on your list of names.”

“Excellent,” Weyland drawled, tucking his shaking hand under his other arm. “This night is improving rapidly.”

“Scarlett?” Cormac breathed, panic flaring from him. Aidan calmed the Vampire’s racing heart, but with his attention sodivided, it didn’t stop Cormac from taking a step closer to Weyland.

Three hybrids moved between them, but the human held out a hand. “What of her?”