Page 26

Leah

Addison was gone.

I stumbled out of the wrecked building, just in time to watch her disappear—nothing but tail lights in the distance.

The remaining Leyore women were scattered across the rubble-strewn lot. Maxine’s family had fucked off just as quickly as they had arrived, slinking into the shadows without a backward glance.

Maxine herself was trembling on her feet, fists curling and uncurling at her sides. My heart had damn near exploded when that monster chucked her out the window, and the relief of seeing her on her feet was almost too much to bear.

I rushed over to her, inspected her from top to toe, and tugged her into my arms. Maxine leaned into me, wordlessly coiling her arms around my waist.

Over her shoulder, I glanced at Hunter—standing, or rather trying to stand, near a toppled wall, while Jordan hovered about trying to steady her. The air smelled of soot, blood, and cold dampness that matched the icy dread in my bones.

Hunter’s face was a mask of pain and fury. Blood stained her temple and she clutched at her side with trembling fingers. Her eyes blazed, glinting with anguish.

Addison was gone.

I watched Hunter through a sheet of rain, and for a split second those haunted eyes locked onto me. But then Maxine stepped out of my grasp and turned. Her mouth settled in a grim line, and Hunter’s eyes slid to her, pupils narrowing to pinpricks.

“ You, ” Hunter snarled. She lunged forward, nearly toppling over. Jordan tried to halt her, but she shoved the redhead off, stumbling a few steps. “This is on you , Maxine.”

Maxine blanched, her face twisting with remorse. She opened her mouth to speak, but before any words could form Hunter closed the distance between them, furious tears rimming her red eyes.

“You dragged us into your family drama. You lied and you kept secrets, and now Addison–” Her voice caught on Addison’s name. She took a ragged breath, and her expression contorted with pure grief. “Addison is gone. That monster has her—he has her because of you!”

“Hunter–” Maxine’s voice cracked, her posture faltering. “I’m so–”

“So what. Sorry?!” Hunter spat, cutting her off. “I don’t want your apology, Maxine. I want Addison back! ” Her fury radiated outward, fierce enough that Jordan stepped in, arms raised in a cautionary gesture.

“ Hunter, ” Jordan hissed, catching the seething vamp before she could stumble to her knees again. “Calm down. This isn’t Maxine’s fault.”

“Not her fault!?” Hunter raged anew, grasping desperately to her anger so she wouldn’t have to feel anything else. Anger was always an easier emotion to handle than grief. “I knew we should have done this in San Francisco. I told you—all of you!”

“Then we’re all to blame,” Jordan murmured, tentatively touching a soothing hand to Hunter’s back. “Maxine did the best she could.”

“I don’t care about that. Addison is gone! ” Hunter slapped her hand away, bracing her hands on her knees when her unsteady feet refused to obey. Her accusatory eyes returned to Maxine, brimming with vicious fury.

I edged closer to Maxine, quietly planting myself between her and Hunter and lifting my chin. Hunter could tear straight through me, even in her roughed-up state, but even so, I did my best to shield Maxine from the brunt of her angry gaze.

“It’s going to be okay.” Jordan approached Hunter cautiously, eventually looping an arm over her shoulders. “Addison is going to be okay. We just need a plan.”

I found myself nodding along. We just needed a plan. We needed a plan and then everything would be okay… right? So, what was the plan?

All eyes looked to Maxine and she stared back, folding her arms over her chest. “I–I don’t know. I don’t know what to do.”

A few minutes later Hunter and Jordan were frantically debating our next move. Their voices merged into a muffled roar in my ears as I prowled the edge of the deserted lot, scanning for Maxine. She’d slipped away a moment earlier, so quietly I hadn't noticed her departure.

It was only when I reached for her hand and found empty air that I realized she was gone.

A jolt of alarm shot through me when I finally spotted her near a broken metal fence, moving with quiet purpose toward the shadowy street beyond. She was limping slightly from her earlier injuries, shoulders bowed under a burden of guilt.

“ Maxine! ” I hissed, trying to keep my voice down. “Where the hell are you going?”

She paused, glancing over her shoulder, eyes widening at the sight of me. We converged at the rusted fence, incessant rain splattering mud around our ankles.

“Where are you going?” I asked again, though I could already guess the answer by the haunted look in her eyes.

“I–” She hesitated, a flicker of conflict crossing her face. “I have to fix this.”

I eyed her warily, half-expecting her to bolt like a spooked rabbit. “What are you going to do?”

The rain hammered down around us. Water dripped from Maxine’s hair, rivulets streaking down her cheeks. Rain, or tears, or both? I couldn’t tell—my own eyes stung with the same mixture of salt and sorrow.

Maxine stood before me, jaw set, her battered body trembling.

“I’m going to give myself up.” She tried to say it firmly, but I could hear the waver beneath the words.

My heart lurched. Anger and dread flared so fiercely I could barely breathe.

“No. No—you can’t do that to me again,” I hissed, stepping closer until our faces were inches apart, the rain plastering my hair against my forehead. “ You can’t leave me again! ”

Maxine swallowed hard, dropping her gaze. “If I don’t, Gregor will kill Addison. You saw what he did—he’s unstoppable. This is the only way to make him back off, to–”

“No!” My shout cracked in my throat as I seized her shoulders. A fresh wave of raindrops spattered down, trailing icy rivulets along the exposed skin of my arms. “Don’t you dare walk away from me again, Maxine. There has to be another way.”

“I wish there was.” She looked away, tears mingling with the rain on her lashes. “But Gregor’s obsessed. You don’t understand how deep it goes. Ever since my family forced a blood bond on us, he’s been fixated on me. He’ll stay that way until the day he dies.”

I froze, dread wrapping cold fingers around my spine. “Blood bond?”

She nodded, something like shame crossing her features.

“When my parents arranged our marriage, they performed this ritual—mixing our blood with a muttered spell.” Thunder rumbled overhead, matching the anxious thrum in her words.

“They said it would bind us so we’d always want each other, no matter what.

And if one of us found our real mate—the person whose soul calls to yours—the blood bond would keep the marriage from falling apart.

It was meant to override any actual feelings of love, to forge an artificial attachment. ”

A ragged breath escaped her. “That’s why Gregor is hellbent on getting me back. But… the spell—it never worked on me.”

My grip on her shoulders tightened. “Why not?”

Maxine’s lips trembled. She closed her eyes briefly, rain tracing dark paths along her cheeks. “I never understood—until now.”

She hesitated and I waited, breathing catching in my throat.

Maxine opened her eyes, bright and glossy and brimming with tears. “The blood bond didn’t work because I’d already found my mate. The spell didn’t take hold, because my heart, my everything … it already belonged to someone else.”

I felt my pulse stutter, tears prickling hot in my eyes. “What are you saying?”

“It’s you, Leah,” she whispered, voice barely audible over the thundering rain. “You’re my mate—the one who has my heart. I know it sounds insane, but it’s the only explanation. My parents’ stupid ritual failed because… I was already bound to you.”

Something fragile inside my chest crumbled to dust, the final wall between us caving inward, and I could finally, finally see her. I stared at her, the rain turning both of us into bedraggled specters in the storm. But I could look at her forever.

“Maxine,” I choked out, fresh tears merging with the downpour.

For a moment I couldn’t speak, though a million things came to mind. I loosened my grip on her shoulders, dropping my hands to fist in her jacket, raindrops catching on my lashes. “That’s—God, that’s why he’s so set on getting you back?”

“Yes.” Maxine exhaled shakily. “He can’t understand why the spell didn’t tie me to him, and it’s driving him insane. He thinks I’m his, but I’m not. I never was.”

A bitter laugh escaped me. “You’re insane if you think I’ll just let you go to him. Not now. Not when I finally–” My voice wobbled, raw with the confession burning to be free.

Maxine’s eyes slid shut, mascara streaking down her cheeks. “I have to, Leah. If that’s the price for saving Addison, for saving everyone–”

“No!” I repeated, desperation turning my voice into a near-sob. My hands lifted to cup her face, forcing her to meet my gaze despite the rain lashing around us. “No. If he won’t relent until the day he drops dead, then we’ll just have to kill him.”

Maxine’s eyes widened. “That’s impossible. He’s ancient, he’s too strong.”

“So what?” I shot back, tears and rain indistinguishable on my cheeks. “We’ll do it together or we’ll die trying.” The vow scorched my tongue, fierce and unyielding. “I’m not letting you hand yourself over. I refuse to live in a world where you vanish from my life all over again.”

A strangled sound escaped her, half-sob, half-laugh. “Why would you go to these extremes for— me?! ” She looked heartbroken by the question, like she couldn’t understand the depths of what I felt for her.

“ Are you fucking dense?! ” I didn’t mean to yell, but the wind was roaring around us and the blood was rushing in my ears and I had to tell her, I had to tell her, I had to tell her. “Because I love you, you idiot! God —how have you not realized that yet?”

For a single heartbeat, everything stopped. The pounding rain paused in the sky, the clouds ceased rushing by overhead, the tears on my cheeks slowed to a crawl. Maxine stared at me, trembling lips parting.

Then she gave a wobbly smile, a crackling laugh. A beautiful sight.

“I love you too.”

Nothing else mattered. Not a single, goddamn thing. I pulled her in, pressing my lips to hers in a desperate, hungry kiss, the cold rain in stark contrast to the blaze in my chest.

Maxine gripped my collar, yanking me closer, and we drowned in each other, oblivious to the torrent of rain whipping down from the sky, and the wind that snatched at our hair, our clothes. I clung to her, welding my body to hers, leaving no sliver of space between us.

Eventually we broke apart, panting, our foreheads steepled together. Every inch of me trembled with adrenaline and raw emotion.

“Okay… Okay. I can’t—I won’t leave you behind again,” Maxine breathed softly, brushing a lock of sopping hair from my forehead. “I swear it.”

I nodded, swallowing the lump in my throat. “Good.” My voice came out rough, but I soldiered on. “Because if you do, I’ll just come after you. I’ll follow you anywhere. That’s a promise.”

Her sobbing slipped into a broken laugh, and she kissed me again, gentler this time. “That sounds more like a threat than a promise.”

“Semantics,” I muttered, kissing her back. I pressed my lips to her mouth, her cheek, her forehead. I kissed the tears from her lashes and tangled my fingers in her hair. “Now let’s go kill this bastard.”