Chapter 28
TWENTY-EIGHT
“Well, this explains why Vincent didn’t send Atlas.”
Adam barely heard Robin’s words over his thundering heart, over the flapping wings of the thing inside him desperate to beat its way out and wrap those wings of warmth around the vampire frantically pacing the length of the cellar he’d had no choice but to retreat to.
The rising sun had trapped Icarus, preventing him going from after the one person Adam knew he put above all others.
Including him.
“What does he want?” Jennifer asked. “There’s no ransom request, no message, just the picture.”
The picture—a smug, grinning Atlas with his arm around the shoulders of a much shorter woman with long green hair and hazel eyes, only the slightest creases at the corners, far fewer than one would expect on a woman who, by Adam’s math, should look closer to fifty than thirty.
Adam circled one end of the cellar table.
His legs were steadier now, the battle rush of adrenaline faded, the initial shock of that picture internalized, the pain he’d felt for Icarus better tamed though no less intense.
He leaned a hip against the side of the table near where Icarus was pacing. “Did they take her to leverage you?”
“I don’t know.” Icarus stopped in front of him, his eyes wild with fear and with self-recrimination Adam recognized all too well. “Maybe. Fuck!”
“Why else would they take her?” Adam asked, sensing that he’d finally get the whole truth now, that Icarus was either ready to share it or had no choice.
It would be the latter, judging by the frustrated twist of his lips, as if they’d sealed in the truth for so long that his body was fighting to keep it in still. “For her own power. Because I fucking showed it to them.”
“You both did,” Cormac said, rejoining them from upstairs where he’d been questioning two of the shifters they’d detained.
The rest of Vincent’s strike force, including the other warlock, had retreated.
“You showed them yours tonight,” he said to Adam.
“And you”—he jutted his chin at Icarus—“showed them hers at the Canyon Lands that day, didn’t you? ”
Icarus’s eyes slipped shut, a powerful cocktail of guilt and fear pinching his features, answering Cormac’s question. The raven had been right.
“Which is what?” Adam asked more gently than Icarus was being with himself.
“If they don’t know already, and they find out . . .” He covered his face with his hands and roared, loud enough to rattle the metal tanks and light fixtures. Everyone in the room took a step back.
Except Adam. “Icarus, what power?”
He lowered his hands and opened his eyes, locking his gaze with Adam’s and drawing whatever strength he needed, everything Adam had left to give him.
A slight nod, a silent thank-you, before Icarus shifted his attention to Cormac.
“You weren’t wrong about me putting my hand to the ground and asking for help.
That’s exactly what I did. And she answered. ”
“Your sister?” Cormac said.
“Nature.” His blue gaze returned to Adam’s. “Her name is Mary, and she’s Mother Nature.”