Page 55 of Jagged Souls

Once that starts, all we’ll need to wait for is for Zita to smuggle Maddox inside the school.

My heart rate increases as I call Khalid. He’s with the rest of my brothers and Stormie, working on creating a new ward around the house. He doesn’t answer, but I feel the air buzz with power, giving me the reason why. A shimmering blue wall, visible only to sups, shoots up around our yard. Then it goes black, crackling with energy as Stormie feeds it the bubble of magic she took from Rudy. My anger towards her ignites, but I push it down. I can’t kill her. I need her for this raid.

She’s a shielder, meaning she can contain my powers if I start to pulse. No one knows when I’ll hit my ascension or even if it’ll happen, but if it does, itwillspiral out of control, exploding out of me and hitting everything in its path at random intervals. Given we don’t know what abilities I’ll be blessed with, I could kill everyone nearby, so she needs to stay by my side during the rescue.

We’re only going to have one shot to take Antonio by surprise, and I won’t be the reason we fail.

My phone rings as Khalid calls me back.

“What’s the update on Zita?” I ask as soon as I answer. The last I heard, she’d managed to steal someone’s phone and text Antonio, telling him in a coded message that she had important news she needed to tell him in person. He never answered her, but she was driving up to find him.

“Antonio’s men picked her up in South Carolina. They’re interrogating her.”

“They going to kill her?”

“I don’t think so. She’s using the intel about the raids she ‘overheard’ as leverage to move up from omega.”

She’s smart. It makes her seem selfish rather than a rat. And if we lose, she still comes out better for it. I can see why my brother likes her.

“And Maddox?”

“In position.”

My grip on my phone tightens. Everything so far is going to plan. I could have my wife back in a few hours. But if they don’t buy Zita’s act, I’ve just killed my brother. “Call me as soon as there’s change.”

“I will.”

I start to hang up, knowing he won’t answer my other questions about Micha. He wants my head in the game, but just as my finger moves towards the end call button, I blurt, “Are they breeding –”

But the line is already dead.

Burning with a need to move, I start to head back down the fucking stairs. I’ll get the kid to tell me what they’re –

My phone vibrates, and I glance down.

My feet instantly root in place.

My breath is squeezed out of my fucking lungs as I stare at the notification on the screen.

Antonio:You’ve violated something sacred to me, so I’ve returned the favor.

My hands shaking with rage, I open the text. At the sight of a link beneath his message, an eruption of darkness burns through my veins, clawing at my skin, begging for release.

The fucker’s posted her torture on the dark web.

I tap the phone.

Micha’s body appears, beaten and broken. Her clothes are torn, her breasts and pussy bare. Antonio is pinning her to a table with one hand on her throat.

My rage burns cold as I hover on the play button so I can see how long the video is.

Four hours. Thirty-eight minutes.

Four hours. Thirty-eight minutes.

Four hours…

Thirty-eight minutes…