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K incaid was about to release his prey when some inner sense of self-preservation warned him that they were no longer alone.

Before he could unleash his preternatural power to determine the danger, an unseen force slammed into him with the crushing power of a bulldozer.

The woman in his arms let out a hellacious scream.

Blood spurted from her chest, nose, and mouth before she went limp in his arms.

Kincaid let out a harsh cry of his own as pain unlike anything he had ever known drove the breath from his lungs and sent him to his knees. Luca, he thought, fighting for breath. It had to be Luca.

He tried to gather his power, tried to block the necromancer’s dark magic, but to no avail.

Summoning what little energy he had left, Kincaid tried to harness his thoughts, but it was hard to think coherently through the pain. All he could manage was a single word. Help. He had to trust that Saintcrow would get the message. It was, he thought, his only chance to survive.

Darkness closed in around him. With his last lucid thought, he tried to tell Rosa to find Saintcrow. And then oblivion swallowed him whole.

Kincaid woke to darkness, with no awareness of where he was or how long he’d been there.

Not that it mattered. What mattered most was Rosa.

He had a dim memory of Luca standing over him, telling him in lurid detail how he planned to destroy Rosa an inch at a time. Had she taken refuge with Saintcrow?

Jake growled low in his throat as fear rippled through him.

The thought of losing her forever was more excruciating than the knife-like pains that were his constant companion.

He writhed in agony as Luca’s magic clawed at him.

He had been in pain before but never like this.

Teeth clenched, he cursed Izabela’s talisman for failing to protect him, cursed Luca, cursed himself for not being more careful.

And yet there was nothing he could have done to thwart Luca’s black magic.

Despair settled over him, darker than his prison. No one knew where he was. Hell, neither did he. There would be no help, no reprieve. Superman wouldn’t fly in to save him at the last minute.

The pain came in waves, stealing his strength and his will to fight. Darkness beckoned him and he fell into it gladly, Rosa’s name a prayer on his lips.