Page 59

TWENTY-SIX

Sorsha

I woke up to a spray of grit pattering against my cheek. As I swiped it away, the morning sun seared my eyes through the broken window above me.

I’d fallen asleep on the RV’s sofa, one arm cradling my head and the other tucked against my bandaged belly. I couldn’t remember deciding to forego the actual bed—everything after the ramming of the armored truck into the Everymobile had turned into a blur.

Birds were chirping outside, and the next gust of wind brought a wash of pleasant warmth along with more grit. I sat up and squinted at the scene outside.

Right. Somewhere during our hasty flight last night, Ruse had switched the RV to its school bus setting. We’d parked in the lot outside a sprawling rural elementary school well outside the city limits. A stretch of trees beyond the lot blocked any view of the nearest buildings. On a Sunday, no one would be bothering us here.

At least, that should be the case. Leland might have overheard us talking about the city bus lot, but I didn’t see how he could have figured out what glamours the RV held unless he’d developed some unexpected supernatural power too. The best we could figure, he’d directed the Company to keep an eye on the Lincoln Road lot last night, and they’d tracked what would have looked to them like a city bus until they’d been able to get into a suitable position to ambush us.

Lord only knew what the people around the square had thought of the chaos afterward.

Pickle leapt up from the floor and tucked himself close to me, resting his chin on my thigh. As I scratched between his ears, three of my higher shadowkind companions materialized in the living space around me. Ruse took a glance into the kitchen cupboards and appeared disappointed with his findings. Thorn surveyed the inside of the RV as thoroughly as I suspected he’d just been investigating the grounds outside, his expression typically grim.

Omen brushed his hands together. “We appear to have evaded any additional assaults for the time being, but I don’t think we should count on that luck holding.”

If you could even call what we’d experienced so far “luck.” My gaze darted to the door to the master bedroom. “How’s Gisele?”

Thorn grimaced. “Still unconscious. I’ve seen shadowkind in a similar coma a few times before when they’re badly wounded… Sometimes they manage to regain enough energy to restore themselves, and sometimes they fade utterly into smoke in a couple of days.”

“At least we had the RV to drive off in before the mortals ended her completely.” Omen patted the wall. “You managed not to get one of our vehicles destroyed, Disaster. So far, anyway.”

I wasn’t in the mood to return his snark with more of the same. Bow must still be in the bedroom watching over his—friend? Wife? They’d never really clarified their relationship.

Shadowkind didn’t tend to pair up in a romantic sense in their own realm, but for mortal-side enthusiasts, who knew what human customs they might have gone in for beyond the horse feed and the other kind of grass. Whatever the case, the centaur and the unicorn shifter clearly cared about each other a lot.

My stomach clenched at the thought that next time it might be one of my trio who drew the short straw in facing off against the Company. And speaking of that trio…

I glanced around. “Where’s Snap?”

“Dozing in the shadows to sleep off that big meal, apparently,” Ruse said with amusement. “Hey, devourer, time to rejoin the physical realm!”

No slim figure emerged to answer his call. Ruse cocked his head and vanished into the dark patches himself. When he returned several seconds later, still alone, the clenching sensation crept up to the base of my throat.

“He wouldn’t have gone far,” the incubus said. “He’s always stuck close to the rest of us before. And we’ve all seen he’s particularly stuck on you.” He shot me a smile, but it was tense along the edges.

Thorn was frowning. “I didn’t encounter him during my sweeps of the area around the school. Where would he go?”

“Perhaps he heard there was a country fruit stand nearby,” Omen muttered, but his cool eyes betrayed more concern.

I got up to check the view from the windshield as if the others might have somehow missed him shooting hoops in the school yard. “When was the last time anyone saw him? I know he was in the RV with us when we took off from the square.”

I’d held onto him briefly then, confirming to myself that he was still the same passionately gentle man I’d found myself welcoming into my bed and my heart—and doing my best to reassure him that I knew it. I might have been startled by seeing his full shadowkind powers in action, and what he’d done to that guy hadn’t been pleasant to watch, but he hadn’t used them lightly. His regret over taking that step had been written all over his beautiful face afterward.

Ruse’s brow furrowed as he thought back to the previous night. “We talked about what he saw during his devouring. Then you two started patching up Sorsha’s wound, and I don’t think I heard anything from him after that. When we parked here for the night, I assumed he’d taken to the shadows to get some rest.”

“We were focused on helping Sorsha and finding somewhere safe to pass the night.” Thorn rubbed his chiseled jaw. His frown deepened. “I don’t recall taking note of him after that initial conversation either. It never occurred to me that he might leave.”

Fucking hell. A lump rose in my throat, almost choking me. “He was so ashamed of his power. You all saw the way he would react when it came up. He was so adamant that he’d never use it again, and then for him to feel like he had to…” Because of me.

It was all because of me, wasn’t it? Leland had tipped off the Company because of his grudge against me. The shadowkind had stayed by the RV instead of escaping into the shadows to protect me. I should have been paying more attention to Snap after—I should have noticed he was slipping away from us.

I dropped my head into my hands. Pickle nuzzled my arm as if sensing my distress, but the gesture didn’t give me much comfort. “Where would he have gone?” I asked the RV at large.

“I don’t know,” Ruse said. “I don’t think he’s been mortal-side long enough to have regular haunts.”

Omen’s voice had turned even flatter than usual. “If he isn’t in his right mind enough to stay with us, he’ll be easy pickings for any Company hunters prowling around. Let’s hope we find him—or he finds his way back to us—before they do.” His shoes scraped the floor as he swiveled. “You two take my bike back into the city. Try to follow the same route we took and watch for him. We also need to check the Wharf Street building so we know whether it’s still a valid target.”

I glanced up at him. “You’re letting Ruse drive ‘Charlotte’? What are you going to do?”

As Ruse and Thorn tramped out to detach the motorcycle from where Omen had clamped it to the back of the RV yesterday, hidden under the glamour, the hellhound shifter fixed his narrow gaze on me. “I’ve got to see how much more power we can drag out of you, mortal. If we’ve lost the element of surprise and Snap, we’re going to need you outright blazing to take the Company down and get him back.”

The last thing I felt like doing at this particular moment was tap dancing to Bossypants’s tune, but the look he gave me warned off any arguments. And he might have a point. It wasn’t as if I’d be doing Snap any good by sitting around and moping.

I marched after him out into the parking lot. He ushered me toward the school yard. Chalk marks from the previous week’s recesses colored the pavement in pastels: creamy hopscotch boxes, jagged pink and purple flowers, a mint-green abomination of a kitten. That kid better not have any dreams of art school.

The yard gave us plenty of space to work with. The sprawl of pavement stretched all around the brick school building and out to a larger stretch of grass, where football goal posts jutted toward the clear blue sky. I rolled my shoulders and shook out my arms, trying to shed the guilt twisting through my innards.

“Okay, here we are. What crap are you going to put me through this time?”

Omen had turned to face me. His eyes flashed. “I hardly think you can call it ‘crap’ when it’s gotten you this far. You could barely summon a spark to save yourself before, and last night you started a bonfire. It’d just be ideal if next time you could light up our enemies instead of random civic sculptures.”

He motioned to a piece of blue construction paper the breeze was nudging across the ground, doodled with gawky stick figures. “Let’s see if you can get a blaze started now without an immediate crisis hanging over you.”

He didn’t think Snap’s disappearance was a crisis? Maybe I should try setting his shirt on fire again. But as much as my emotions were churning inside me, it wasn’t the sort of distress that got my heart thumping. I glared at the shifter and then the paper, but no heat stirred beneath the gloomy funk that had come over me.

“What does this even matter?” I demanded. “We should be out there looking for Snap too—covering as much ground as we can.”

“It appears he’s been gone all night. He’s got too great a head start if we head out on foot, and we only have one vehicle I feel comfortable sending back into the city to simply meander around, thanks to this friend of yours and his loose lips.”

That provoked a flare, but of my temper rather than any voodoo. “He’s not my friend. He’s fucking nothing to me.” Which was exactly what had pissed Leland off. How had I ever been attracted to anything about him?

He’d seemed normal. Safe, as long as there were no strings attached. Look how wrong I’d proven to be about that.

“Nonetheless, my point stands.” Omen jerked his head toward the field. “Let’s at least get your pulse going, then, and see if that’s enough to jump-start your inner fire. Sprint between the goal posts a few times.”

To my irritation, my feet started to move automatically. I caught myself and planted them on the pavement. “No.”

The ice in Omen’s gaze hardened. “No?”

“You heard me, Luce. N. O. You ran me ragged at the fairgrounds, and that got us diddly squat. The only thing you’ve actually tried that worked was dragging me around on your motorcycle, which you’ve already sent off with someone else—oh, and getting all houndish up in my face, if you want to see if I’ll light you up again.”

He sneered. “I’d like to see you try. Is that what you need—for me to get in your face? Rain a little hellfire down on you and see what catches?”

He stalked toward me, all controlled aggression, everything from his stance to his predatory expression setting off a clang of warning bells in my head. Maybe I should have taken the sprint while I had the chance.

Fuck that regret to Fiji and back. I wasn’t letting him terrorize me, no matter what kind of deadly beast he was.

I backed up, but slowly, my hands rising as they clenched. “What do you think you’re going to do to me, huh? Take a few swipes with those puppy-dog claws? Gnash your great big fangs? Somehow I’m not shaking in my boots yet.”

“You should be,” he snapped with a hint of a snarl that chilled my blood. Then he socked me right in the shoulder.

His fist wasn’t chilly—it slammed into my body with a blast of otherworldly heat. Apparently he could blaze just fine even in human form.

I stumbled, clamping my teeth against a gasp as the impact radiated through the still-healing cut across my abdomen. Then I lunged right at him.

I wasn’t totally sure what I was hoping to accomplish. I just wanted to pummel something or someone, and Omen was there acting like such a dick it was hard not to see him as an ideal target. I lashed out with my own fist, skimming his jaw as he dodged to the side. He gave me a shove—not too hard, just enough to send me staggering backward.

“Come on then, little mortal,” he taunted. “Where’s your fire now? Am I going to have to thrash it out of you?”

I didn’t think so. As I circled him, my heart was thudding like the rhythmic pumping of bellows raising flames from a furnace’s embers. My inner fire burned through my gut and trickled through my veins, turning me molten.

“Such a fantastic teacher,” I shot back at him. “Five minutes in, and you’re beating up on your only student.”

“If it’s the only lesson that’ll work…” He feinted and snatched at me. His fingers bruised my arm as he yanked me toward him and spun me around. I barely wrenched myself out of the way of the kick he aimed at my ass. “Seems like you need a little more toughening up, anyway.”

I swung at him, and he caught my knuckles. With a chuckle and a heave, he sent me stumbling sideways. “Nice try. Is that the best you can do?”

“You haven’t seen anything yet. Let me remind you that I’ve done more for your people in the last few years than you’ve managed so far.”

That blow landed even if the physical ones hadn’t. An orange light flashed in his eyes, but his voice stayed tight. “If you think that, then why are you so afraid of giving this battle your all? Let that fire out, Disaster. Show me what you’ve got.”

He came at me then like a hound unleashed, no sign that he intended to stop until I forced him to. His first smack across my cheek whipped my head to the side. The next sent a lance of prickling pain through my collarbone.

I did my best to block him, to dodge him, but I’d never fought anyone like this. My self defense classes had focused on a few quick moves to disable your attacker so you could run for the hills, and I couldn’t land a single one of those against the onslaught of this shadowkind.

He must have been able to tell he was overwhelming me, but he didn’t let up. A fist to my jaw. A heel to my toes. Fresh jolts of pain marked my body with every huff of breath he released.

The flames inside me flared hotter on the combined fuel of frustration and panic. I slashed my hand at him, and his sleeve caught fire. He slapped it out and pushed me toward the school building. “Not enough. Let’s see more of that. I want to see everything .”

The welling sense of power was starting to sear right through me from the inside out. Why couldn’t he lay off me for one fucking second?

Why did Leland have to be such a vengeful asshole? Why hadn’t I steered clear of him to begin with?

How could I not have realized Snap needed more from me last night?

Such a fucking mess. Burn it down. Burn it all down.

The urge rolled over me in a wave so visceral it brought a jab of terror with it. The certainty gripped me that if I gave Omen what I was asking for, if I let loose everything that was raging inside me, I could burn even this man with all his powers to a crisp.

A flare of heat slipped out—a flame shot up from a tuft of his hair that had risen from the slicked-back strands. He shook it away and punched my other shoulder. “Still not seeing what makes you so great.”

“I don’t think you want to. I don’t think you’d survive it.”

“Oh, ho, big talk from the mortal.” He swiped at my temple, hitting me hard enough to send my thoughts reeling. “Try me, then.”

The heat scorched my throat. I couldn’t swallow it down. My rising terror flickered higher alongside those flames. “No, Omen, I really don’t think?—”

“Come on , Disaster! Why can’t you do this one thing? Or were all those grand rescues before, letting out the collectors’ prizes, only about the glory of pulling the capers off? Don’t you care whether you can help any more shadowkind? Or whether we ever see Snap again?”

“Don’t you ?” I burst out. “All I see is a fucking bully who doesn’t have a clue what he’s doing if he can’t badger everyone around him into falling into line. As far as I can tell, you’re the problem here, not the solution.”

A growl escaped him, and suddenly he was really on me, hurling me into the wall with a slam that spiked pain all through my back. He pinned me there, the thrust of his hands nearly shattering my wrists, his eyes burning and his teeth bared. His hot breath spilled over my face.

There—there was the beast I knew was in him. Somehow seeing his cold front fall away dampened the fury in me.

Not so much for Omen. He wrenched himself back a step a moment later, cursing under his breath. His hair had bristled; his chest was heaving. He blinked, but the orange haze wouldn’t quite clear from his eyes.

I let my arms drop to my sides. He leaned in again, his palm against the bricks just inches from my head, his conflicted gaze holding mine.

“What is it about you that you always have to bring out the worst in me?” he asked in a ragged voice.

“I don’t think this is the worst,” I said honestly. “Right now? You feel like you’re being real. I like you angry—way better than I like the ice-cold prick who orders people around from his high goddamned horse, anyway.”

He guffawed, the sound equally raw. “You like me better when I’m on the verge of literally biting your head off.”

I shrugged, my shoulders scraping the wall. I might have liked him better, but I still valued my life too much to try to push past him right now. My anger had dwindled, but fear was alive and well, thrumming through my pulse. “It’s become increasingly clear to me that I have unusual tastes. But yeah, I do. Although I’d also prefer that you didn’t actually bite my head off, if it’s all the same to you.”

Omen’s own head bowed, dipping closer so his forehead almost grazed mine. The heat of his body radiated over me. It wasn’t entirely unpleasant, to tell you the truth.

Yep, the poster girl for unusual tastes, right here.

“If you had any idea how hard I’ve worked to get here…” he muttered.

“Get where?” I asked. “The state of being an asshole?”

“See, that— You—” He let out another growl, but it was a subdued one this time. Then he eased back just a little. A flicker of something I hadn’t seen in him before crossed his expression. Was that… concern?

He fingered the side of my shirt, his fingertips brushing my side for the briefest of seconds. “I opened your wound again.”

I glanced down, more surprised than I should have been by the streak of bright red spreading across the center of the bandage. The sight of it brought the sting of the wound into sharper awareness. My mouth twisted. “Well, hey, what’s it matter if another mortal is spouting blood, right?”

Omen’s tone was gruff but firm. “You know you’re more than that.”

I supposed I did. And that was clearly the only reason he cared—because of my superpowers and how they might help his cause. “I’m sure I’ll survive, because or in spite of that.”

“No doubt.” He hesitated, still looming over me by the wall, as if he couldn’t quite tear himself away but also didn’t know what he was doing there. “I was taking out frustrations I shouldn’t have directed at you, at least not entirely. I wish… that I’d been less of an ‘ice-cold prick’ toward Snap lately. Maybe he thought he’d crossed some line I wouldn’t abide by, and I’d made him feel he couldn’t even check with me to see where he stood.”

I would have laughed if I hadn’t been so shocked that Omen was lowering himself to admitting any regrets at all. “You think I haven’t been beating myself up as much as I tried to beat up you? If I’d been more careful what I said around my ex—if I’d paid more attention to the state Snap was in last night?—”

Omen interrupted me with a hoarse chuckle. “Suffice to say there’s plenty of blame to go around. Maybe you didn’t send me up in flames, but you put up a pretty good fight.”

I guessed that was a high compliment coming from him. I wasn’t completely comfortable with the flames that had been surging through me just minutes ago, though. If I’d let myself hurl the full force of them at him, just how bad would it have been?

Then he raised his hand to my hair, and those thoughts fell away. My awareness condensed to the warmth of his knuckles grazing my cheek as he fingered a few stray strands—not so different from how Snap had the first morning we’d met.

Omen’s gaze slid from his hand against my face to my eyes. The fiery light had faded from his, but the pale blue didn’t look quite so icy now. I found my hand drifting forward to rest against his chest, taking in the slowing rhythm of his breaths beneath the taut muscles.

What the hell was I doing? I couldn’t tell you. Whatever it was, it seemed to draw Omen nearer. He leaned in, his fingers sliding down to stroke across my chin, and a new pulse of heat flared in my lips. I wet them, my pulse kicking up a notch, not entirely sure what I wanted but wanting it very much at the same time.

His breath tickled over my face. Then he shoved the hand he’d leaned against the wall to push completely away from me, his gaze jerking toward the RV.

“We should get you patched up again before you make any more of a mess of yourself, Disaster,” he said, back to business as usual.

I peeled myself off the wall with only a smidgeon of disappointment. Whatever line we’d come close to crossing just now, I couldn’t help suspecting it might be better if we stayed on this side of it.

“And then back to training?” I suggested.

Omen shook his head. “No. I think we’ve both had enough of pushing you around. I know you’ll fight as well as you can when the need is there.”

I wasn’t sure whether to be relieved or insulted by him throwing in the towel. I was trudging after him toward the Everymobile, debating just how suicidal I’d be to put up an argument, when the door flew open and Bow stared out at us.

“Please—Gisele—I think she’s getting worse.”