Page 63 of Wicked Bonds

“Something isn’t right,” she said, grabbing Balthazar’s shoulders. He’d sat up as well, still on his knees between her thighs. “We need to go.”

The alarming sensation had increased, telling her the Seraphim were almost through her barriers already. That implied her first few layers hadn’t worked as expected.

Maybe she’d rushed the wards.

But she doubted it.

No, something was definitely wrong. They didn’t even have time to find their clothes. At this rate, the seeking Seraphim would be there in seconds, not minutes.

She wrapped her arms around Balthazar’s shoulders and called upon her wings, misting them from the room half a beat later.

Balthazar’s hands found her hips midflight, their thighs touching as they both straightened their legs in preparation for landing.

Leela wasn’t sure where precisely to go, her instincts firing too fast for her to process her surroundings as their feet touched the ground. She blinked twice, expecting to see the familiar streets of San Francisco—her usual go-to location when fleeing.

But the structures around her were nothing like the hilly California city.

And the signs were definitely not in English.

“Tokyo,” Balthazar supplied, his brow furrowing as he took in the bright lights of the city. It was a few hours behind Melbourne and still nighttime here—a realization that was a good thing, considering their mostly naked state. “Where’s your flat?”

“I don’t have one here,” she admitted, her voice barely audible. Tokyo wasn’t a place she’d even anticipated going, and yet, standing here felt… familiar.Toofamiliar. Like she and Balthazar had been in this exact place before. But she couldn’t find any memory of it within her mind. Not even an inkling.

So why am I experiencing an odd sense of déjà vu?she wondered.

“We can’t stay right here,” Balthazar said, interrupting her thoughts. “Let’s go south. We have a place in Okinawa, right on the water.”

A memory taunted Leela’s mind, one she couldn’t quite define.

Frowning, she followed the trace in her mind before Balthazar could provide directions and took them to southern Japan.

Right to the doorstep of a home she’d never seen before.

Yet recognized as though it were her own.

An Elder home.

Luc’s home.

But how do I know that?

And why do I feel like I’ve been here before?

Chapter12

Balthazar

Questions rolledthrough Leela’s mind as she glanced around the front yard and back at the door, each inquiring thought rivaling his own queries.

Because she shouldn’t know this place existed.

Very few of the Hydraians knew of its existence, and this home wasn’t a place Balthazar frequented often. The five-bedroom estate was technically Luc’s place, but as with everything else related to the Elders, they shared it for purposes such as this.

Maybe Leela had followed Luc here at one point? Jacque teleported the Hydraian King here when he needed to think, which, lately, was a lot more often than usual because of Aidan’s death.

Perhaps that was why Leela knew about it?

But the blocks on the edges of her psyche suggested it wasn’t that easy an explanation. Balthazar wanted to prod at them, see if he could move them out of the way. However, their security mattered most at the moment.