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Did she put up much of a fight?

“What do youmeanyou lost her?” Gwyn’s voice is shrill as she shouts into her phone. I can’t contain my grin as I saunter down the hallway. I might have underestimated Gwyn and gotten myself into this predicament, but she’s no stranger to failure either.

Margot

No. She thought Nico was pretty. You know how he is.

Roman

Did she try to use magic?

Margot

She was wearing a protection amulet, but that obviously didn’t matter.

I sigh. Nico is going to be fucking insufferable. Protection amulets only work if you don’t want the attention, and evidently she didn’t mind his.

I’m leaning against the doorframe of my father’s room when Gwyn throws a lamp at the wall beside me. She’s naked except for a thong and her rage, and fucking Christ, I need help.

A video comes through my phone a moment later. The clip starts with Nico’s face at an unflattering angle, and he murmurs about technology before flipping the camera around. First I see his foot, then a tire, then the trunk of Gwyn’s 1970 Chevelle SS. It’s a thing of beauty. Painstakingly rebuilt from the ground up by the man who raised her, it’s everything a classic muscle car should be. It’s been wasting away in the parking garage for the last few weeks, and I’d gleefully tossed Nico the keys when he left.

Gwyn hadn’t ordered the coven to keephimin. Only me.

And she hadn’t earned their loyalty either. Not a single person had told her.

I don’t think the Chevelle will be seeing any car shows in the near future as Nico pans up. His hand appears in front of the camera, reaching into the trunk toward black fabric that turns out to be a pillowcase. When he pulls it from a woman’s head, a flash of scarlet curls is all I can see until she shakes it out ofher face. He used duct tape on her mouth, and I can make out a magic blocking sigil drawn on it with a marker. Beneath her, there’s another one spray painted in the fabric of the trunk liner.

It hurts to see it. As Sasha wiggles and writhes and screams through the tape, I give a little pout about the damaged interior.

“What thefuckdid you do, Roman?” Gwyn shouts before tossing her phone on the bed as she tugs on a shirt. As the camera pans back up to Nico’s face, I exit out of the message. She doesn’t need to know shit.

“No bra, sweetheart?” I ask, and she throws her phone.

“What’s he doing there? Oh my fucking god, Gwyn.” Hale’s voice is tinny from the bed.

“Don’t worry. I didn’t let her fuck me,” I say. “Not for lack of trying, though.”

“Why is he there?” Hale yells, but Gwyn ignores him as she pulls on the tightest pair of leather pants I’ve ever seen. High-waisted, it takes her a moment to button them up, and she’s murmuring to herself as she does. She’s furious, and I’m thrilled. It’s the first time I’ve been able to properly take a breath since I saw my father splayed on the marble ballroom floor, Gwyn standing over him and dripping with his blood. I needed this.

“How did you get through to Emile? All your shit is monitored.” Hale murmurs. “How the fuck did he manage to evade all of my tracking spells? And now he’s taken Sasha. Goddammit.”

I go still. He thinks Emile is responsible for this, and I have no idea what the fuck he’s talking about. I haven’t been able to reach my uncle on his cell phone, and he hasn’t tried to contact me—other than incessantly tugging on my oath to him. Without being able to leave the compound, I have no idea where the other end of the command has come from. So, if he thinks Emile has something to do with it, I need to know why.

If I continue to ignore my uncle’s command, it’s going to infuriate him. I have no idea what he’ll do. And if there’s one person I want to see even less than Gwyn, it’s Emile. There will certainly be hell to pay whenever he sees me. What’s worse is that every moment of his rage is justified. If he commands me to swim to the middle of Lake Michigan and drown myself, I’ll deserve it.

“Why do you think it’s Emile?” I ask, taking note of Gwyn’s chewed up nails as she picks her phone up and takes it off speakerphone.

“Where are you?” Gwyn asks, shoving past me. “Millenium Park? Are you joking? Do you need me to send someone?” She walks through the kitchen to avoid the broken glass all over the living room. I go to the other side of the counter, hands in my pockets. As soon as she hangs up, she’ll begin what she thinks is an interrogation. But instead, she’ll find herself in the middle of a negotiation—and it’s one I don’t intend to lose.

Hale says something I can’t make out, and I haven’t been listening. I’ve been focused on the sound of Gwyn’s blood rushing as her frustration builds. The faint squeak of the leather as she walks, her thick thighs making the fabric rub, is equally distracting.

“I don’t want to hear it, Hale. You justhadto go ‘flick the Bean,’ didn’t you?”

“We weren’t just sightseeing. We were doing research too!” Hale insists, voice discernible now that I’m paying attention. “Emile is definitely close by. The pendulum won’t swing, which means he’s using some sort of?—”

“Okay!” Gwyn shouts, cutting him off as her eyes meet mine. I force my expression to go slack, choosing to reveal as little as possible to her. “Come back to the compound. I’m going to need your help.”

Gwyn hangs up and turns away from me. Twisting her hair up into a clip, she reveals bare, porcelain skin. Her shirt is a long-sleeved crimson, and it sits off the shoulder. I hate that I have the urge to come up behind her and press my lips and teeth to that revealed flesh.