Chapter Eighteen
Hack
The entire fifteen minutes it takes me to carry Sage back to the building the four of us share in The Shade is a testament to my self-control.
Although we spend most of our time in Georgia, the apartments here are convenient when our presence is required.
The whole way from the portal to our apartment, the fuckers around here are giving off evil vibes when they looked down on her.
I get it, she’s not thirty yet, so her scent is purely anthros but still…
one more snarl and I’ll fucking snap. And by snap, I do mean their necks.
Gritting my teeth, I use a finger to open the door, doing my best not to wake Sage.
It’s not a difficult task considering she’s knocked out cold, and I have a feeling it has little to do with her being tired and a lot to do with Baba Yaga.
Falling asleep like she did is not natural but I’ll have to figure out that problem later.
Yes, that’s where my mind went.
When I saw the bolts aimed at the shield nipping her skin, I should have ripped Baba’s body in two, but if anything had happened to me, Sage would have been alone and vulnerable. That’s not an option.
“Well, shit. What is she doing here?” Pierce is at the top of the second floor—my living quarters—stepping aside to let me pass as I take Sage to my bedroom.
The building is ours and it’s five floors, four full apartments, one for each of us with a common area on the first floor where we hang out and relax, sometimes even play pool.
We didn’t bother making it into proper apartments since we spend so much of our time together anyway.
Well, except for Slay, he built a door to keep us at arm’s length.
Although, he’s a secret softy because he opens the door every time he makes dinner. Which is almost every night, but that’s beside the point.
The point is, I need to get Sage comfortable and let her sleep off this…whatever it is.
“We just got back from Alaska. Baba Yaga turned out to be an evil cunt. I knew you’d be here. I don’t know what’s wrong with her.”
“Ah, so the stories are true, then?” I’m sure he can hear the slight panic in my voice so he places two fingers against the inside of Sage’s wrist, his head bowed as he counts her pulse.
“She’s stable. Does she have any other symptoms?
” Sometimes it’s difficult to reconcile the man he was with the demon he is.
So many of his anthros traits are still anchored to him.
He’s assuming she’s ill since I was carrying her but I believe it’s more sinister than that. One minute she was panicking, the next she was my sleeping beauty. Coincidence? I don’t think so.
“None.” At least not that I could see.
“All right. Just let her sleep it off and I’ll take a look at her when she wakes up.” Pierce didn’t move, his gaze running up and down Sage’s body, scanning her from head to toe.
“She doesn’t have any physical injuries.” I don’t mean for my voice to sound so threatening but here we are.
“Relax, Hack. I’m not checking her out, I’m checking on her.
There’s a big fucking difference.” Shaking his head, he pulls the covers up over her legs and walks past me.
Before he’s out the door, he stops, putting us shoulder to shoulder.
“Don’t be an asshole. Save that energy for when it really counts. ”
With those parting words, he walks out, leaving me standing there, staring at my chosen.
I don’t react to his accusation but that doesn't mean I don’t acknowledge it.
Am I being an asshole? Yeah. In my defense, I’ve been on an emotional roller coaster for endless centuries getting mere moments—days if I’m lucky—with every version of Aiyana—Sage—Adriana.
There are dozens of names she’s gone by throughout her lifetimes but for some reason I can’t quite explain, this one feels different.
Stepping closer to Sage, I’m careful not to jostle her as I slide her heavy coat off and place it on the nearest chair.
Once I’ve removed her boots, I pull the covers up and over her shoulders.
My need to touch her is greater than anything so I take advantage of a privileged moment alone.
With my thumb, I brush along her temple and move a rebellious strand of hair away from her face, admiring the way her breaths come and go like lost ships at sea.
The way her full lips part just enough to make me want to devour them.
The way her eyes dance behind her lids as she dreams of careless mothers and enemy soul mates.
Hekate’s words come back to me, her advice lighting a fire deep inside my gut. Sex would break the hex which would, in turn, eliminate one of the pesky problems keeping us apart.
The thought of us uniting our souls for the first time—in this life—with the simple goal of wiping away a hex doesn’t sit well with me. Although my memories of us are vivid and numerous, this would be a first for her.
What choice do we have? Without breaking the hate hex, we’d be on a constant push and pull, not getting anything done and all too soon, I’ll find myself mourning her again.
I can’t do that. No, I won’t do that.
“What happened?” Slay’s voice startles me out of my profound thoughts. The last thing I expect is for him to be interested in anything we have going on.
Looking over my shoulder in acknowledgement, I shrug. “Baba Yaga did something, I’m just not sure what it is, yet.”
“Hmmm. She’s a piece of work, that witch.”
Frowning, I turn to face him when he steps up to my side. “You know her?”
“Know is a strong word, but yeah. I’ve run into her projects from time to time.” My brows sink deeper into a V the more he talks.
“You didn’t think to mention this the other day? And what do you mean by projects?”
“I don’t have the exact details but she’s been known to…experiment on anthros throughout her life.” I guess the information Pierce and I read on that website was accurate.
“How the fuck is she getting away with that?” Wouldn’t Hekate know and put a stop to it?
“Beats me.” With a shrug he turns on his heel and walks back to the door of my bedroom, his ever present dark cloud following him like a loyal puppy.
“She’ll be all right, though.” Then he’s gone and I’m left alone again, counting my chosen’s steady breaths as I contemplate the ways I’d like to destroy her oldest relative.
“Hey, wake up.” I’m on my feet before Pierce can finish his order.
My first instinct is to check on Sage but her position is identical to the last time I looked her over. Her head is angled away from us as opposed to when I fell asleep with her facing me but aside from that small detail, she’s been sleeping like a dead weight.
“What’s wrong?” Ever since Sage has come back into my life, I’ve been on high alert. It feels like every moment is a potential threat to her existence.
“We got something.” Pierce looks over at Sage and before I can react, he does that thing again where he checks her pulse.
I know there’s nothing sexual in his touch but fuck my life, I have the deep-rooted need to erase every trace of evidence that his skin was pressed against hers.
And yes, I’m fully aware of how fucking insane that sounds.
With just his nod, I know she’s okay. At least physically.
Pierce walks out, tilting his head my way to let me know we’re talking out in the hall. Sage is asleep so I’m hoping she can’t trip her way into death but shit, sometimes she’s like a fawn who’s just been born into the world when she walks.
“Two things.” Pierce holds up his middle and index fingers as if I don’t know what two means.
Just then, Slay shows up as though he’s been summoned from thin air.
The Shade has this ethereal state about it that doesn’t exist on Earth.
We’re physical here, but we’re also many things outside the physical.
When it comes to Slay, being able to move without making a sound is true no matter where he is.
“Slash is somewhere in this realm getting the fuck beat out of him and last I saw, he was enjoying it a little too much.” With Danika’s disappearance, Desdemon must be going out of his mind, and taking it out on Slash is giving him some semblance of comfort while he waits for information.
“Why is he wasting his time on Slash? It’s not like he had anything to do with it. He wasn’t even there.” Slay’s question echoes my own.
“From what I hear, he’s got half The Shade looking and spying and so far he’s got nothing.
Apparently, he’s going after the messenger because we should have told him sooner.
” Pierce shrugs as if it’s just another day in the life of the Four Horsemen.
“When I tried to interfere, Slash told me, and I quote, ‘Fuck off, get your own torture chamber’.”
We shouldn’t laugh, but how can we not?
“Idiot.” Bored with the conversation, Slay shakes his head as he gives his one word opinion and slinks back to wherever he was before he appeared out of nowhere.
“You said two things,” I remind Pierce as I stretch my neck to check on Sage before giving my attention back to my brother when I see that she’s still sound asleep.
“It’s nothing solid so we’ll need to see for ourselves, but Vurmik has been keeping his rather large demon ears to the ground for me. There’s talk that she may be somewhere in Kohrye.” I nod at Pierce, remembering Vurmik as a weasel who’s able to get people to talk without much effort.
“Not surprising and not much help. Kohrye is huge. What does he expect us to do, go door to door?” It’s like telling the anthros police that the suspect is in California. It’s no help whatsoever.
“We’ve got a name, and if we’re lucky, that name will have a location.”
My spine stiffens and my entire body goes rigid. Finally, some good news.
“And you couldn’t lead with that?”
He could have shaved off five minutes of this conversation.
“What’s the fun in that?” Clapping me on the shoulder, Pierce gives me a blinding grin that puts all his pretty teeth on show.