Page 61 of Samhain Savior

“Witch?”

“Uh, boss?” Vine started, his words hesitant. “Where’d she go?”

Staring around the room, I looked for her, my breath seizing in my lungs at the thought that she’d been hurt in the fight. But after scouring the room and finding only dead Order witches, I finally realized the truth.

“She ran.” I knew I had been a fool to think that I could trust her. She was a liar like all the others. The moment I was distracted—trying to save her ass, no less—she bolted, taking the piece of the Fallen Key with her. “That bitch fuckingranfrom me?”

Mal cawed again, this time sounding both angry and afraid. With a gentle whisper of wings he took off, out the shattered windows and into the sky, no doubt looking for Delilah.

“I don’t think she ran, boss,” Vine said, his spear still held ready, but no longer wreathed in flame. “She was cool.She wouldn’t do us dirty like that. Maybe she was taken. Or maybe—” His words cut off when I shot him a look.

“She ran. I know it.” Depositing my bow and arrow back into my Rip, I withdrew a small silver dagger, the hilt embedded with a sapphire so dark, it was nearly black. A beautiful weapon for a horrible job. “And when I get my hands on her, she’s going to fucking regret it.”

“She can’t have gone far,” Corson offered calmly, but my rising anger wouldn’t listen. “You’re the only one here who can open shadow gates, so we know she’s on foot. We’ll find her.”

“Iwill find her.” And when I did, there’d be Hell to pay.

Closing my eyes, I stretched out my senses, allowing the connection between us to fizzle to life. For days now, I’d been ignoring it, refusing to believe what was right before my eyes. But even since I’d collared her, Delilah and I had been entwined in more ways than I was prepared to admit.

But after I’d kissed her in the garden, there was no denying it; the witch and I were inextricably linked in a way that I had never anticipated and didn’t understand.

But for now, I would use it to my advantage and track her betraying ass down.

Then I’d punish her for making me fucking worry.

Because beneath my façade of anger, the words Vine had uttered were what I feared the most. What if Helenahadtaken her? What if she hadn’t run, but had needed me to protect her, and I wasn’t there?

The possibility was more horrific than I wanted to consider.

Taking a breath, I reached out, my shadow magic calling to the collar I’d secured around her throat.

The collar that had protected her from me when I’d let my anger get the better of me.

I hoped this time it would sense my intentions, know that while I most definitely wanted to throttle the little witch, what I truly desired was to throttle her in a way that would have her moaning with pleasure.

Pulling back my drifting thoughts, I finally felt her, the spark of our connection causing her presence to appear like starlight in the darkness of my mind.

She was near, and she was frantic.

“I found her,” I snapped, turning for the door. “Let’s go.

Chapter twenty-seven

Delilah

Racing down the street, I moved as quickly as I could, the driving rain cutting into my skin like razor blades.

Archer was a liar. All this time, he’d professed to be working against the Order, but the moment they tracked us down, he revealed the truth.

He knew them. By name. He had history with the witches that had chased me my entire life.

My chest ached, both with the burning pressure of the relic’s desperate plea for release and with sorrow for the revelations I’d just been slapped with.

I couldn’t trust anyone.

But Icouldtrust my knowledge.

It had finally occurred to me, standing in the church and listening to the Storm-bringer prattle on and on. The bulb was yet another blood lock. I could get it open, but only if I had the key.