Gods, he wished he were alone so he could shift to his cougar, rip both fae into tiny pieces. He’d lost too many good friends to the night fae, been hunted himself too many nights. And Blaer had not only attacked Marjani, she’d forced his friend Luc to accept her geas.
Rosana bumped her shoulder against his. “Calm down,” she mouthed.
He gave a tight nod.
She was right. Night fae were energy vampires, with a creepy sixth sense that allowed them to home in on negative emotions—fear, anger, agitation. The only way to hide from them was to stay calm, slowing your heart and breath so they couldn’t track you.
Breathe in, breath out.
Retracting his claws, he pulled out the dagger and held it against his side. He forced himself to relax, blanked his mind.
In, out.
Beside him, Rosana slowed her breath to almost nothing.
The two fae continued scanning the backyard. Power brushed over Adric’s skin, cold and black. A night fae questing for prey.
He stilled, sinking deep into his animal.
Next to him, Rosana drew a barely perceptible breath and gripped his left wrist. He turned his palm over, threaded his fingers through hers and gave her an encouraging squeeze. She lowered an eyelid in a slow wink.
He managed a small smile back, although he’d never felt less amused.
Inside the B&B, doors slammed. From the third floor came the sound of frightened human voices. The bastards had rousted the couple upstairs.
Adric’s fingers tightened on the dagger’s handle, but he remained where he was. The fae wouldn’t do anything but scare the crap out of the human couple. The humans hadn’t even seen him and Rosana, so they’d be no help to the searchers.
Rosana’s palm was damp with nerves. He squeezed her hand again.
Hold on, angel.
A minute ticked by. The tension wound tighter.
He took another deliberate breath.
Calm, cool, blank. A sheet of paper. A snow-covered field.
Serenity flowed from Rosana. Maybe it was her, and maybe it was the charm, but it helped.
At last the woman murmured in disgust. The dark tendrils withdrew.
“They could be miles away by now. All I know is they’re not in this bloody inn.”
The man murmured assent, and the two of them returned inside without bothering to close the sliding door.
Adric waited until their voices receded before jerking his chin at the fence separating the next yard from the B&B.
Rosana nodded, and together, they scaled the fence and sprinted behind the neighboring house. They continued that way down the street, sticking to backyards as they aimed for the water.
When they were almost to the beach, Adric pulled Rosana into the shadow of an empty cedar-shingled house.
“Mãe de Deus.” Her breath whooshed out. “What was that about?”
He shrugged, although he had his suspicions. “You were perfect.” He gave her a hard kiss. “Cool as could be.”
She shrugged, but he could tell she was pleased. “My training as a Seer includes meditation techniques.”
“Well, it worked, but now we need to get the fuck out of here.” He indicated the deck behind her. “We can stash the bags under there and come back for them later.”
His quartz was engineered to be a smartphone. While Rosana stowed their bags beneath the deck, he notified the Lewes police about the break-in at the B&B.
“A man’s hurt. Send an ambulance ASAP.”
“Your name, sir?”
“That’s not important,” he said, and ended the connection.
He and Rosana peeled off their clothes and tucked them under the deck, and then he dragged her long, lush body up against his. Her skin was icy, and even though he knew river fada had naturally cool metabolisms, he hated that she’d been pulled out of a warm bed because of him.
“The Breakwater Light,” he reminded her. “Stay in the water until I signal you. Three flashes with my quartz.”
She wound an arm around his neck. “’Kay.”
He brushed a strand of her hair back from her temple and then frowned. Rosana was a river dolphin, not an ocean-going dolphin like a bottlenose. “The salt water isn’t a problem?”
She shook her head. “The bay is actually an estuary—a mix of fresh and salt water. And I can take salt water for short periods of time. My mom’s a bottlenose.”
“Okay, then.” He kissed her nose. “Watch for a blue light—I’ll flash it three times in a row, then pause and repeat it.”
“Got it—three blue flashes.” She touched his cheek. “Be careful, okay?”
He blinked, bemused. When was the last time anyone besides Marjani had told him to be careful? He was the strong one, the alpha. Even as a teenager, he’d been the one his friends looked to for direction.
“Yeah. Sure.”
He watched as she glided across the deserted street to the beach, sticking to the shadows, silent as a ghost. She sprinted across the sand and dove into the shallow water. Shining bits of green and blue and purple glimmered beneath the surface, so beautiful he caught his breath. A slender torpedo-shaped body sketched an arc against the night sky and disappeared beneath the waves.
Adric waited another minute to make sure she got away safely. Then he shifted to his cougar—and headed back to the B&B.
8
“What’s the use of being a Seer,” Rosana muttered as she jogged into the icy bay, “if you can’t See your own freaking future?”
She hadn’t had a hint the fae were coming. They could’ve been in the room before she’d known they were there. Why couldn’t she have a useful Gift, like being a healer?
“You don’t choose your Gift. It chooses you. Lucky us.” She could almost see Colm’s mouth twisting in a self-mocking smile. “And you know Seers almost never See what lies ahead for themselves.”
“Yeah, yeah,” she snarled. “Can’t forget Rule 1.” She dove into a wave.
Colm had drilled several truths about being a Seer into her. Colm’s Rules, she called them.
Rule 1: A Seer almost never Sees his or her own future.
Rule 2: The Sight is unpredictable. You can train it, but it’s like trying to ride a tiger. You never know when it will turn on you.
Rule 3: Belief is as important as skill. To free your Sight, you must believe in its essential truth.
Freaking rules. As far as she could tell, being a Seer was worthless. People were wary of you, and they didn’t want to listen to you even when you knew you were right.
You couldn’t even use your Gift to save yourself. If Ula had Seen that King Sindre was laying a trap for her and Nisio, they wouldn’t have left on that trip across the ocean and Rosana wouldn’t have grown up without her parents.
She gave a hard kick and let the change take her. Magic shimmered over her skin. For a timeless few moments, she was neither human nor dolphin, but colorful fragments of light and energy. Then her legs fused, became a tail. Her face elongated into a river dolphin’s beak, and her arms became flippers.
She sucked air through her blowhole and with a powerful thrust of her tail, skimmed through the midnight sea. She was Rosana, and yet not Rosana.
Stronger, more supple. Wild. Free.
She remained beneath the surface for several minutes, not resurfacing until she was a few hundred yards out, the shoreline curving behind her in a giant C. Ahead, the flash of the Harbor of Refuge Light marked Cape Henlopen and the Delaware Bay’s western boundary. The Breakwater Lighthouse was a little before it, but unlike its sister lighthouse, it was dark, having been decommissioned years ago.
She set out for the Point on a path parallel to the shore.
That had been a night fae on the balcony. Or maybe the woman was a mixed-blood, because Rosana had never heard of a pureblood night fae with blond hair.
Fear tripped up her spine.
Somehow, that woman was connected to her vision. Nothing else made sense. But how?
&nbs
p; She knew Prince Langdon was out for blood. His only living son, Tyrus, had gone missing last June after attacking Adric’s clan. The Baltimore fada had clammed up about what really happened, but everyone knew Tyrus was dead, with Adric the chief suspect.
But without proof, Langdon had done nothing. Yet.
Still, Adric wasn’t the type to wait around for the prince to attack. If he thought Langdon was a threat, he’d strike first.
But when? And more importantly, how could she stop it?
If only she knew more.
She gave a frustrated swish of her tail. Helpless, and hating it.
If what she’d Seen was true—and she’d never had such a clear, detailed vision before—Adric was going after Langdon soon.
And he’d die.
The swim to the Point took about fifteen minutes. Rosana navigated with sweeps of her sonar, emitting sound and interpreting the echoes: the curved shape of the shore line; the fishing pier that jutted into the water; a school of Atlantic croakers; a shipwreck dating to the 1700s.
A stack of huge granite slabs loomed before her, the half-mile-long breakwater that gave the lighthouse its name. She surfaced on the inner side of the breakwater a safe distance from the rugged slabs. The sky above was clear, the stars white pinpricks in its dark cloth.
She scanned the beach. No sign of Adric.
She slapped her tail against the water a couple of times. The breakwater blocked the Atlantic to form a calm, quiet harbor. If he was nearby, he’d hear her.
She waited a minute and then smacked the water with her tail again.
Still no Adric.
Her stomach clenched.
Stop worrying. The man’s an alpha. A big cat with teeth and claws.
A pod of three wild female bottlenoses appeared, drawn by the commotion. They were larger than Rosana’s six-foot length, but friendly. They greeted her with a mixture of squawks, whistles and clicks.
Rosana replied in their language, and they circled her.
Who, who who? whistled the eldest female, a motherly sort with small, wise eyes.
Visitor, Rosana replied. I mean you no harm.
Why, why why? the motherly bottlenose asked.
Meeting a friend. But he’s not here. Worried.
Sorry… We wait.
Their bodies brushed hers, offering comfort.
For the next quarter hour, the four of them swam back and forth in front of the lighthouse until Rosana had to face facts. Either Adric had been captured, or he’d returned to the B&B to sniff around some more. It was what her brothers would’ve done.
The smart thing, the safe thing, would be to head farther out to sea. No one but another water fada could track her in the ocean, and with the head start she’d had, even a shark would have trouble scenting her.
But fuck being safe. If Adric had been captured, it was three against one, and at least two of the others were fae.
Not just any fae. A night fae.
Damn, damn, damn. She didn’t want to go back. She wanted to get as far away as possible from that scary bitch and her henchmen.
But there really wasn’t a choice. She wished the wild dolphins a polite farewell and whipped around to head back to Lewes.
9
Adric raced through the backyards, a shadow in the night.
He had a bad feeling about the second man with Lady Blaer, the one he hadn’t seen. He couldn’t leave without knowing for sure.
Sirens split the night. He gritted his teeth, the high wail excruciating to his shifter ears. At least it meant help was on its way to Mark.
The wood fence ran the length of the B&B’s property. He peered through them into the parking lot. The two fae were just getting into the back of a glossy black limo. But it was their rangy, hard-faced driver who made Adric’s lungs cinch tight.
His hunch had been correct. The second man was Luc, one of his lieutenants. No, make that former lieutenant.
Anger and guilt clogged his chest.
Late last summer, Luc had accepted a geas from Lady Blaer. For the next decade, the wolf fada was Blaer’s man, not his. So Adric had been forced to expel him from the clan.
It didn’t matter that Luc was an old friend, one of the small, close-knit group who’d helped Adric and Marjani take down Leron Savonett, their bastard of an uncle. It didn’t matter that Luc had been imprisoned and tortured simply for being Adric’s friend.
Adric had had no choice. As alpha, he was connected through his quartz to every man, woman and child in the clan. He couldn’t allow a man under the control of a fae to remain part of that network.
“Get us out of here,” the blond female ordered Luc.
Adric’s lips peeled back in a silent snarl. He was sure now that she was Lady Blaer.
His muscles gathered, his whole body shaking with the need to attack.
Kill.
The woman had put his sister in a fucking iron cage. She’d forced Luc to accept her geas. And perhaps worst of all, Blaer had learned the secret of the earth fada’s quartz. With the right words, a fae could control an earth fada through their quartz—and Blaer knew the incantation.
For so many reasons, Blaer needed to die. But attack now, and Luc would be forced to defend her. And while the two of them fought, Blaer would simply teleport herself and the ice fae male out of there.
“Where to?” Luc asked Blaer.
“Virginia—the New Moon Court.”
Luc nodded and shut the limo door. His head swung to where Adric crouched, his eyes the amber of his wolf.
Adric froze, a sick feeling coating his stomach—because he wasn’t one-hundred-percent sure that Luc wouldn’t betray him.
The former lieutenant’s face blanked. He opened the front door and slid behind the limo’s steering wheel.
Adric released a breath.
The car purred to life and headed down the street. At the corner, Luc pulled over to allow two police cars and an ambulance pass by.
Adric waited until the limo was out of sight before racing back to the house where he and Rosana had left their things. There, he changed back to man and pulled on his pants and T-shirt, leaving the rest in the duffel bag for now.
Luc’s face had been hard as stone, closed up tight. The man had always been grim, but now he looked like he’d been scrubbed clean of emotion.
Gods, it sliced at Adric, to leave a friend with the fae, especially Luc. During the Darktime, Adric had risked his own life to rescue Luc from Leron. If it would do any good, he’d do the same thing in a heartbeat.
But Luc had accepted Lady Blaer’s geas of his own free will to save Marjani in Iceland. Now Luc was bound to her for the next decade, and Adric couldn’t do a damn thing about it. Only Luc could break the geas, and his former lieutenant would never do that. The man would die before breaking his word.
Adric tightened his jaw. If only he hadn’t sent Luc to Iceland after Marjani.
The clan needed you in Baltimore. And Luc insisted on going. You probably couldn’t have stopped him if you tried.
But Adric was alpha. The final decision had been his—and because of it, he’d lost Luc to that fae bitch.
That’s when it hit him. Luc was Blaer’s man. He must have led the fae to Lewes—and Adric.
His lungs contracted. He pressed the heel of his hand to his chest, telling himself that it wasn’t Luc’s fault. He was under Blaer’s control.
But it felt like Luc had shoved a knife into his heart.
He grimly set his hurt aside. Rosana was waiting for him. Rolling up his jeans, he jogged barefoot into the bay until it reached his calves before setting out for the Breakwater Light. If Luc did return, the water would erase Adric’s tracks.
He hadn’t gone far when he saw the river dolphin slipping through the waves, a sleek smudge against the lighter gray of the night sky. He should’ve known she’d come back for him.
He dropped the bags on the sand and signaled her with his quartz. She immediately headed in, shifting a few yards offshore.
She rose from the bay, water streaming down her naked body, and everything in him stopped.
Breath, heart, even his mind.
All he could do was stare in helpless longing.
She strode through the waves toward him, all long legs and curves, wet hair snaking like seaweed over high, firm breasts. Water droplets shimmered on her skin, the charm a silver glint on her wrist.
She was a siren with ocean-colored eyes, come to land for one short night.
Sorrow squeezed his insides. She was so beautiful, so at home at the water.
So different from him.
They could never have more than these snatches of time.
But his feet were already moving, taking him to her.
10
Adric was okay.
Rosana’s knees went weak with relief at seeing him unharmed.
Their eyes locked, and her spine tingled at the need and heat in his. She walked toward him, a moth to his fire.
He met her halfway, hauling her up against his lean, sinewy frame. The water sucked at their ankles. The icy wind whipped around them.
She had time to draw a breath and then his mouth crashed onto hers. One kiss spun into the next, and the next. Hard, drugging kisses that took her deep and whipped her around until she clung to him as if he were the only solid thing in the world.
His hands gripped her hips, molding her to his body. His erection pressed against her belly through the placket of his jeans. She rubbed against it and he groaned.
The wind picked up, scouring her exposed skin. She shivered and pressed closer, tunneling her fingers under his T-shirt, seeking his warmth. She might be a river fada, adapted to cool streams and caverns, but even she got cold on a night like this.
He lifted his head, swore. “You need to put on some clothes.”
“Clothes.” Dazed, she rested her forehead against his chest. “Right.”
As she got dressed, Adric suggested they camp out in Cape Henlopen for the night and get the car in the morning. “Otherwise,” he added, “we’ll spend half the night answering questions for the humans.”
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