Awake in Shadows

by Eve Langlais

  A name.

  Exiting the shop, he made a call. “I need the address of the Cabal leader. A man named Titus.”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  “Where are we going?” It was the first thing Adara had said since they’d left Baba Yaga’s shop. Ensconced in the backseat of the car with Stefan driving—casting curious looks in the rearview—they’d fled before trouble could arrive. Given all that had happened, it didn’t take much intelligence to realize that Adara was in no shape to fight anyone tonight.

  Alas, Titus feared she was her own worst enemy. Despite the tie between them being broken, he could see the gears in her mind turning and churning. He could almost predict what she planned next.

  She’d try and leave. It was up to him and Logan to make sure she couldn’t. To convince her that they would stand by her side.

  “How are you feeling?” he asked, leaning forward.

  “Okay.” She shrugged.

  “Have a drink.” Logan retrieved a water bottle from the mini fridge and offered it.

  Titus inwardly grumbled. He should have thought of that, especially since she grasped it and greedily sucked the fluid.

  With a big sigh, she capped the water and leaned back. “You didn’t say where we’re going.”

  After what had happened at Baba Yaga’s shop, Titus knew they needed to rest somewhere secure. “We can’t go back to my house,” he announced. “Nor yours,” he added before Logan could open his mouth. “We need somewhere safe to rest and plan.”

  Adara, morose and apathetic to their surroundings, just shrugged. “Doesn’t matter where we go. Nowhere is safe.”

  Not the answer he wanted to hear, and it made Logan frown, as well.

  “Don’t say that, honey. We’ll handle whoever it is that’s looking for you.”

  “What if you can’t?” She didn’t face them, instead just stared out the car window.

  “Have you forgotten you escaped him once before?”

  “Did I?” she asked, casting them a sardonic gaze. “I was a broken thing when they found me. Battered almost to death and mind wiped.”

  “Given someone is looking for you, it’s obvious you either escaped or were saved. I would assume the latter given the effort put into hiding you,” Titus added.

  “You think someone saved me?” She shook her head. “No one came to my aid.”

  “You can’t know that for sure?”

  A bitter laugh escaped her. “Actually, it’s the only thing I am sure of. I don’t know how I escaped his clutches. Perhaps he let me flee so he could catch me again.”

  “He won’t catch you because I won’t allow it,” Logan growled.

  “You can’t protect me forever,” she remarked.

  “Why not?” Logan asked.

  “Because that’s not a life.” The words snapped from her.

  “Perhaps in your mind it’s not,” Titus interjected. “However, it is our choice what we wish to do.”

  “Your choice will get you killed,” Adara spat, finally showing signs of life instead of that dreadful apathy.

  “Some things are worth dying for,” Titus replied and meant it. Whereas Logan grumbled, “What he said.”

  “Idiots.” Said on a sigh.

  And that was the last thing she said before the car pulled to a stop under the massive portico of a lavish hotel downtown.

  Logan eyed it askance. “What the fuck is this?”

  “Our home for the next little while.”

  “You chose a hotel over our places?” Logan asked. “How is that supposed to be more secure?”

  “Because this one is run by a dragon, and they’re not ones to see their investments harmed. It will afford us the best protection.”

  “Did you say dragon?” Logan seemingly took a moment to digest that info before exclaiming, “Since when is there a fucking dragon in town?”

  Titus allowed himself a bit of a pompous air with his reply. “He’s been here since before the first house was erected. The settlers built atop his cavern. He chose to take that as a sign they’d come to worship him. As the city grew, he had his servants acquire property and buildings, such as this one.”

  “A giant flying lizard owns the hotel.” Logan shook his head. “That’s fucked up, even for me.”

  “Actually, Morpheus owns a large chain of them. Most of the luxurious hotels and resorts are owned by dragons. They enjoy the money-making aspect of it. Overcharging for services, selling merchandise at hugely marked-up prices. It’s a dragon’s capitalistic dream.”

  “I don’t see what overpaying for a hotel has to do with staying safe.” Even as he spoke, Logan rolled out of the car and suspiciously eyed the valet hovering nearby.

  Titus followed more slowly—and elegantly. “Dragon-owned properties are also extremely secure. Think of them as neutral zones. No one tries anything in them. Even demons wouldn’t dare attack.”

  “Says you.”

  “Yes, I do.”

  “Would you both stop?” Adara finally interjected. “It doesn’t matter where we go. He’s coming.”

  “Let him. You’ll be safe here.”

  “Who is this guy you’re so scared of?” Logan asked.

  She shrugged. “I don’t know.”

  “Then why are you so sure we can’t beat him?”

  “Baba Yaga said he was a dark lord.”

  “So?” Logan prodded.

  “Leave her alone,” Titus snapped.

  The wolf turned a hard gaze on him. “We don’t have time to mollycoddle her. We need an idea of what to expect.”

  “I don’t know.” Adara shrugged. “All I can tell you is I feel cold.” She hugged herself and shivered.

  Titus shot Logan a look that clearly said, “Enough.”

  The wolf’s lips flattened into a thin line. It said he’d hold his tongue for now, but that they’d have to talk later.

  Titus gave Adara a hand and helped her from the car. Her fingers were frigid and held a fine tremble.

  “Can you walk in on your own?” Titus asked. “If I carry you, we might run into trouble with security.”

  “I can walk.”

  But she couldn’t run. At one point, her past would find her. Titus just hoped she’d let him stand by her side to face it.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  With a vampire on one side and a wolf to her left, Adara entered the lavish foyer of the hotel. While she had the energy to put one foot in front of the other, she didn’t have any other interest. She didn’t even lift her head and look around. She wouldn’t be here for long.

  “Geezus,” Logan exclaimed in a mock whisper. “This place is a bit fancy for what we’re wearing, don’t you think?”

  Given that Adara wore jeans and a shirt, acrid with the sweat from the spell, she wasn’t fit to go anywhere. She huddled deeper in on herself.

  As if she could hide away.

  A voice kept taunting her. “Too late. Too. Late. He’s coming. All for naught. You were supposed to be forsaken. It was our gift to you. Your salvation. Now ruined.”

  Titus murmured, “Keep moving.”

  To which, Logan replied, “Is it me, or are they all staring at her?”

  Who was staring? It drew Adara’s attention enough to raise her gaze and notice the knots of people to the left and right of their small party. Groupings of three and four that had gone silent and, yes, stared.

  Her cheeks were hot, yet her blood ran cold. She dropped her head and huddled closer to Logan, seeking his warmth.

  He wrapped an arm around her.

  “Get to the elevator,” Titus stated.

  “I can do that, but where are we supposed to go? We don’t have a floor or number yet.”

  “Stefan is securing the room. I only do thirteenth floor, room thirteen.”

  “What if it’s occupied?”

  Logan asked the very question Adara wondered.

  “It isn’t occupied. The dragons have ways of knowing when their clients will have need.”

/>   With the doors shut and the elevator moving, Adara felt relaxed enough to lean against Logan. She needed his solid strength.

  “You okay there, honey?”

  She nodded.

  “What she needs is a proper meal and some rest. I’ll have a call put in to the kitchen.”

  “I’m not hungry,” she stated, although she did feel hollow.

  “You must eat. Your strength is more important than ever now.”

  “What if I’m tired of being strong.” And, yes, it sounded petulant. Because that was how she felt at the moment.

  Defeated. Alone. Wondering why she bothered.

  The elevator dinged and slid open. The hallway was long, yet it bore only four doors. In front of room thirteen, Titus palmed a touchscreen.

  With a click, the door opened, and the guys ushered Adara into a luxurious suite that did manage to draw a gasp from her. The large window across the room overlooked the city, the many lights shining brightly in the night sky.

  “Oh,” she exclaimed, moving towards the view, blinking as another city superimposed itself, also glowing at night.

  She stumbled, and before she could recover, a hand held her elbow.

  “Have a seat.” Titus guided her to a sofa.

  The cushions almost swallowed her, but she let out a sigh. She should enjoy every ounce of comfort she could.

  I won’t get to enjoy this for much longer.

  Depressing reality, which was why she ate the food and took the hot bath they suggested.

  She even let them tuck her into bed.

  But she couldn’t sleep. How could she with everything she’d learned and everything she still didn’t know?

  She rose and wandered to the sliding glass door and stepped outside, only to almost turn around as she realized she wasn’t alone. Logan stood there, having already exited via the living room.

  He turned, his granite face unsmiling, but his gaze on her was soft. “Hey, honey.”

  “Hi.” A part of her said to flee. Wanted her to turn around and leave. Instead, she approached him, and when he held out his arm, she tucked in under it, relaxing in the comfort of the closeness offered.

  She needed the heat of him. Logan always felt so vibrant and alive.

  “Worried he’ll find us here?” he asked softly.

  She nodded. “The witch…” She paused. “She says I can run, but I’ll never escape.”

  “Unless we kill him.”

  The menace in Logan’s words brought a shiver and exultation. “What if he can’t die?”

  “Everything can be killed. Some things are just harder than others.”

  “I appreciate you want to help me, but I don’t want you to die.” Spoken softly.

  He still heard. He turned Adara so she faced him, and rough fingers tilted her chin. His green gaze met hers. “Asking me to do nothing is worse.”

  “I’m scared,” she admitted, a tremble to her words. Shame in her heart. What happened to that tall and brave Adara in her dreams?

  She was raped and beaten and left for dead.

  Was it any wonder she had no desire to relive any of it?

  “Don’t be scared, honey.” He tilted his head enough to brush his lips against hers.

  Heat flared. She didn’t move as Logan did it again, his mouth pressing more firmly.

  Making her feel alive. Making her want…things she couldn’t have.

  She pulled away and leaned her head forward, her hand on his chest.

  “I’m sorry, I can’t.”

  Not yet.

  But it was getting easier to touch. To feel… Which was the problem.

  She couldn’t allow herself to care any more than she already did.

  Because that would make it much harder to do what had to be done.

  If Titus and Logan wouldn’t listen to reason, then she’d act for them.

  It sounded noble in her head: sacrifice herself so they could live. And yet, for some reason, one word kept repeating itself over and over.

  Coward.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  While Adara slept on the bed—having eventually succumbed to exhaustion—and Titus under it as dawn crested—which caused no end of amusement for Logan—he made a call to his beta in the living room.

  “If it isn’t the asshole,” Kevin answered with all the genteel manners of a dog with heavy balls who smelled a bitch in heat. “Where the fuck are you now? We need you.”

  “Why? What happened?”

  “Nothing except that demon dude showed up just before dawn and was beyond pissy when you weren’t here.”

  “Too fucking bad for him.”

  “That’s what I said, and then the fucker tried to break my jaw.”

  Logan repeated, “Tried?”

  “I ducked. And before he could swing again, the boys might have shown him what a bad idea that was.”

  “You attacked him?”

  “More like restrained him. Only took eight of us.”

  Eight? How fucking strong was he?” Logan pinched the bridge of his nose. “That might not have been wise.”

  “I’ll tell you what’s not wise. Walking into our house making fucking demands. We don’t take orders from him or anyone else from Hell.”

  “No, we don’t, but we should be careful.”

  “Careful?” Kevin snorted. “Since when are you a pussy rolling over and giving belly?”

  “I’m not,” Logan snarled. “But I am cautious. We don’t know what that fukcer is capable of.”

  “Not much once the sun rose. I swear he shrank in size the moment the horizon turned pink.”

  “So what did you do with him?”

  Silence.

  “Kevin?”

  His beta sighed. “We had him tied up. Swear we did. And we only left the room for a minute to grab some breakfast.”

  “And?”

  “And when we came back, the rope was on the floor, and the dude was gone.”

  “That blows,” Logan muttered. Because this guy was obviously involved somehow in the whole Adara fiasco. Perhaps he was even the guy the witch had warned was coming. “Did he happen to say anything?”

  “Other than, ‘you’ll regret this, and I’ll skin you alive and wear you as a suit?’”

  “Isn’t that a scene from Men in Black?”

  “Who could forget the Edgar suit?” Kevin chuckled evilly. “More seriously, though, he blathered something about it wouldn’t be long before he tracks her down. And to take what happened to the witch as an example of what will happen if she’s kept from him.”

  The words chilled Logan. Enough that he almost left the hotel to find out what had happened in person. But that would leave Adara unguarded. Dragon hotel or not, he wasn’t about to do that.

  “I need you to do me a favor,” Logan said to his beta.

  “Shoot you now and put us all out of our misery?”

  “Ha, ha. So fucking funny.”

  “I know. What do you need?” Kevin asked, his tone turning somber.

  “Visit this address. Let me know if the woman running the place is okay.” He gave him the location of Baba Yaga’s shop and wasn’t too surprised when an hour later, there was a knock at the suite door. A peek at the security camera screen showed Kevin at the door, looking as if he’d seen a ghost.

  “What happened?” Logan asked, stepping into the hall and shutting the door behind him.

  Kevin, who never let shit rattle him, looked unnerved. “I found the store you were talking about, only it didn’t look like no hut on chicken legs.” His beta held up his phone, and the pictures turned Logan’s stomach.

  The spot they’d visited the night before now sported a worn gray storefront, the door peeling paint. The large display window was grimy with filth, but not enough to hide the body strung in it. Arms and legs splayed. Head sitting in front of it. Baba Yaga’s mouth still open in a scream. The hundreds of cuts a testament to the patience of the torturer.

  And this guy was looking for Adara.
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br />   “That’s not all,” Kevin announced. “I was listening to the police scanner on the way in. Fire trucks were en route to a major blaze in progress.”

  “My house?”

  Kevin shook his head. “Your vampire buddy’s place is gone.”

  It seemed the demon liaison had been busy overnight. Logan paced. Impatient to act. When Stefan arrived an hour after Kevin had left, covered in soot, Logan pressed his lips into a grim line.

  “How did Mammon get so close to the house?”

  The incubus, looking weary and bland, his lilac pants gray with smoke, his yellow shirt stained, shrugged. “Who says he did?”

  “You saying he can lob fireballs?”

  “A demon lord can do many things.”

  “That Mammon fellow is a lord?”

  A hesitation and then a nod. “There is one who goes by that name.”

  “How come no one is stopping him? I thought demons weren’t allowed to fuck around on Earth.”

  “They’re not. But Mammon is…” Stefan paused. “Highly placed.”

  “Great. We’ve got a rich fucking demon running wild in my city. How do we stop him?”

  “You know what he wants.” Stefan eyed Logan.

  Logan’s lip curled, and he growled before he could stop himself. “Not an option.” Like fuck was he handing Adara over.

  “Then prepare to watch more people die because he won’t stop until he finds her.”

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  The gray plain held a wispy mist, and Adara grumbled, “This is not where I wanted to be.”

  She’d hoped to spend time in the other dream. The one with the field and the impenetrable wall. She knew she was getting close to scaling it. Soon, she’d see the other side and hopefully understand.

  Who am I?

  The neutral space she stood in didn’t teach her anything other than that she really preferred having color in her life.

  She whirled around and complained aloud, “Okay, dream, I’m supposed to be in charge. Show me something else.”

  The gray mist swirled, and for a moment, teased her with a glimpse of the sunny field before closing in all around once more.