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NINE

Sorsha

It was going to be a long drive from Chicago to Austin, so I figured I might as well find something useful to do with the time. Only because I was such a hard worker, and not at all to distract myself from the fact that the woman who’d raised me had distorted my memories without telling me, of course.

Why had Luna been so adamant that I never return to the city of my birth? She’d never given me reasons, just obscured that key image so I had no choice, no way of knowing where to go. Would she ever have talked about it with me if she’d lived to see me all the way to adulthood, or had she planned to take that secret to her grave regardless?

I couldn’t ask her now, and I didn’t think Omen would appreciate it if I asked him to listen to my entire life story up until age sixteen to find out if she’d glamoured other blanks into my memories. So I just wouldn’t think about it. Piece of cake. Ha.

I wasn’t really looking forward to the call I was about to make either. Vivi had told me that Ellen was home from the hospital, so I should be able to contact her at her regular number, but that didn’t mean the co-leader of my local branch of the Shadowkind Defense Fund would be happy to hear from me. Being attacked by Company goons as a warning would tend to sour a person to the gal who’d drawn that attention in the first place.

But Ellen had gone to the trouble of reaching out to me when she’d realized I was in danger, even while she was still in the hospital. I couldn’t be totally out of my mind to think she might help us again.

I pulled my legs up where I’d tucked myself into one corner of the sofa-bench and brought my phone to my ear. At the other side of the sofa, Snap was examining a coffee mug Ruse had handed him in the game of Let’s See If You Remember This that had been going on without any wins all day. Rather than remind myself of the innocent bemusement so often in the devourer’s expression now, I gazed out the window. The lights along the freeway flashed by through the thickening dusk.

To my relief, Ellen picked up on the second ring. “Hello?” she said with an unusual tentativeness that made me wince inwardly.

“Hey, Ellen,” I said, suddenly tentative myself. “It’s Sorsha. I’m sorry I haven’t checked in on you sooner—hell, I’m sorry about all of it. Things have gotten pretty… crazy.”

Understatement of the century.

Ellen made a dismissive noise. “I know you hadn’t expected any of us to get hurt. This group you’ve clashed with—they’re obviously much more of a menace than we’ve dealt with before. None of us expected that.” She paused. “Did you get my warning about Leland in time? He didn’t turn up at the last meeting. I’m not sure if he’s sided with this Company of Light completely now.”

I hadn’t gotten her warning soon enough—not in time to save us from getting T-boned by an armored truck, anyway. And my ex-FWB hadn’t shown up because he must still be staked out in his townhouse wearing boxers on his head and drinking cold, stale coffee as Ruse had instructed him to do for his “protection.” It seemed better not to mention either of those facts, the former for Ellen’s benefit and the latter for mine.

“Who knows, with him?” I said with a stilted chuckle. “I really appreciate you looking out for me, especially considering the state you were in. Are you doing okay?”

“Oh, yes, no permanent damage here. I’m made of stronger stuff than those criminals realized.”

A sporadic crackling sound carried from the background. Was that… popcorn popping? A smile tugged at my lips despite my guilt. If Ellen was experimenting with popcorn flavors again, she couldn’t be feeling too bad.

Lord only knew when I’d get to sample any of her new combos again. When would I be welcome at another Fund meeting? Assuming I made it back home in the first place…

I shook off the gloom of that thought and focused on my main objective. “About those criminals—we’ve found out that their operations are spread out much farther than we’d guessed: across the country and even overseas. I know a lot of the Fund members aren’t feeling all that friendly toward me or that cause right now, but if any of you would be willing to lend a hand even in some teeny tiny way… We’d make sure you stayed out of the line of fire, of course.”

The moment the words came out of my mouth, I felt like a shit heel. She’d just been beaten to bits, and here I was suggesting she might do me another favor. What had I been thinking when I’d come up with this ridiculous plan?

Well, I’d been thinking that Ellen was just about the only ally with much in the way of resources that I still had that I could call on, but that didn’t make it an act of compassionate genius.

Ellen was silent for a moment. I was debating asking Ruse if he could take a break from shoving assorted paraphernalia in front of Snap to charm the Fund leader into forgetting I’d ever brought up the subject when she finally cleared her throat. “Something needs to be done about them. I don’t know what we’d be able to offer on our end, but—I’ll give it some thought and make some discreet inquiries.”

“ Very discreet,” I emphasized. “I don’t want anything else happening to you. Don’t—don’t mention the Company or take any action against them, not right now. Just let me know when you know if you’ve got anyone who still wants to take action, and I’ll work out the details from there.”

Even with that cautioning and Ellen’s willingness, I ended the call with a lump of nausea in my stomach.

Ruse was now dipping his fingers into a cup of water and sprinkling droplets over Snap’s head. “There was this time it started raining while we were scouting out one of the disappearances, and you were so surprised you stayed right in it instead of vanishing into the shadows like a sensible being.”

Snap laughed, shaking his head as the drops hit his curls. “I wish I could remember that. The water falls right from the sky?”

“Unfortunately,” Thorn muttered. I couldn’t tell whether his grimness was due to the devourer’s continued forgetfulness or his distaste for mortal realm weather. Maybe a little of both.

Past him, near the driver’s seat where Omen was at the wheel, Antic the imp was hopping from one foot to the other like a kid trying to avoid the urge to pee. She turned a map in her hands. “The next exit,” she said determinedly in her squeaky voice. “You want to get on the 24. Oh, it’s a pretty one.”

“I don’t care what it looks like as long as it’s going to get us to Austin,” Omen said.

I didn’t know where Pickle had gotten to. He hadn’t come scampering to me for pets since the accidental burning this afternoon. So much for two years of back rubs and bacon.

My phone, still in my hand, pinged with an incoming text. Another one from Vivi. I know you’re probably very busy saving the world, but could you shoot me a quick message letting me know you’re okay? Ditto! Kissy-face emoji.

As I looked at the words, my throat tightened. My best friend’s effortless cheer felt leagues removed from anything my life resembled at this moment. What might I inadvertently do to her if we ever hung out again? The image of one of her trademark all-white outfits singed to brown and black flashed through my mind, and the constricting sensation ran down to my chest.

This was what my life had become: monsters and mayhem… and maybe this was what it should have been all along. I didn’t know what to say to her anymore.

Still alive , I forced myself to write back, because a reassured Vivi would be much safer than a panicked one. Reasonably okay. Not much to report yet. You hang in there. Ditto. The sign-off was our homage to one of our favorite cheesy romance flicks, and I couldn’t not say it when she did. You could consider that a sacred pact, no matter how far I veered into monsterdom.

“And then we make a right at those shiny lights,” Antic said to Omen’s wordless grumble.

Ruse slid onto the sofa beside Snap and gave the devourer’s hair an affectionate ruffle. “You know you’re all right now, don’t you? We’ll make sure those assholes never get their hands on you again. There’s no need to be hiding away.”

Snap blinked at him with one of those puzzled looks that wrenched at my heart. “Is someone hiding? I’m right here.” He spread his arms as if in demonstration.

My dear, sweet shadowkind. If Ruse was right that Snap had essentially devoured everything about himself from the past however many months, was it even possible for him to spit himself back up, so to speak? What would it take? If I needed to put on a full-blown musical production or sacrifice a crow or some other hocus pocus, someone had better fill me in quick.

The incubus glanced across the table and caught my look. Whatever my expression showed, it turned him as grim as our warrior companion. He opened his mouth as if to speak, but at the same moment, Omen’s voice barked from up front.

“That sign says we’re heading toward Atlanta. I might not be a geography expert, but I’m pretty sure that’s a hell of a lot more east than we want to be going to get to Texas.”

Antic let out a squeal of apology and fumbled with the map. “I think—I think— Texas . Yes. Right. I had it turned the wrong way. We don’t want to be on this road at all.”

Omen’s next growl suggested that if the imp gave him one more direction, he’d be picking her bones out of his teeth in a minute. Ruse arched his eyebrows at me, his expression still more solemn than usual, and sauntered over to lend a hand.

“We’re not too far off track,” he said, and grabbed Omen’s phone from the dashboard. “But you know, even if we don’t need sleep, we could use a break from the highway. Let that road rage simmer down and all. It’s been a stressful day. I’ll charm us a space in a hotel so luxurious it’ll mellow even you out, Luce.”

He flashed a grin at his boss, who bared his teeth in a much more menacing fashion in response. The incubus retorted with some gesture I couldn’t quite make out but knowing him was probably obscene.

The hellhound shifter sighed. “Fine. But mainly because Darlene could probably use a break. I expect us to be up and on the road again at sunrise.” He glanced over his shoulder at me. “If you had ever bothered to learn how to drive, the rest of us could have slipped in and out of a rift and been there already.”

I stuck my tongue out at him, although sadly he didn’t get to see my show of immense maturity because he’d already returned his gaze to the road. “As if you’d leave ‘Darlene’ in my disastrous hands anyway.”

“Good point,” he said, in a tone I chose to believe was more amused than annoyed. “Work your magic, incubus. If you can shock our mortal speechless for a minute or two, I’ll consider that a victory.”