Page 106 of Solar Shadows

“You’re not having him,” I whispered, my chest a tangle of thorns.

“Son?”

With the snap of a finger, I rushed into my room, grabbed my gun and witchcop jacket, and hurried outside. Like hell would I be waiting behind these walls while other witchcops did the job I was supposed to be doing.

For Isaac.

For Mum.

For this whole house.

Chapter 34

ISAAC

Surrounded by the weird solar shadow thingies dancing in a ring around me, my retinas burning, my body on the cusp of melting, I lay curled in a ball. Hoping for the darkness, for a cooldown, for the shadows to cool and be dark and normal.

This wasn’t proper solar power. This was an affront to sunlight, a fake slice of bullshit to taunt me, to mock me.

“Do you feel me, babe?” Tony’s voice clawed on the outside of my ball like a feral, hungry beast.

“Fuck you,” I retorted, wishing for an escape route.

“Maybe later. First, I have a job for you.”

I went to lift my head before thinking better of it. If I moved, the nasty solar energy got in.

“And then you’ll be free,” he added. “But I’d suggest you stick around. Rethink your rejection, be by my side. I’m the horse to bet on. I’m the bigfucking daddy you’ll want to be hanging off when you learn the truth.”

Daddy? Horse? Who the fuck did he think he was? The apocalyptic threat?

Here we go, another contender throws their hat into the ring.

Whoopee.

I took the bait with the intent of getting out of this bind and kicking him so hard in the groin he’d taste his ball sacks for a year.

“What job?” I asked weakly.

“That’s the spirit, babe. Right, so all you need to know is I’m becoming more. It’ll make sense soon. First, we go to Blood Palace.”

Becoming? The fae woman mentioned something about becoming. But a she, not a he.

What the fuck? Had she seen the wrong person or creature or whatever?

And Blood Palace? Seriously? Why would we want to go there? It was home to the head vampire of Coldharbour and her sired ones. A huge house close to the train station with a horrific amount of plastic flamingos in the front yard.

“Why?” I tried.

“You’ll see. Now stop resisting me and let me take over.”

I held on tighter, my mental powers like titanium. I felt his attempts to prize my fingers away from myself. Tug, tug, tugging, but I wasn’t budging, rebuffing more of his advances.

“I’m going nowhere near the place,” I countered. “So fuck you.”

A terrific force slammed into me, forcing me out of my ball.

I screamed as I was struck again, lifting into the air from a second strike like a soccer ball hurtling toward the goal.