When he turns, he’s holding a syringe filled with a strange, black glowing liquid. “You see, this is a concoction I made especially for you.” He smirks before he impales the needle into the side of her neck. “Maybe this will help you remember.”
Emily’s eyes roll to the back of her head. She foams at the mouth. Horrifying wails fill the air, followed by the sickeningcrack!, crack!, crack!of her bones breaking one by one. Furpierces her skin. However, the transformation looks all wrong because she’s now stuck somewhere in between. I almost storm into the room, the urge to wring Cain’s neck all-consuming, but I stop myself at the last second. I can’t do anything rash. I have to think this through. Blood pools from the deep grooves my nails are digging into my palms.
“Fuck you!” she clips out through a sob that morphs into another blood-curdling scream, because the transformation starts again. Then stops. Starts again. It goes on and on and on in an endless loop of broken bones and wails of suffering.
Silence blankets the vast space when Emily faints mid-transformation. The stillness is eerie—akin to a flash of lightning before an impending storm. Cain strides toward the exit of the interrogation room, prompting me to flatten myself against the wall before sprinting on the balls of my feet toward the armory. The sound of the door to the interrogation room closing echoes in the quiet. So, I hurry my steps. In the pitch-black darkness of the armory, I close the metal door after me as silently as I can. Theclickreverberates against my eardrums like a thousand rusty nails. I expect Cain to burst into the room any second now.
I heave out a relieved exhale when his disappearing footsteps travel through the door. However, it doesn’t last long because frustration has me biting my knuckles as I let out a muffled scream, then swear under my breath.
Every second that trickles as I wait for Cain to leave the basement is a grenade bouncing in the confines of my ribcage.
Tik. Tok.
Tik. Tok.
Tik. Tok.
There’s no doubt in my mind that I have to save Emily. She can’t suffer more for something I’ve done. She shouldn’t be suffering at the hands of a hellseeker, period. This is a direct violation of the Celestial Treaty, and I know how this is going toend if Cain doesn’t get what he wants from her—he’s going to kill Emily. Bit by bit, a plan forms in my mind. I just hope it won’t go to shit.
If it does, I’ll do everything in my power to get Emily out.
No matter the consequences.
23
Iris
Ipress my finger on the light switch to my right. The burst of fluorescence sears my retinas, so I blink a few times to adjust while I stride to the shelf in front of me and swipe a dagger—my excuse if someone saw me coming down here, or if I encounter anyone on my way up.
Even though it kills me to stay five more minutes in the armory without helping Emily, I have to make sure I won’t bump into Cain. When the time is up, I get out and climb the stairs. My muscles twitch with the need to tap into my hellseeker speed. But I don’t. I can’t appear anything but oblivious to the hate crime happening in the basement. As my feet touch the first floor, I make a beeline for the back of the mansion, exiting through the door and taking the pebbled mosaic garden path.
The sun is high in the sky. It flickers a dizzying dance through the shrubs and the luxuriant branches of the hawthorn trees. Even though the radiating heat is beating down on me, I can’t shake the iciness that sunk its claws deep beneath my skin—akin to permafrost—the moment I left Kaiden’s penthouse. Today, though, it somehow seems worse. Ominous. It sends shivers down my spine.
Aside from the two men attending to the flower beds, the garden is empty, so my shoulders sag a bit in relief. It’s short-lived, though, because the second I reach the gargantuan oak tree and take my phone out of the back pocket of my jean shorts with trembling fingers, all my muscles lock up.
Biting my lower lip, I tap on the screen to unblockhisnumber before calling. All the stoicism I gained from my mental prep on my walk here is shot to pieces when he answers on the first ring. “Angel.”
Kaiden’s pet name for me lands like a sucker punch to my solar plexus. My legs can’t withstand my weight, so I slide down the tree until I’m seated on the grass. The bark prickles my skin through the thin fabric of my T-shirt, as I say, barely above a whisper, “Don’t—”Fuck. Why is it so hard to speak?“Don’t call me that,” I repeat, white-knuckling the phone. Somehow, I find it within myself to clip out, “Something happened—”
“What’s wrong?” he interrupts, alerted by the urgency in my tone.
The velvety timbre of his voice cleaves my bleeding chest wide open again. I inhale sharply through the debilitating pain. “I um…fuck, I don’t even know how to tell you this. Grayson has gone mad over the news of Erik being a serial killer. It’s my fault…I gathered all the evidence, called the police, and also alerted the media because I didn’t want to risk the Council burying it. And now Grayson thinks you fabricated the evidence to hide Erik’s disappearance.” My next breath stopsshort in my lungs. “Kaiden, they kidnapped Emily. She’s being interrogated.”
The sound of something smashing to pieces pierces my ear. “Motherfucking FUCK! That self-righteous scum. Logan and the pack have been going crazy looking for her; she disappeared last night.”
“He’s torturing her. Cain. The enforcer,” I mumble. A string of sharp curses follow from his end. “This is all my fault.”
“None of this is your fault, Iris,” he snaps.
“Yeah, it is—”
“Stop blaming yourself for killing that piece of shit and letting the world know what a sick fuck he was.”
“Listen, I will try everything I can to get her out, okay?”
“No, Iris. I’ll come deal with it. I’ll burn the building down if I have to. This is a blatant breach of the Celestial Treaty; Emily is under the Conclave’s protection. They have no fucking right.”
“I know, but Kaiden, please think before you do something stupid. This could start a full-on war between the Order and the Conclave.”
