Chapter 26 Aiden
I blinked to the back of the house near the garage to grab the car keys before anyone could stop me.
Katarina was alive, and I wasn’t going to waste any time.
Shocked by how intense my emotions were at this minute, I tried to remember if there had ever been anyone in my life who made me feel this way.
Like my heart was going to explode from my chest now that I knew she was alive, a whole world of possibilities opened in front of me.
Dorian had been hurting just as deeply, I could feel it in the bond we shared after our time with Katarina.
Now we could both get our woman back and never let her go again.
It took another minute for the rest of the guys to join me in the garage.
The black Suburban was the only vehicle we owned that could fit all of us, so those were the keys I chose.
I unlocked the SUV with a beep and just as I pressed the button to open the double garage door, Dorian and Grim came tearing past me and almost swiped my legs out from underneath me.
“Assholes!” I shouted at the dueling dogs.
“What the hell are you two idiots fighting about?” Dorian hadn’t been able to keep his wolf at bay once Grim confirmed that Katarina was alive.
I could feel that anguish through the bond and the second we understood what Grim was saying to us, Dorian’s wolf took control.
Now it looked like his animal side was also choosing to assert his dominance over Grim.
Watching the two giant beasts snarl and snap at each other distracted me enough that I didn’t hear Blaise walk up beside me. He snatched the car keys out of my hand, almost bending my fingers backward.
“What the fuck?” I snapped at him. “I’m driving.”
“I’m driving,” the half-breed growled.
Reaching toward him, I tried to grab the keys dangling from his oversized hand. He lifted them high enough that I couldn’t reach them unless I wanted to jump, and I wasn’t going to reduce myself to that. “Stop being a dick!”
Dorian and Grim slammed their chests into each other, making a horrible thudding sound as their bodies entwined.
I could hear teeth on teeth while they postured their dominance.
Much like Blaise dangling the keys over my head in a show of his own power, all these guys were at a breaking point. Including me.
“Enough!” I screamed at all of them. “Are we going to get Katarina or are we going to endure these stupid pissing matches all day?” My face heated with rage, and my hands trembled with impatience.
I rarely lost my temper anymore around the men, but these last few days had been some of the hardest in my life, and my patience was thin at best.
Blaise lowered his arm, gave me a quick nod, and then stepped out into the gravel driveway where Grim and Dorian were still having a standoff. “Let’s go.”
They both panted with exhaustion and Grim’s ears kept flicking back and forth like he was listening to another conversation we couldn’t hear.
And that’s probably exactly what he was doing.
While I didn’t completely understand how his psychic connection to Katarina worked, they were able to communicate in a way that sparked a fierce flame of jealousy deep inside my bones.
Katarina and I were connected in our own way, but I would never be able to see the world through her eyes as I presumed Grim could.
Grim let out a yip, snapped his teeth at Dorian, and trotted over to the Suburban.
He waited next to the back passenger door on the driver’s side, looking at me and Blaise with an attitude.
Huffing a small laugh, Blaise jingled the keys in his hand, pushed past me, and opened the door for Grim.
As soon as the black beast jumped inside, Blaise slid into the driver’s seat.
“I said let’s go,” he snarled at me and Dorian.
Dorian’s wolf shook his fur, stretched back into a downward dog position, and then jogged over to the SUV. He waited for me to open the front passenger door, but when I instead opened the door for the back seat, he growled.
“You are not sitting in the front,” I looked down at him. “Get in the back with Grim.”
Dorian bared his teeth.
“Do not growl at me, wolf.”
He did it again.
“Get in!” Blaise yelled, and I raised my brows at the obstinate animal. See? I was right.
With a huff, Dorian jumped into the back seat, snapped at Grim, and then settled on his haunches like he was waiting to be buckled in.
I didn’t do that, of course, and instead slammed his door shut and started to step into my seat.
But Blaise had to be a dick and he was already backing out of the garage before I got my foot up on the running board.
Hopping along and being dragged out of the house, I shot a glare at the half-breed who tried to hide his smile.
“I hate you,” I muttered as I finally got my body and leg inside before he took off. Gravel spun up behind us, clicking against the vehicle and making me wince. Roman didn’t like it when we damaged the cars.
Ignoring me, Blaise looked in the rearview mirror at Grim. “Which way?”
Grim barked once.
I glanced at Blaise who squeezed his eyes shut for a moment while we waited at the end of the driveway. “Right?” he clarified.
Grim barked again.
“Left?” I asked as Blaise glared at me.
Grim growled.
With a smile, I slapped Blaise on the shoulder.
“Right it is, half-breed. Let’s go!” There was probably some deep-seated reason why I loved to goad Blaise so much.
Maybe it was because I never had a brother.
Or perhaps because I enjoyed bringing out the worst in people sometimes.
Regardless, the aura of annoyance rolling off his oversized shoulders made me happy.
I never said I was a good person.
Grim continued his series of yips, barks, and growls, directing us toward our girl.
He hadn’t done much whining until we found ourselves two hours out of the city and driving down some dirt county road.
Agriculture fields flanked our sides, most of them tilled and waiting for another planting.
Every once and a while there would be an old farmhouse set back away from the road, but for the most part, we hadn’t passed much civilization in the last thirty minutes.
“Uh, Grim. Are you sure this is where she is?” I asked.
Grim’s wet snout smashed against the side of my face like he was giving me a bitch slap. Dorian’s wolf huffed as he laughed at me, and I didn’t miss the smirk growing on Blaise’s lips either.
“Okay,” I muttered, pushing his head away. “I’ll trust you.”
My heart thudded in anticipation. We had to be getting closer, right?
I’d only been out to this area once before, and it wasn’t long after we first moved into the abbey.
In the last fifty years or so, this part hadn’t changed much.
Lots of agricultural land with a long and sordid history.
I could still feel the energy of the dead out here.
It was something my lineage allowed me to do, but not something I told many people about.
Besides, other than my fire, most of my fae magic had been muted when I left my own realm and escaped to this one.
Blaise slowed the car to a stop when our road ended at a cross-intersection.
“Left or right?” he asked the dog, but Grim didn’t reply right away.
Instead, he shoved his head between us and scanned the landscape through the front window.
He panted and long strands of drool fell to the console.
I wrinkled my face in disgust and was awarded an evil side-eyed glare from Grim.
Suddenly, his ears perked up, and he jumped back into his seat. With amazement, I watched as he stepped on the window button and lowered the glass all the way down. And a split second after that, he launched his massive body out of the window.
Dorian barked and quickly followed behind. He didn’t land as smoothly, instead rolling several times in the dust before regaining his footing. Craning my neck to see where they were going, I hit Blaise on the shoulder several times. “Go! Go, left! Follow them!”
Blaise shrugged off my hand but immediately drove us onto the next dirt road and did his best to keep up with the animals without being right on top of them. After all, we didn’t want to run them over. Or at least not at this moment.
Grim and Dorian met each other stride for stride as they sprinted down the road. The long, white hair of Dorian’s wolf rustled behind him in waves. And the lean muscles covering Grim’s body shimmered in the sunlight each time his paws hit the ground.
The road started to turn to the right in a sharp bend. But the two dogs kept running straight which took them into a field. “Follow them!” I shouted to Blaise.
He shook his head. “The road curves all the way around up here. Keep an eye on them.”
Annoyed that he wouldn’t do as I said, I turned in my seat and tried to watch where they were going.
Much to my dismay, because I hated it when he was right, the road snaked one way and then the other, so by the time we had circled the field, Grim and Dorian darted out in front of us.
Blaise slammed on his brakes to avoid hitting them, swearing under his breath.
We fishtailed several times on the dirt road, but Blaise kept us under control.
“What is that?” I asked, pointing to something moving in the distance.
“I think it’s a truck.”
I didn’t stick around any longer. Now that I could see where I needed to go, I teleported out of the Suburban and landed in the middle of the road several hundred yards ahead with the rest of the guys behind me.
In the distance, I could hear Dorian and Grim’s pants as they sprinted closer.
In front of me, I heard the squeal of brakes on the old white pickup truck and the grinding of gravel as it tried to slow.
The middle of the road in front of a moving vehicle was probably not the best place for me to appear.