CHAPTER 15
“YOU GOT IT?” Alex examined the small, faintly blueish dagger that was lying on the counter in his sister’s safe house. “I thought Finneas said artifacts couldn’t be created this quickly.”
“He and I talked again after we got back to the sector,” Sera said darkly. “I was able to persuade him to come around to my way of thinking.”
“Please tell me you didn’t just start a war with the entire fae kingdom.”
Smirking, Sera continued, “This dagger isn’t classified as a true artifact. Its magic isn’t strong or lasting enough. That’s how they were able to get it to us so quickly. The power it contains will degrade after twelve hours.” She checked her phone. “Make that eleven and a half, now.”
“That’s cutting it close.”
“It’s what we get. Finneas said they spelled it that way on purpose so that it can’t be stolen and used to get through their wards. Apparently, the faerie are feeling touchy about their border given the recent security issues in the region. We’ll just have to hurry. Will Dante help us?”
“He’s in. Evan Girard will have her network standing by to hide people once we get them out.” He hesitated. “And you know I talked to Isabella.”
“When I first saw your text, I couldn’t believe it. What the hell was she thinking?”
“She’s convinced Father is sick.”
“One of the freed prisoners we interviewed referenced that, too. We thought they were referring to Luciano Cavalieri. I don’t buy it.
I think it’s all a fake illness constructed to buy sympathy and convince any researchers who are balking to look the other way and abandon medical ethics.
They probably have other fake stories about kids they’re supposedly trialing the drug on at cancer treatment centers and chronic illness patients like Ava Girard. ”
Sera shook her head. “The data doesn’t lie. Cavalieri Industries has been cutting drug access for years and if they ever did manage to develop some miracle serum using fae blood, the only people getting access would be the oligarchs who could pay top price.”
Alex held up both hands. “Isabella gets that she messed up. She gave us the confirmed location for the research facility. I think this could be a real breakthrough with her.”
“I want you to be right, okay?” Sera leaned against the kitchen table. “I just don’t know that we can trust her.”
“We don’t have a choice. The resistance is moving ahead with the strike?”
“They’re coordinating with Finneas’ team since we both have hostages in there.”
“Do you know when?”
“It’ll start in just a few hours.” She nodded to the dagger. “So this will open any lock or barrier you touch it to. For the spell to work, you have to touch the tip of the dagger to the lock and say three words in Elvish.”
“Great,” he muttered. “Since we both remember my Elvish pronunciation was famously lacking back in school.”
“We should both probably practice.”
Ten minutes later, he’d managed to successfully unlock the padlock seven out of the previous fifteen tries.
“I’m texting Finneas and telling him his language is all vowels,” he grumbled. “I don’t know how anyone can speak it.”
“I’m sure that will go over well.”
Alex rubbed his temples. “And I’m not sure I’m going to improve my accuracy in the next few hours. We might as well text Dante—”
A sudden wave of dizziness and panic washed over him. The dagger fell from his hand, clattering to the floor. Vision blurring, Alex staggered into Sera’s kitchen table.
“Alex!” she said sharply. “Sit down. Let me get you some water.”
“No, wait.” He was staring at the mating mark on his wrist, which had suddenly gone so cold to the touch that it practically burned his skin. “Something’s happened to Dani.”
“You’re shaking and your pupils are dilated.” Sera pressed a gloved hand to his forehead. “Your pulse is spiking.”
He could feel his heart threatening to hammer out of his chest. “I can feel something is wrong. Something bad.”
“Is she alive?”
“I think so. But barely. We have to get to her.”
“I’ll go.” When he started to object, she shook her head.
“Your heartrate is way too high. No doubt it’s spiking in reaction to whatever is happening to her, but you’re not going to be able to dematerialize safely.
If we get to wherever she is and we need to leave quickly, I may need to be able to grab her and scatter fast. If I can’t grab both of you—”
“I’m going,” he growled.
“Fine. But if we’re doing this, I’m taking you. No sense in your heart exploding on the way there.” His sister grabbed his hand. “Take deep breaths.”
“Just get us there, Sera,” he whispered, praying they wouldn’t be too late.
Dani hurried out of a newly constructed office building in the downtown district, stuffing a paper application form into her satchel.
When she’d gotten the text notification that there was last-minute hiring for custodian positions, she’d hurried across town to fill out an application and do an interview that day in person.
Alex had said it could be weeks before she would be able to be out in public after the transformation process started, but they’d faced one delay after the next.
Without her income at the distribution center, and with Evan only able to find sporadic hours, they needed a steady source of work.
If nothing else, she’d grabbed an extra application so Evan could apply.
Reaching into her bag, she powered her phone back on. Half a dozen missed calls and messages filled the screen from when she’d been in the building, waiting to interview.
Alex: Change of plans. We need to postpone.
Her heart sank. Not again.
Alex: I’ll contact you as soon as it’s safe.
Which meant they’d somehow gotten the keys from Finneas and were moving forward with the plan to break the aberrant prisoners out of the castle. She sent up a silent prayer to whatever gods were listening to keep Alex safe as she read the next text.
Evan: Emergency at work. I can’t get to school to pick up Ava.
Dani swore. It was Evan’s day. Ava could walk home on her own. It was only a mile. But their neighborhood was rough on the best of days, and with the recent riots, there was no way she wanted their ten-year-old sister out on the streets alone.
She took off in a dead run, satchel thumping against her hip, the cold December air burning in her lungs as she raced down the sidewalk. At the corner, she slowed long enough to play the rest of her messages aloud.
Nadine’s voice came over the recorded message.
“Dani, where are you? Ava just got home. She’s in bad shape. She said she was followed on her way home by two men. She managed to outrun them, but she’s shaky and I don’t know what to do. Should I give her more insulin, or—”
“No!” Dani practically shouted into the phone.
That was exactly the wrong thing to do. Ava needed her emergency sugar tablets, or juice.
Then a good snack. More insulin when her sugar was already low could kill her.
She hit redial, but of course Nadine didn’t pick up.
Desperate, she tried Ava, but her phone just rang and rang, the call going unanswered.
She ran faster, rounding the corner two blocks from home. She tried not to picture Ava lying unconscious in a diabetic coma on the bathroom floor, unable to reach for her phone, while Nadine stood helplessly by.
In desperation, she dialed Evan, and was unsurprised when the call went straight to voicemail. If Evan was preparing for a critical resistance operation, standard procedure was to go dark so she and the people she was trying to protect couldn’t be traced.
“Please don’t be dead,” she prayed as she reached their apartment building. Her heart pounded so hard it hurt as she ran up flight after flight of stairs, the adrenaline making her hands shake. She dropped her keys twice before managing to fit the right one into the lock.
“Nadine!” she screamed. “I’m here. Let me in!”
There was only silence from within.
Terror filled her. She tried not to picture Ava lying unconscious on the bathroom floor as she finally managed to force the door open. She burst inside, not questioning why the lights were off, the apartment eerily quiet.
“Ava,” she gasped, hurtling towards her sister’s room—
She didn’t make it more than a few steps before something cold and hard struck her on the back of the head.
Dani came to slumped on the couch. Her head hurt terribly. She tried to move and found her hands and feet had been bound with tape.
Seated in the chair across from her was Lara Cavalieri. She was wearing a cashmere sweater over perfectly tailored slacks.
And she was holding a gun.
“Where’s Ava?” Cold fear slithered down Dani’s spine.
“My gods, you’re stupid.” Lara rolled her eyes. “I can’t believe you actually fell for that.”
“Is she somewhere safe?”
“For now. We’re holding her at a secure location.”
“Please don’t hurt my sister.” Dani began to shake. “She’s only ten. She has to check her blood sugar levels at regular intervals. Please just let her go. I’m the one you want.”
Lara’s expression hardened. “I warned you to stay away from Alexander. I gave you so many chances to go back to your sisters and forget about him. But you had to take what was mine.”
“Please,” Dani whispered, tears spilling down her cheeks.
“Like the greedy little whore you are, you just couldn’t stop. You had to keep taking things that weren’t yours.” Lara rose from the chair, crossing the room towards her. “What do you have to say for yourself now? You fucked him, didn’t you?” She raised the gun. “Don’t lie. I’ll know.”
“I’m sorry.” Dani closed her eyes, waiting for the shot to come.
“You’re sorry for what?” Lara taunted. “Sorry for sleeping with my fiancé? Sorry he thought you were good enough to fuck, but that he didn’t love you enough to make you his wife?
I’ve seen the mark on your wrist. It explains so much.
You’re an aberrant, a little blood witch.
Somehow, you managed to put a blood spell on Alex, getting him all twisted up in his head so he couldn’t tell up from down.
He doesn’t know what he wants anymore. You turned him away from me.
Things were fine before he met you. We were going to get married. ”
Dani swallowed, saying nothing. She needed to keep Lara talking. But was there any chance Evan or Alex would show up in time?
Her heart sank.
If the rescue operation at the prison or the illegal research facility was really happening right now, they wouldn’t be back for hours.
“That’s why you showed up at the auction,” Lara continued, eyes manic. “It was never about saving your sister at all. You wanted Alexander, wanted to take him from me. You knew the only way to get what you wanted was to enthrall him using blood magic.”
“I swear to you, I didn’t,” Dani said softly.
She had to try to calm Lara down. Could she convince her that she and Alex had broken things off, that he didn’t want her after all?
“He’s obsessed with you, won’t listen to reason.” Lara’s expression hardened. “It’s like he’s forgotten how good we are together, when just weeks ago, he felt that way about me.”
“He told you that?”
“He didn’t have to. Alex has always been very private.
But things were moving in that direction.
I was giving him time to get there on his own.
And then you moved in and ruined everything.
” Her nostrils flared. “If the only way to end his fixation with you is to sever the link you share, then so be it.”
It happened so fast.
One second, Lara was raising the pistol.
Dani started to cry out, to beg her to stop.
There was a flash, then a terrible pain in her side. She cried out, slumping over.
Hot, sticky blood soaked her right side. With her hands taped together, she couldn’t apply much pressure to the wound, but she tried anyway, pressing her arm into her side. The pain nearly made her black out.
“You left me no choice. It should be over quickly. You won’t feel too much pain before you lose consciousness.”
“Please,” Dani begged in a whisper, unable to manage anything else through the pain.
Her vision slowly began to dim. Was this how she was going to die?
Alone, bleeding out, where Evan or Ava would find her?
That thought, the image of her sisters never being able to enter their apartment again out of the trauma of finding her dead, forced her awake from the veil of gray that had begun to descend.
She couldn’t get to her phone, was sure Lara had taken it.
Closing her eyes, she silently prayed.
Alex, help.