by C. M. Owens
Gage and Kimber are still fighting with the two juiced-up strays, and I look down as Roslyn chokes and coughs, seeming to come back to us a little as the wounds on her body start to close up without leaving a mark behind.
“Thad,” she whispers, smiling even as her eyes stay shut.
“I’m here, love. I’m here.”
“I love you, too,” she whispers, confusing me. “You’ll kill them all. I know.”
“Now’s not the best time for her to be in la la land,” Dice points out.
The chains rattle as I settle her down on the floor, and I peek around the corner again, trying to see if I can use any of my gatekeeping skills down here. Fucking nothing.
“Can’t get it up?” Dice asks me, to which has me groaning.
“We could break through the seals, but apparently neither of us can use our gatekeeping skills down here. But that also means they can’t dematerialize.”
Looking around I take in all the anointed weapons that have been abandoned as the bodies have dropped. I don’t know how much longer we have until Ella blows the entire place apart.
“You can’t fight them,” Reese growls, keeping Roslyn sheltered.
“Really don’t see any other alternative right now. I can’t shift. I keep trying, but I fucking can’t. It’s like they designed this to be a light or dark user only terrain.”
“Same problem,” Reese confesses.
“Great. I get stuck with the two animals who can’t be animals. I really fucking hope you two aren’t expecting me to be the hero,” Dice hisses.
My eyes move down to Roslyn one last time, and I look back to Reese.
“As soon as they’re distracted, get her out of here. Maybe Slade can ice Ella long enough to let you by.”
“Ice Ella,” Dice snorts, and I glare at him. “What? It’s funny. Her name is Ella Ice for fuck’s sake.”
Groaning, I start to turn away, but I kneel instead, and kiss Roslyn for what might be the last time. She kisses me back, moaning into my mouth, and making it really hard to pull back. But when my lips part from hers, she’s still lost to reality—eyes closed as she whispers incoherent dreams to us.
“This place is toxic to her, and her mind was too fragile to be back so soon. She won’t snap out of it until we get out of here,” Reese tells me.
“Guess I need to try to clear a path,” I say without too much confidence.
A bunch of dark users who are almost as powerful as Gavin? Definitely not making me feel confident.
“She’s going to kill you if she wakes up and you’re dead,” Dice says as I stand.
“I’ll let you figure out the problem with that logic on your own,” I grumble, looking over at Reese. “Just get her out of here.”
I don’t wait for him to say a word before I push around the corner, slinging the sword. The blade slices through the first one whose back is turned, but I’m on the ground and gasping in the next second without anyone even touching me.
Fucking magic. Fucking brilliant plan.
Chapter 40
ROSLYN
Thad cries out in pain, and fury rattles inside me. How are they hurting him? His lips have left mine, and I can’t find him. He was just in the bed with me, but now I feel his pain as though it’s mine.
I search blindly, feeling trapped by darkness, and force my eyes to open as I glance up to see my father looking around a corner, hearing him curse whatever he’s seeing.
Why is this changing? I don’t want fear and angst. I want my peaceful place back.
My body feels healed, but my mind is still fuzzy, clouded. I don’t know what’s real and what’s not, but I feel the chains still on my wrists, telling me that I’m still locked up.
The monster grows tired of the wait…
Pushing up from the ground, I decide the monster wants to play. Apparently my dream has me ready to fight back, and I’m more than ready. I try to shift, but I can’t, and I remember the collar isn’t on me. Even now they’re controlling what I can and can’t do, and that shouldn’t be allowed in my mind.
But this can’t be real.
“You’re awake!” Dad gasps when his eyes dart to mine. He jerks me to him, hugging me so tight that it feels so real, and the confusion only grows as I hug him back, ignoring the rattle of the chains that protest the movement.
Glancing down, I see the stone bits still attached, and I curse my escape world. I can’t use magic in these shackles.
“Well, those dumbasses! They’re not blocking the power of an incubus!” Dice exclaims, reading my cuffs before suddenly jerking one off. “That’ll fucking teach them to forget about me. I’m the motherfucking little engine that could. Hashtag—incubuses rock.”
Now I know this isn’t reality, even though Dice does a good job at staying true to his agenda of being weird. Dice is my hero and Dad is wearing rodeo attire—complete with cowboy boots and the tightest jeans I’ve ever seen.
My head is so fucked up.
But at least this dream allows me to fight.
The other cuff breaks off, and I grab both chains, ready to have some fun as I turn the corner. It’s my fight. It’s my mind. It’s my mind fighting back, to be more specific.
So why the hell is Ella here and looking like a crazed madman on the loose? She’s fighting the horde of dark users and the Gemini, and he’s fending off her attacks while managing to keep the swarm off him.
Her dark laughter grows louder as the walls around us quake, and I hear Slade curse from here like he’s struggling.
A blast of power is knocked away by my barrier, and I look down just in time to see Thad trying his best to get up, his eyes on the fight and not on me. My lips curl into a smile as the fury bubbles up inside me.
The monster is finally here.
Dad joins my side with a sword just as Dice shakes me, forcing me to look into his eyes. “They could probably use you going a little crazy right about now. And I don’t mean in the talk-to-yourself kind of way.”
The top of the prison is torn away suddenly, and blinding light blares down on us as Ella’s power rumbles free from her. With a wave of my hand, I toss aside several of the unsuspecting dark users, bashing their skulls into each other as I walk through death alley.
Thad manages to get up, and his wide eyes meet mine as screams emerge around, terror rising and feeding the darkness that surrounds our souls. The fight doesn’t matter anymore, because I’ve found him.
“Get her out of here!” the incubus yells to someone, but I’m too busy staring into the honey-colored eyes.
“Be prepared to run!” I hear Slade yell back.
Grabbing Thad by the back of the neck, I pull him down to me, enjoying the way he immediately grips my sides and kisses me back with the same abandon as all hell breaks loose around us.
Even as the light dims around me and I go limp in his arms, I feel the peace wash over me despite the nightmare.
Chapter 41
THAD
“Probably not the best time for a make-out session, you fucking cliché,” Dice says while shoving a sword through the chest of a dark user just after a blast of power misses my head by inches.
Roslyn drops, but I scoop her up and cradle her to me, before glancing up to the thirty-feet between us and freedom. Reese is right. This place really is toxic to my girl.
“How good are you at jumping?” I ask the incubus as I squat, preparing to launch us up as orbs, streaks, and madness flash all around us. Something slices against my side, and I curse while staggering.
“I guess I’m about to get really fucking good,” Dice groans, and I leap, barely clearing the top, but I manage to land on my feet without dropping the unconscious girl in my arms.
Dice yelps before plummeting back down after an epic jumping fail, but Reese pops up with the incubus in his arms seconds later. Dice curses while jumping down, dusting himself off, just as Gage and Kimber leap out.
“Hope your mojo works at full potential now,” Dice tells Kimber a
s she struggles to open a portal.
Something explodes from behind us, and my heart sinks to my toes as Kimber screams for Ella. Gage grabs her before she can rush back, as smoke and flames race toward the sky.
The ground rumbles beneath us, and Reese shoves me through a portal before I can attempt to go back. I land with a thud, still clinging Roslyn’s limp body.
Gage stumbles through the portal as Kimber sobs and fights hysterically, and I drop to the ground as Dice turns pale beside me. The silence becomes deafening, because the portal is gone, and there’s nothing but woods surrounding us. Even the creatures are too scared to make a sound right now.
The only sounds are Kimber sobbing and our hearts thudding in our chests. Gage holds Kimber to him, as I hold Roslyn closer to me, now clinging to her to keep myself from falling apart as tears fill my eyes.
Dice breaks down, sobbing wildly as he lands on his hands and knees, and my legs try to give out. But then suddenly, the wind stirs and Slade materializes, walking toward us with a limp, unconscious blonde over his shoulder.
“Take her. I had to knock her out,” he says, acting as though we haven’t just been freaking the hell out that she was dead.
He pretty much shoves her toward Gage, like he can’t wait to be rid of her. Dice stands, quickly clearing his throat as he wipes away the proof that he was just a wreck.
Gage takes her, as Slade averts his eyes from Ella.
“How’d you knock her out?” Gage asks. “She was ready to kill you.”
Kimber is all over Ella, investigating her limp body, while quietly chanting thank you over and over.
“Not something I care to discuss,” Slade grumble. “She wasn’t trying to kill me.”
“She really was,” I tell him, clearing my throat from all lingering emotion.
Slade narrows his eyes on me just as Gage says, “Thank you for helping.”
“Don’t thank me,” he tells Gage, then returns his attention to me, dropping his gaze to Roslyn for a beat before meeting my eyes again. “I hope you know what you’re doing. We’re not friends. We’re not allies. We’re nothing. Stay out of my way, and I’ll stay out of yours. All of you.”
He turns and vanishes into the air, and I roll my eyes at the dramatic exit before bending and kissing Roslyn’s forehead.
“He’s a bit of a douche,” Dice points out. “Hashtag—douche. That’s what we shall call him from now on.”
I look over at his red-rimmed eyes, and I cock an eyebrow. “That was a fast recovery from your—”
“I had blue sand in my eyes. It hurt like a bitch. I knew Ella wasn’t dead,” he snaps, turning around and moving toward the cabin. We’re not too far away from Gage’s house—well, what’s left of it.
No one seems to be particularly chatty as we trek through the thick of the forest, eyes open and alert for any movement. There’s still so much shit we have to tackle, but not today. Not right now.
Roslyn moans in her sleep, smiling happily at whatever thoughts are playing within her mind.
“How long do you think she’ll be out?” Reese asks.
“Hell if I know. It’s like her body heals faster than her mind is ready for. Same thing happened when that anointed bitch stabbed her. Not to mention she was out of it back in that place.”
Even the gashes on her face have healed without a mark.
“You fucking assholes!” My head snaps up at the sound of Zee’s voice, and I see him and Chaz walking toward us like they’re ready to kill.
“There wasn’t any time,” Gage says, still holding Ella in his arms.
We keep walking, and they join us as Zee continues to gripe. “A phone call, jackass. We could have been there in no time.”
No one was really thinking about anything other than hurrying. Which means Roslyn has earned a spot within the family, since everyone was willing to risk everything.
Kimber’s gasp finds my ears, and I look up as we walk out of the woods, seeing what’s left of Gage’s house—a few shards of timber and a foundation.
“What the hell happened?” Kimber gasps as Chaz takes Ella from Gage’s arms.
Gage rubs the back of his neck as Dice answers. “Gage woke up a wee bit pissed when he found out you were gone.”
When Kimber jumps up to straddle him, and they start acting like horny teenagers, I move toward the left, heading back to my place.
“Stay at Kane’s,” Reese calls out, causing me to pause. “It’s best if everyone stays together for now.”
No way in hell do I want Roslyn to wake up in a house full of people.
“I know you want her to yourself,” Reese goes on, “but you’re safer in numbers, and I have to return to my pack. She’s safer with you than she is with me, but only if you all stay together.”
“He’s right,” Kimber says, moving off Gage as she looks at me.
“That way we don’t get left out again,” Zee adds, glaring at me. “We went all the way to that cabin. Roslyn left them all in a panic. Drackus is doing damage control to keep Alyssa, Calypso, and Kane from finding out what’s been going on. He has them researching all this first shit in that book Chaz has. Maybe we’ll get a clue as to who the damn master is.”
“I should call Sadie,” Reese says while pulling out his phone.
“Tell them to slim their search by only looking at women,” Dice announces.
I don’t want to stand out here and talk all day, so I start walking Roslyn toward Kane’s, even though I’d rather be in my own house.
“So if my mother and her mother are slapping skin, that means technically she and I are close to being brother and sister,” Dice quips, jogging up beside me.
I groan as a few chuckles emerge.
“You guys get over near-death shit too quickly,” Kimber grumbles, staying close to Ella.
“Which means,” Dice adds, ignoring Kimber completely, “you and I are on the road to being brothers.”
I glare over at him as we come around from the back side of Kane’s house, but I just shake my head, deciding it’s not worth the argument. He gets off on that shit.
As everyone fills in Chaz and Zee on what went down, I head up the steps, walking by the smirking incubus as he holds the front door open for me.
As soon as I have Roslyn upstairs and on the bed, my phone goes off, chirping in my pocket.
DICE: #Brothers #BrotherlyLove #YouKnowYouLoveIt
Why did I even look?
I move into the bed beside Roslyn, pulling her to me. I’ll be with her when she wakes up.
“Text me back, brother!” Dice calls up the stairs, and I glare at the door I shouldn’t have left open.
Laughter filters up, and I roll my eyes while nestling in closer to my girl, just when my phone goes off again.
DICE: #Family #TakeCareOfMySister #ThatSoundedDirty
All of the sudden, We Are Family starts playing loudly, and I curse while getting up and slamming the fucking door. But I slam it too hard, and the damn thing breaks off the hinges and half of it collapses to the floor, while the other half dangles by a screw.
Motherfucker.
Another stupid text comes through.
DICE: #EpicFail
Turning off my phone, I grab a pillow and pull it over my head while curling back up next to Roslyn.
Chapter 42
ROSLYN
“Monster Evil! It’s way better than Master. I refuse to call any woman master ever again.”
My head pounds as voices gather in my ears, and I struggle to open my eyes.
“You don’t know it’s woman,” Karma drawls. “But I do know that I’d better not get left behind again.”
“Same here,” two guys say at once.
“Someone owes me a thousand dollars when it turns out to be a woman.” I know that voice. It’s Dice.
Dice and Karma?
I try to sit up, but my head just pounds. But it feels like I’m moving. It also feels like someone is holding me as I move.
“Calyps
o and Drackus are on it. They’ll find something in either Drackus’s books or in Chaz’s book. Kane knows a lot of people who were older than his dead sire, so he might be able to shake down some leads too.”
“And we twiddle our thumbs?” Ella asks.
“You twiddle your fucking thumbs,” Dice tells her. “Every time you try to help, you go a little too wild. What happens when Slade isn’t there? He said he’s done with us.”
Tense silence fills the air, and I try harder to move, but no such luck.
I feel my body being lowered, but someone is still holding me. Not just someone. It’s Thad. He smells so good, and I really hope I’m not still dreaming.
“So what if he’s done?” Ella mumbles. “I can learn control. Mom did. Dad did. So will I. It just takes time and practice. At least I contribute more than a pretty face.”
“Hey!” Dice yells. “I contribute, damn it. Considering most of you motherfuckers go insane after using too much power, I’d say I’m a damn fine asset.”
Why is he so loud?
“You just gonna carry her around everywhere until she wakes up?” Dice asks, even though it seems completely random.
“Yep. I don’t want her to wake up alone.” At the sound of Thad’s voice, it’s like my body finally responds to my desperate attempt to wake up, and my eyes fly open to see the bottom of his chin.
“Is it weird you dated her mother and now you’re dating the daughter?”
What? Sure he didn’t—
“For the last time, I didn’t fucking date her mother.”
“If you say so. New question: Am I supposed to start being all overbearing and protective? And what happens when you two fuck? The sexual energy finds me whether I want it to or not,” Dice says, confusing the hell out of me. “Is it creepy to feed off my own sister’s sexual energy?”