Chapter 1 The Present #3
“You think I can just, what, drag three grown men and a corpse into some alternate dimension?” I hiss. “I just got this body back, Cassian! I barely remember how to breathe, and now you want me to play interdimensional Uber?”
Cassian shoots me a glare. “Would you rather get arrested carrying a dead body?”
Ugh. I don’t like this. Not one bit. But what choice do I have?
“Fine,” I snap, throwing up my hands. “I’ll try. But if this goes sideways? I’m blaming all of you.”
Nathaniel doesn’t miss a beat. Still crouched, he pops the trunk and hauls the plastic-wrapped body out. It lands with a dull thud—mercifully bloodless. The Candy Maker’s DNA is still sealed inside.
Remember how I said the cops were bound to catch these guys eventually? Yeah. Still true.
But now? I need them alive. I need them free.
Because they’re supposed to kill my ex-husband, and I’d really like to keep my newly-corporeal ass out of jail.
I shut my eyes. Focus.
Come on, Skye. Flicker. Do the thing.
But the void doesn’t come like it used to. There's no instant pull. No easy shift into the endless dark.
There’s something, though; an electric buzz at the edge of thought. A tug at the seams of reality.
And then… nothing.
I squeeze my eyes tighter. Strain. Push. Will it.
I feel like I’m on the verge of something, either vanishing or spontaneously combusting.
Neither option’s great.
“Any day now, sweetheart,” Talon drawls.
I grit my teeth. I am going to flicker. And then I’m going to stab him.
An ambulance screeches to a stop, just past the wreckage. The crushed car hides us for now, but I can hear the urgency: doors slamming, voices shouting, boots hitting pavement. We’re out of time.
“Skye,” Cassian growls, voice razor-sharp. “Now.”
I don’t know how. I don’t even know if I can. But the static erupts beneath my skin. Reality cracks. My vision tunnels, the world warping like it’s being sucked through a pinhole.
And then—
The car crash, the sirens, the shouting medics—none of it matters anymore.
We are nowhere. We are everywhere. Two medics rush past with gurneys, eyes scanning the wreckage, but they look right through us, like we’re ghosts.
The bystanders who were just whispering and pointing?
Nothing. Not even a flicker of recognition.
This isn’t the void. No endless silence. No pure, merciless black.
This is… limbo.
My world. The space between death and whatever waits beyond.
And for a second—just one heartbeat—it feels right. Like home. A rush of relief floods me. I didn’t know if I still could. I didn’t know if I’d ever be able to touch this place again. I feel—
Then it hits me.
A tremor. Subtle, but wrong. Like a thread snapping inside a loom. The air warps. The edges of my vision shimmer like heatwaves over pavement.
You’d think being back here would feel as natural as breathing. But it doesn’t.
My power pulses, then recoils. Like it knows I don’t belong anymore. I reach for it, but it slithers just out of grasp. Trembling. Feral. Foreign.
It’s slipping. Fast.
“Um, guys…” I start, my voice tight. “We have a problem.”
I don’t know what’ll happen if I lose control completely. Maybe we’ll land back at the crash. Or on the other side of the world. Or, God help us, somewhere that isn’t even real.
I need to act. Now.
My vision fractures. The world tilts at an angle that shouldn’t exist. My body feels like it’s being pulled in every direction at once.
Cassian grabs my arm, his grip tightening. “Skye.” His voice is sharp now, edged with alarm. He feels it too—that terrifying distortion. And that’s what scares me most. Cassian is the one who causes panic, not the one who gets caught in it. But right now? He’s definitely caught in it.
“I know, I know,” I hiss, muscles trembling. “I just… I’m not sure where to—” And then I see it. The empty ambulance. And my body, apparently running on pure instinct and terrible ideas, says: Screw it. That’s it.
Everything snaps.
Not flickers. Not warps.
Snaps.
I don’t know if it’s instinct or dumb luck, but I do the only thing that makes sense in the moment: I teleport us into that empty ambulance.
Which is idiotic, because it’s barely feet away from the wreck.
And it’s going to be the first place the paramedics enter once they realize there’s no patient.
The moment we land inside, we collapse into an awkward heap of murderers, regret, and a plastic-wrapped corpse.
Cassian crashes against the opposite wall with a thud.
Talon sprawls across the floor. And Nathaniel, poor, suffering Nathaniel, somehow ends up half-sitting on the goddamn corpse.
He lifts his hands. Stares at them. Then lets out a slow, deeply pained sigh.
“It worked,” he says.
“For now,” Cassian mutters. He’s already moving, slamming the rear doors shut so hard the whole vehicle rattles.
Talon stands, casually brushing blood from the sleeve of his shirt. “Well, that was dramatic,” he says. “I’d give it a solid seven out of ten. Points for effort, but the landing—”
I kick him in the shin.
God, that felt good.
He jerks back, startled, whatever he was about to say cut off with a sharp inhale.
“What the hell…” he mutters.
“Bet that didn’t feel like a warm mist, huh?” I snap.
He gawks at me for half a beat, then grins, slow and delighted.
“Oh,” he murmurs, rubbing his shin. “You really are solid, aren’t you?”
The implication hangs in the air for anyone to hear.
And well… what can I say? Heat blooms under my skin, a flush creeping up my neck.
Not from embarrassment, more from the way his eyes linger, sharp and assessing, like he’s fully realizing all the things he can do to me now that he couldn’t before.
“I guess so,” I say, aiming for nonchalant.
Then—
“Where the hell are the patients?” a medic yells, just outside. “There’s blood all over!”
Shit.
Cassian’s eyes lock on mine.
“Can you flicker us out of here?”
I squint. The static is still humming in my bones.
But I’m drained. Bone-deep, soul-wrecked tired. I don’t think I can do it again.
The door handle rattles.
We all freeze.
Then Cassian moves.
One second he’s in the back with us, the next he’s in the driver’s seat, hot-wiring the ambulance like he just stepped out of a heist movie.
“Are you serious?” I whisper-shriek, watching him work with a kind of ease that only comes from too much practice.
Nathaniel groans, fumbling for something to bolt the back doors shut. Talon is laughing. Actually laughing.
I stare, horrified, as the engine roars to life, sirens blaring. Cassian slams his foot on the gas, and the ambulance lurches forward like we’re on a rescue mission for Satan himself.
The medics? The crowd of concerned bystanders? Probably even a few squirrels in the trees?
They’re all screaming.
And the four of us?
We haven’t even scratched the surface of the shit that’s coming.