Chapter 28
TWENTY-EIGHT
Change is inevitable.
CELINE
I wake to my phone buzzing on the nightstand.
Sunlight presses in, curling around the edges of the curtains and creating a halo effect. It doesn’t feel early. Did we sleep past checkout? I can’t bring myself to care.
Curled on his side, Riven is already awake, his gaze fixed on the vibrating phone.
“Has it been going off for long?”
“Yes.”
I sit up abruptly, my brain coming fully online.
“Why didn’t you say something? It could be an emergency.
” My fingers graze the phone and knock it off the table.
It skids across the carpeted floor before disappearing under the other bed.
Riven retrieves it for me and treats me to a distracting view of his bare ass while he’s at it.
“Thanks.” I take it from him and curse when I see multiple missed calls from Ciprian and Alistair. They’re going to be pissed.
I call Alistair. He picks up before the second ring. “Angel?”
“I’m here, Ali. Sorry, we slept in.”
There’s a pause on the other end of the line as he processes what I didn’t say. “You need to come back, Celine. Someone sent you something.”
I push a strand of hair out of my eyes. “What do you mean? Who sent me what?”
“Papers. A book. I don’t know, angel, I can’t bloody read it, but a care package shot through the gateway outside the Fringes. If it’s not for you, I don’t know who else it could be for.”
“The fucked-up gateway? My gateway?”
“Yes, that gateway!”
His voice gets muffled, then I hear Ciprian loud and clear.
“Hey, babe. Don’t mind Alistair, he thought you were dead for about ten minutes, so he’s coming down from a frenzy.
I’m texting you an address. Idris visited a few months ago on a diplomatic trip or something and he can create a portal there. ”
“Okay.” I jump out of bed, put the call on speaker, and set the phone down to free up both hands to toss things in my backpack. “Okay, Ciprian, we’ll be on our way in five minutes.”
“Perhaps you should dress yourself before you pack everything, darling.”
Heat floods my face, and I freeze, staring at the phone like it’s going to come to life.
Ciprian makes a strangled sound before sighing. “You better have blown her mind, dude.”
I bite my lip, unsure how to respond to that. Ciprian doesn’t sound mad, and I know we talked about this, but knowing something might happen and having it confirmed isn’t quite the same thing.
Riven’s face flickers, and he clears his throat. “I tried my best.”
“Fuck, that doesn’t sound promising. Did you make her come?”
I’m in the process of shoving one leg into yesterday’s jeans, and I miss the hole and nearly fall on my face. “Oh my gods,” I snap. “Is this the right time for this conversation?”
Ciprian groans and his voice gets fainter. “Dammit, Ali, I don’t think she got off.”
I snarl, grabbing the phone from the bed and holding it close to my mouth. “Not that it’s anyone’s business, but I did. Multiple times. I ‘got off’ so much we’re probably going to owe the hotel money.”
“Did you throw him around?” Alistair sounds torn between morbid curiosity and envy.
My scowls softens. “Please, Ali. You know I save that for you.”
He growls. “Enough of this. Get to the address. We’ll see you soon, angel.”
“Wait!” Ciprian’s voice is distant. “I want to know how big it—” The call ends, and I glance up at Riven, expecting . . . Shit, I have no idea what to expect, but it isn’t the wide grin covering the bottom half of his face.
A flicker of static rolls along the bridge of his nose, and—what is that? I lunge for the lamp and turn it on, but by the time I look again, his face is the same as usual, features buried beneath layers of smooth amber. Pull it together, Celine. Now isn’t the time for hallucinations.
Riven drops a shirt over my head.
It smells like him, and I inhale deeply, hoping he doesn’t notice.
My mind and heart are racing. If someone sent me something from the celestial realm, it has to be Malach or my father. Both options make me nervous.
What will I do if Malach tells me to stop trying? His words almost broke me in the monster realm, and he wasn’t even trying to be cruel. If he doubles down . . . No. I can’t think that way. It would mean my efforts were for nothing.
“Answers, darling. No matter what this is, it could hold answers.” Riven’s voice is calm and assured.
He’s not telling me how to feel, but he is separating the emotions.
It’s exactly what I need. Now isn’t the time to create devastating hypotheticals.
Fiction is for nighttime, and it’s—I glance at the time on the phone—fuck me, it’s noon. Noon is firmly for facts.
I lace up my combat boots and glance at the rumpled beds. The urge to strip the one we used last night, toss the sheets out the window, and run is hard to ignore.
My phone lights up as Ciprian sends the address he promised, and I push the sheet issue from my mind.
It’s time to go.
Hooking the backpack over my shoulders, I check the bathroom, then under the beds in case we dropped something. “Are you ready?”
Riven nods.
We leave the hotel and head toward the address. When I see it’s a parking lot full of rental cars, I snort a laugh. Of course. Idris is ruthlessly efficient. Running into the office, I turn the car in and text Ciprian to let him know we’ve arrived.
Ciprian
Go to the back of the building. Green dumpster, dent on the side.
I grab Riven’s hand and tug him around the building, keeping an eye out for security cameras. There were plenty mounted on the front, but with no cars on this side, the coast is clear. Good. We don’t have time to deal with terrified humans.
The air sputters, fighting back as it’s displaced by Idris’s magic, then a purple circle of swirling light appears behind the dumpster. Fifteen seconds and one disgusting magical squeeze later and we’re standing inside the compound, two feet from the indoor tree.
I’m surprised by my relief. This isn’t my home, but it’s a lot closer to it than the string of hotels and motels I’ve been sleeping in on the road.
Luca grabs me before I can stumble over the tree’s thick roots, kissing my forehead and tossing Idris a grateful nod. With the tips of his pointed ears peeking through his black hair, the fae is as cool and unruffled as ever. He closes the portal with a flick of his wrist.
“Welcome back,” he says.
“Thanks.” I smile. “For the portal and the home base.”
“Of course. Ciprian is . . . family.” It takes him some effort to get the final word out, and my lips twitch at the pinched expression on his face.
“Holy shit! I heard that!” Ciprian skids around the corner, his black eyes glittering with delight. “Sheena, your boyfriend called me family!”
She follows him into the foyer. “One of my boyfriends is your literal brother.”
“Idris, bestie, not Callum. Idris the unimpressed called me family.”
Idris sighs. “And I am already living to regret it.”
Ciprian’s grin doesn’t fade. He’s as pleased to get a reaction out of Idris as he is a compliment. He reaches for me, but Alistair darts into the foyer and shoves him away before snatching me up.
My legs wrap around his waist, and our surroundings blur as Alistair’s lips crash against mine while we move at vampire speed. Enjoying the kiss and his possessiveness, I sink into his arms and let him abduct me.
The bedroom door slams behind us.
“That was rude,” I whisper, trying and failing to maintain a straight face.
Alistair’s eyes flash red. “Like I give a shit.”
The hinge of the bedroom door creaks as it opens and slams again. I glance over my shoulder in time to see Ciprian’s glare turn distinctly demonic. “You son of a bitch,” he snarls.
Ali smirks. “It’s not my fault you’re slow.”
Streaks of color spread across Ciprian’s cheeks, and his hands fist at his sides. “If I’m slow, it’s because someone decided to drink half my blood and demand a field trip—”
Everything blurs again, then we’re in Ciprian’s space. “You assured me you felt fine,” Alistair hisses. “Sit down. I can’t believe you got out of bed if you weren’t feeling well.”
Ciprian rolls his eyes and cups my chin, bringing our lips together and ignoring Alistair’s rant. “I’ve missed you, hot wings.”
I kiss him thoroughly, a shiver of desire rolling through me.
The door opens again, two sets of footsteps entering the pretty green bedroom Sheena made for us. “I don’t think we’re going to get a good house guest review from the fae,” Luca says, reaching between Alistair and Ciprian’s bodies and extracting me.
Riven stands alone by the door. His stance is a little too deliberate to be natural. His spine is rigid, his knees are locked, and the blank expression on his face has more in common with an art installation than a living person.
Luca follows my gaze. “You three left Riven and me to twiddle our thumbs out there.”
My heart squeezes. Luca’s always watching out for me, and now he’s extending that loyalty to Riven. It can’t be easy for him. The bond throbs. What would I do without him? I squeeze his hand and look over to where Alistair is trying to wrestle Ciprian into a chair.
“What came through the gateway?” I wince at the shrill tone of my own voice. Zero calm. I sound like I’m skipping blindfolded along the edge of a cliff laced with landmines.
The silence that meets my question doesn’t help.
Luca leads me to the sitting area. I plop down next to Ciprian. There’s paper on the table, but I don’t recognize the messy handwriting. “We’re assuming you can read this because we definitely can’t.”
I grab it with shaky fingers, scanning through the common tongue.
The letter is from Lyklan, and each sentence is worse than the last.
Malach is being held hostage by my father, tortured, and Lyklan doesn’t believe he’ll survive much longer. He’s asking me to come save him. It’s exactly what I feared, and the reason I’ve been trying so hard.