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SIX

Sorsha

I’d never been to any sort of reunion—family, class, or otherwise—but I doubted there’d ever been one as joyful as when Omen ushered me across the cracked pavement of an otherwise vacant lot to the waiting RV.

I was still ten feet from the door when it burst open. Snap sprang out first and dashed to me with his usual serpentine grace.

He wrapped his arms around me and tucked my head under his chin with a sigh as if my arrival had put every wrong thing in the world right. I hugged him back just as eagerly. Didn’t I wish our problems could be solved that easily.

Pickle scampered after the devourer with excited little squeaks, Thorn chasing behind the little dragon with a worried glance over his shoulder to make sure no mortals were close enough to the parking lot to see. My foster creature twined around my ankles, still chirping away.

Ruse sauntered over to join us at a more languid pace, but his smile beamed with far more affection than his typical smirk. Heedless of the hold Snap had on me, the incubus leaned in to claim a kiss so intent it left every part of me tingling, in part because I knew just how enjoyable it could be to be adored by both these men at the same time.

Thorn made a sound of consternation but looked as though it was more that he wished he’d thought of making the same gesture than that he objected to the incubus’s forwardness. He seemed to decide Pickle wasn’t causing any real trouble as long as the tiny creature stuck close to my legs and left off that chase. When Ruse released me, the warrior squeezed my shoulder, not quite smiling himself but with a thrum of pleased energy emanating from his brawny frame.

“It’s good to have you back where you belong,” he said, which from the wingéd was practically a standing ovation.

“Then I expect an even more enthusiastic welcome than that,” I informed him. I bobbed up on my toes with the devourer’s arms still around me, and a hint of a real smile crossed Thorn’s lips. He brought them to mine, giving me a taste of the passion that resided beneath his stoic front.

The other wingéd man who’d joined us more recently, Flint, hung back but appeared to at least be not upset to see me. Antic bounded around our cluster with actual applause and bursts of gleeful giggling.

“She’s back, she’s back; the Highest didn’t eat her!” she crowed.

Yes, I was rejoicing that fact too, even if I wasn’t totally clear on what had won Omen over. Just for that moment, I didn’t feel any need to dwell on that. I was back where I belonged, a monstrous human among monstrous shadowkind, and I couldn’t imagine wanting any company more. Not even the bitter tang of asphalt baking in the warm autumn air could cut through my relief.

Omen gave Snap a sharp look. “How much do our new recruits know now?”

The imp’s chant appeared to have stirred something in my devourer. He lifted his head just enough to fix his moss-green eyes on Omen. I felt his body bristle against me with a trickle of aggressive energy as if he might be about to rise into full devourer form, both wondrous and horrifying.

“Enough to realize how awfully you treated Sorsha. How could you have even thought about giving her to them?” His clear, sweet voice came in a more forceful tone than I’d ever heard it take before. “You didn’t even talk to her—or us. You hurt her.” He touched his gentle fingertips to the bruise Omen’s blow had left on my temple, careful not to provoke any further pain. His other arm tightened around me as if he thought the hellhound shifter might change his mind and attempt to charge off with me again.

Huh. Apparently it wasn’t just the warrior wingéd who was prepared to do battle to keep me safe. I’d never thought of Snap as much of a fighter, but I wouldn’t have wanted to go up against him at his fiercest.

I glanced over in time to see Omen practically gaping at the devourer, obviously startled by the chiding. His jaw worked, and his face returned to the same tense, unshakeable mask it’d been since he’d hauled me out of the cave. He took in the rest of our companions assembled around me, all of them now watching him in silence. Possibly wondering whether he was going to attempt to take off Snap’s head for insubordination.

I shifted my weight, preparing to do some defending of my own if the hellhound laid into the devourer, but I didn’t need to. Omen ducked his head, just slightly, and said, “I acted too hastily. It won’t happen again.”

He was admitting he’d made a mistake? My eyebrows shot up. “It’s the end of the world as we know it,” I couldn’t help saying.

Omen’s eyes narrowed as they returned to me, and I tensed all over again. I had the feeling my release wasn’t so much a free pass as a conditional reprieve. And Omen hadn’t bothered to tell me what the conditions of my remaining free were. Probably he’d be noting every slip I made for any excuse to proclaim me a real disaster after all.

“It had better not happen again,” Snap said to the hellhound shifter. “If you try, it might be the end of you .”

I wasn’t sure how easily he could make good on the threat, but given that he had Thorn for back-up, it wasn’t impossible.

Omen appeared to take it seriously enough. His voice turned curt, a few tufts of his hair rising with his temper. “If I say something, I mean it. She’s back, isn’t she?”

Snap made a discontented sound as if to say he wasn’t excusing the matter that easily, but he let it drop for now.

Omen scanned the lot again. “Did we lose the night elf?”

Ruse waved his hand dismissively. “Gloam felt ‘uncomfortable’ with the ‘hostile energies’ and took off.”

My heart sank a little. We were just getting started against an even more powerful enemy than we were anticipating, and we were already shedding allies like a cat shed hair.

The incubus folded his arms over his chest. There was something wary in his expression as he considered his boss. “So, where are we taking things from here?” he asked, a little too purposefully casual to be casual at all. “Off to tackle your good friend who’s mixed herself up with the Company?”

“Tempest is not my ‘friend’,” Omen muttered, and drew himself up a little straighter. He wasn’t the tallest of our bunch by a longshot, but the power and authority he exuded simply standing there gave him a stature that couldn’t be ignored. “But I do know her well, and I think we may be able to use her to our own ends—both to dismantle the Company and to convince the Highest they can lay off on Sorsha. But first we need to get over there.”

Thorn frowned. “Over where?”

“From what she’s said, I assume she’s set up shop in Versailles. She always used to talk about this dream of convincing some royal figure to build a palace so lavish it outdid all others. She finds mortal extravagance both incredibly amusing and appealing. I thought the Sun King’s tastes in that area aligned awfully close to hers—if I’d known she was still alive, I’d have recognized her influence in it immediately.”

Omen squinted past the warrior toward the Everymobile. “Do you think you and your wingéd brethren could handle heaving Darlene through the nearest rift—and bringing her out one of the Paris-area openings?”

“I might even be able to manage it on my own,” Thorn said without hesitation. “I’m not sure how well the mortal vehicle will adapt to the journey, though.”

I’d never heard of any shadowkind taking a mortal-side object that large through the shadow realm before. I’d never been taken into the shadow realm before myself. A chill rippled over my skin despite Snap’s embrace. “Are we sure that I’ll adapt to the journey?”

Omen gave me another of those unreadable looks he kept a collection of. “I’d imagine you’re shadowkind enough to survive the trip, but I wasn’t planning on making an experiment of it just yet. There may be something about your hybrid energies that would alert the Highest if you ventured into their realm. I was thinking you’d fly over the traditional way, with the incubus to smooth over matters of tickets and passports, and we’ll meet up on that side. That way we’ll have our living space and transport wherever we have to go rather than starting over from scratch.”

That made sense. Before the unicorn shifter and centaur who owned the Everymobile had lent it to us, we’d been going through vehicles like a squirrel went through nuts. Although generally those nuts didn’t get blown up. It was awfully handy having a place to crash—if you needed to sleep, like I did—and to hold meetings in and so on that could be on the road at the same time.

And I wasn’t in any hurry to make my first foray, however brief, into the world of shadows.

“I approve of that plan,” I said, and nudged Ruse. “Can you hook us up with first-class seats?”

He grinned. “Hooking up is my specialty.”

Even though that sounded delightful all around, Thorn’s frown had deepened. “Perhaps I should also accompany Sorsha, to ensure…” He trailed off with unusual reluctance.

“I’ll be fine,” I said, and hugged Snap to me once more before easing away from him, since I knew the devourer was even more likely to worry about letting me out of his sight. “They’ll need you to toss the Everymobile through the rift. It’s not as if the Company of Light will be searching every airplane to Paris for me. Omen’s friend isn’t going to expect his people to be traveling the human way.”

“Again,” Omen started. “She isn’t?—"

I waved him off. “I know, I know, she’s not your friend. Po-tay-to, po-tah-to.” But Thorn didn’t appear to be at all reassured. I cocked my head. “Is something else bothering you? You know I look after myself pretty well.”

Who would have thought his frown could get even deeper? For a second, he looked adorably awkward—at least, as adorable as a musclebound giant of a man could look. “It’s no matter, m’lady,” he said, starting to turn away.

Oh, no, he wasn’t getting away with that non-answer. Thankfully, I’d been around Thorn enough to know exactly how to break through his stoicism. I marched over to him and tucked my hand around his elbow. “A word with you in private, my good sir?”

Even though I was teasing him a little, he couldn’t resist the formal politeness of the request. “As the lady wishes,” he said, and for once strode off with me to the edge of the parking lot without glancing at Omen to confirm the boss was all right with the delay. Interesting. Maybe their skirmish back in my prison room had left more fault lines in our alliance than I’d realized. I didn’t think that was necessarily a good thing.

When we were far enough from the others that they wouldn’t overhear us, I turned to Thorn. “All right. What’s the matter? And don’t tell me nothing—I can tell something’s eating at you.”

He grimaced and looked at the ground. “It doesn’t need to concern you.”

“Sure it doesn’t, but I’m concerned anyway. And I’m not letting it go until you spill the beans, so you might as well speed things along by getting right to that part.”

He gave me a glower that was as fond as it was exasperated. Then any trace of humor in his face faded. “In the canyon. You forced an end to our fight—you gave yourself up.”

“Well, seeing as it was either that or watching you two tear each other to pieces…”

His jaw clenched. “I would have managed to get you free. I struck out at the one I swore to serve to ensure it. But you… you were willing to stay caged? To let the Highest do with you what they will?”

Ah. I could see how that idea might not sit well with him.

I rested my hand on his arm. “I didn’t like the idea of facing the Highest. I just liked the idea of you or Omen—or both of you—dying instead because neither of you would back down even less. They’re not going to stop looking for me, and I’ve made myself a hell of a lot more visible in the last few weeks, so chances are I’m going to have to face them eventually anyway. But if no one else’s lives are on the line, I’ll make sure that ‘eventually’ is as far away as possible.”

“I would fight to the death if it meant saving you from some awful fate,” Thorn began, and I gripped his forearm harder.

“Think about how you feel when you picture the Highest sending their minions to kill me. I felt at least that awful watching you and Omen bashing each other around. If you’re allowed to save me, I’m allowed to save you too, remember?”

He opened his mouth and then closed it again. “I see,” he said finally. “When you put it that way… It was not giving up. It was simply a different maneuver in your own battle.”

“That’s one way of putting it.” I shot him a smile. “You should know I’m not in the habit of giving up.”

“That was precisely why the possibility was so disconcerting.”

“Well, you don’t have to worry about it. Now I’m totally focused on kicking some sphinx butt the old-fashioned way. Come on. You’ve got an RV to schlep all the way through another dimension.”

When we returned to the others, Snap tugged me to him for a lingering kiss. “If you should need anyone else to come with you on the plane…”

I could just imagine how many stares his heavenly beauty would draw. “I think we’ll be lower profile if it’s just the two of us. But I’ll aim to be back with you as soon as humanly possible. And I promise when we don’t have murdering psychos to deal with anymore, we’ll take all kinds of plane rides until you’re bored with them.”

He beamed at me and stole one more kiss. Then he shot Ruse a stern look, as if to say the incubus had better take good care of me, before following the others onto the RV.

Only Ruse and Omen remained. The hellhound shifter considered me so intently the hairs rose on my arms under his scrutiny.

“I promise not to crash the plane,” I said tartly.

The corner of his mouth twitched upward. “Do hold to that promise, Disaster. And be careful in general. We don’t know what minions the Highest might still have on the prowl. If you can manage not to cause any kind of spectacle, that would probably be for the best.”

Was he worried I might get myself caught before he could wriggle his way out of his deal? Well, I wouldn’t like the outcome of that either. “I’ll do my best to remain unchained.”

His lips twitched in the other direction at that remark. For a second, I thought he was going to add something, but then he shook his head with a jerk and stalked onto the Everymobile without another word in farewell.

* * *

Ruse went all out on the plane ride. As far as I could tell, he’d decided it was his job to pamper me into forgetting the dingy digs I’d been stuck in for the two days prior.

Along with charming a sales rep at the L.A. airport into giving us a couple of snazzy first-class seats, he somehow managed to get us served an extra posh—as airplane food went—three-course meal complete with fine wine.

“Would you prefer caviar or filet mignon?” he asked me while he held the attendant in his thrall.

I blinked at him. “Is that a joke?”

“There are very few things I won’t joke about, but one of those is good food.”

Well, if he was offering… “I’ll take a slab of beef over fish eggs any day, thank you.”

After we’d eaten, he insisted that I pick the movie we watched together on the little screens, and didn’t make a peep of complaint when I went with a slapstick comedy with about as much nuance as a steamroller. He massaged my shoulders and my feet until I got dozy. Then he tucked me in with a cashmere blanket on my reclined seat. I’d swear I heard him crooning some operatic French lullaby as I drifted off to sleep.

I woke up with the crackle of an announcement that the plane was about to begin its descent and opened my eyes to find the incubus gazing down at me with an almost fraught expression. It was only there for an instant, and then he was jerking his gaze away before returning his attention to me with a more typical sly smile and possibly the faintest of blushes coloring his pale cheeks. “Rise and shine, Miss Blaze.”

Ruse had told me he loved me for the first time less than an hour before our last mission. It’d obviously been difficult for him to reveal that emotion, even though I’d returned the sentiment. We hadn’t had time to settle into any kind of new normal afterward—maybe he was feeling a bit awkward about that still.

I squirmed upright with the swing of the seat back and reached over to grab his hand. “You’ve been awfully sweet the whole flight. Trying to give Snap a run for his money now that he’s honing in on your usual territory?”

Something flickered through the incubus’s expression and vanished just as quickly. He shrugged, a familiar twinkle lighting in his warm hazel eyes. “It’s the least I can do.”

“Well, your efforts have not gone unnoticed… nor will they go unrewarded.” I winked at him and walked my fingers along his jaw to draw him into a kiss, wishing I could slip them right under his cap to grasp his horns the way he liked without exposing them for all the regular mortals around us to see.

With the seatbelt lights already on, I couldn’t make that reward a membership to the mile-high club, but maybe that wasn’t what Ruse would have wanted most anyway. At least one woman he’d cared about in the past had shown she only cared about how well he could get her off in bed. Instead, I rested my head against his shoulder, nestling closer when he put his arm around me.

It was hard to feel all that sour about the bounty on my head when this whole mess had also brought the most fascinating, thrilling, and delectable men I could have imagined into my life.

Once we’d departed the plane, a few texts with Omen directed us to a quiet spot off the road between Paris and Versailles where he and the others had parked the Everymobile to wait for us. As we got out of the cab across the road from the RV, I couldn’t stop a startled laugh from spilling from my lips.

“What in sweet Satan’s name happened here?”

Maybe to someone who’d never seen it before, the Everymobile in its current state wouldn’t have looked that odd. But the trip through the shadow realm had definitely made an impact.

In its current tour bus form, bright purple polka dots spotted the lower edge of the vehicle’s otherwise dark walls with their sweeping yellow—made-up—logo. A crooked antenna I’d never seen before protruded at an angle over the windshield. And toward the rear end, a propeller I couldn’t figure out the function of was spinning wildly as if in a brisk wind, although the cool evening air around us barely moved.

The door opened, and Omen beckoned. “Stop gawking and get your asses on here.”

I reeled my jaw back in, but I stayed where I was. “What did you do to Darlene?” I said, intending to rankle him by using the name he’d given the vehicle despite it not really being his.

He let out a short huff of breath. “The transition through the shadow realm may have had a few side effects. She still runs just fine. Are you coming or did you fly all this way just to park yourselves here?”

I rolled my eyes at him with a teasing smile. “Excuse me for asking.”

We tramped on board. In the dining area, Snap promptly pulled me onto his lap where he was sitting on the sofa-bench and planted a possessive kiss on my mouth. The engine started up with a sputter and... a sound like distant bells ringing?

“Keep any commentary to yourself,” Omen grumbled from behind the wheel.

“All I have to say is, you definitely can’t blame this vehicular mishap on me.” I made a flourish with my hand toward the road ahead. “Next stop, Versailles!”