Page 83 of Their Mate

“You can’t,” Aidan said. “You can only stand in front of the draft.”

Logan rubbed a hand over his jaw. “This serves nothing. We’re angry. That’s good. Be angry at the thing that’s hunting us. At first light we move. Until then, you keep your knives in their sheaths.”

No one argued. No one agreed, either.

“Watches,” I said. “Jamie first, I’ll relieve. Aidan third. Logan fourth. Declan last.”

Aidan grunted with his assent. Declan nodded once. Jamie took the first post at the window, shoulders square as he looked out into the city.

When we settled again, the air between us was still fraught with tension. Aidan rolled his bedroll out farther than usual from Jamie and didn’t look at him. Declan faced the door with body language that saidtry me.Logan himself angled toward the water as if that would bring Sera back. I sat with my back to the wall where I could see all of them.

Jamie glanced over his shoulder once, not cheeky now, just honest. “For what it’s worth, I’ll take the hit when this is done.”

“Noted,” I said.

He nodded and turned back to the night.

Logan finally spoke, eerily calm. “Four hours. Then we go after her.”

CHAPTER 27

Sera

The journey to the Isle of Man took all night. Three, maybe four hours of black water and an even darker sky, of the bow climbing and dropping constantly. When the island finally lifted out of the mist like a dark shadow in the early morning light, I breathed a sigh of relief.

I’d made it.

I rounded the island and Douglas Head greeted me with its old lighthouse and black rocks. I kept outside the breakwater and let the coast run past my port side until I reached the dark mouth of an old service tunnel half-hidden in the folds of the cliff that I knew led to the Watch base.

I nosed the bow toward the opening and let the swell do the work, sliding me toward the narrow bite of the entrance. A slab of rusted steel sat three feet behind the waterline, barnacles crusting its lower lip, and a square, dark speaker was bolted to it.

I cut the engine as water slapped at the hull of the boat.

“Identify yourself,” the speaker rasped.

My throat felt dry. I leaned close and had to practically shout over the sound of the wind.

“Captain Sera Moore,” I said. “No light but our own.”

There was a brief moment of static and then the speaker answered, softer. “No fear but the necessary.”

A bolt thunked from somewhere inside the cliff and the sea gate lifted upward with a groan. Red work lights came alive from within, painting the wet tunnel scarlet.

I eased the engine to a murmur and slid through.

The tunnel opened into a flooded cavern. Hands waved me onward where two figures in oilskins and wool caps waited for me. One was hardly older than eighteen by the looks of it.

I made the last tie-off and climbed up into air that smelled like kettles and gun oil. The older one—a compact woman with a buzzed haircut and a scar that took a bite out of her eyebrow—clocked me fast, eyes flicking over me for a brief second before she lifted her chin.

“Name?” she asked, though she already knew it.

“Captain Sera Moore,” I said.

“You came alone,” the younger one ventured.

“Had to,” I said. “I need your commander. Now.”

The older one’s mouth twitched with approval and warning at once. “You always arrive by the back door?”