Page 183 of Dark Souls

“Break a leg,” I said to her.

“I might break someone else’s just so they can’t run away.” She winked before she disappeared before our eyes.

“She is so perfect for Luka in every way. She’s exactly what he needs,” Hana said with a smile.

My eyes roamed down to her hands, her thumbs still moving nervously in her lap as she stared at the sigil on the table. Forcing courage to the surface, I carefully slipped my hand between hers, entwining our fingers as her lips parted at our touch. My hand completely engulfed hers, but nothing had ever felt so right. She peered up at me before giving me the sweetest smile that made her face blossom like a flower in spring. My chest puffed with pride, knowing I was solely responsible for putting it there.

“I’m sorry if I keep staring,” I whispered, leaning slightly closer to her and inhaling her strawberry scent.

“Do you? I hadn’t noticed,” she lied. The curve of her lips told me she definitely had noticed.

“He does,” Leif added, running his hands over the sigil, closing his eyes and then muttering something under his breath before he started writing something in his notebook in Latin.

I rolled my eyes and Hana giggled. The sound was so beautiful; I wanted to record it and make it my ringtone. Was that weird? That was definitely weird.

“It’s just… I can’t believe you’re mine.”

There was that breath-taking smile again. Her thumb rolled over my knuckle as she looked down at our hands. Her smile suddenly fell, and I felt her whole demeanour change. Concern forced me to act as I placed my fingers under her chin and raised her face to look at me. She had tears in her eyes.

“Hey? What’s wrong?”

“You might not want me when you know… what’s happened to me. What he…”

“Hey,” I said firmly, forcing her eyes to lock with mine. “I will never not want you. What happened to you wasn’t your fault, Hana.”

“I know. But I’m going to need time. To trust. To take this slow.” She said it like she thought it would disappoint me. I hated that.

“I understand. You take all the time you need. I’m not going anywhere.”

“You promise?”

“I promise.”

Love.

“Themorning?!Areyouserious? No way. Demand he come here now!” I shouted.

After spending all night controlling my emotions and allowing the festering anger and hatred to build up inside, I felt like a bomb about to detonate; blowing everyone who dared get in my way to smithereens. And now I knew who was responsible. I couldn’t contain my fury anymore. I didn’t want to.

Mitchell and Parisa Morton. Lia’s fucking parents. I should have known that Lia was raised by the devil. I’d only met Mitchell on a few occasions. Royal events or in passing in the castle corridors after he’d had a meeting with Grandpapi. He was the commander of the Romano Vampire Army. Basically, the next most important position after my grandpapi, who had trusted him enough to give him that position. Grandpapi’s best friend Ren would have been his first choice, but as he was elected a council member it was seen as a conflict of interest, so he settled on Mitchell, a man who had been loyal to him when he had taken over from Lucius.

I had to hand it to him. Mitchell had everyone fooled that he was this polite, respectable, albeit ambitious but fair family man. He’d always presented himself as devoted to our clan and even asked my grandpapi if he could help with some of the funds when he started Academy Pro-Omnibus. And Parisa. I can’t ever remember really meeting her. She’s kept her head down, so to speak. I am sure I have at royal events, but I’d never given that family much notice or much of my time because, well, I hated their fucking daughter with a passion.

“It’s already 4am. It’s only a few hours away. Grandpapi had arranged a breakfast meeting with Mitchell to go over schedules for the newly appointed soldiers. If we want to keep one step ahead of them, we need to maintain an image of being unsuspecting. It will also give you the chance to meet Lia while her father is detained here and find out how much involvement she has in all of this.”

“Luka and Heathen might not have a few hours! For all we know, they could be planning to kill them tonight! And you want me to wait?”

“Yes. Think about it, Ilaria. Why would Grandpapi call Mitchell to the castle at 4am?” Mum argued.

“I don’t know! Make something up! He’s the commander of the Romano Army. Pretend there has been a breach in protocol or an attempted attack on the castle!”

Dad shook his head. “He’d know. If either of those were true, Mitchell would be informed through his alarm watch and the higher-ranked soldiers would report to him.”

I growled, frustration causing my skull to tingle as I leaned my hand against the window ledge in Grandpapi’s office.

“We need to give Leif time to work on Hana’s sigil and try to find a counter spell to free her demon’s soul as well,” Mum added, and I pressed my forehead against the glass. I watched as my breath caused a cloud of condensation against the freezing window. Beneath the raging anger, I knew they were all talking sense. I knew they were thinking rationally and logically, creating a foolproof plan, but they were missing the most important component. Mitchell and Parisa could destroy that sigil at any moment and kill my mate. Maybe tomorrow, maybe in a week or a month. Or maybe tonight. And I would never forgive myself if I just sat here, waiting for the sun to rise before I did anything to save them.

“I know it’s hard, Ilaria. I know you want to burn the world down to find him right this very second, but just like when you handled Wesley, you need to be calm and have patience–” my dad started saying, and I spun around, folding my arms over my chest. Did they all have short-term memory loss?