“Why are you telling me about this?”
She gave me a look. “Because I want you to help. Duh.”
“Evie—”
“We’ll split the bounty three ways. You, me, and Kyla. I saw what you did to stop Lucifer from growing his army, and it was badass.”
“That was a one-time deal.”
She rolled her eyes. “If you were hoping to put that cat back in the bag, it’s not happening. Rumors are flying.”
“Steve,” I ground out, and Evie shook her head.
“Nope. It wasn’t him. I’m still trying to figure out who let it slip.”
I lowered my head between my knees. “Fuck.”
“Hey,hey, Mere, it’s okay.”
No, it wasn’t. There was a reason I didn’t use my power. I couldn’t regret helping Danica and Samael. But…fuck.
“If I were smart, I’d get out of town,” I mumbled. “Before some foreign government comes calling.”
“What?”
“It’s happened before.” I lifted my head, suddenly exhausted. “I was born in Ireland. When I was nine or ten, my father realized what I could do and began bragging. It wasn’t long before the authorities were on his doorstep, along with all sorts of important people speaking all kinds of languages. We moved to New York because he realized I’d be more valuable once I grew into my power. Of course, he couldn’t keep his mouth shut there either, and the FBI came knocking. He bought fake identification and we moved to Durham. That’s when he opened the bar.”
Evie rubbed my back. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault.” I blew out a breath. I wasn’t a child anymore. I had friends here. I’d never be a victim again. Not to mention, a hundred thousand dollars could pay off a large chunk of my debt to Nero…could buy me some time.
The real reason? The pregnant woman. Ilayda must be terrified. What kind of person would I be if Ididn’thelp?
If Jess were here, she’d help. My best friend had been the kind of person I’d tried to be. Always crystal clear about her morals, her values, and always willing to help others.
I still expected to see her saunter into the bar and attempt to convince me to close it for one of her private parties. I still caught myself calling her phone just to listen to her voice mail. I still wanted to drive over to the coven and eat popcorn while we watched horror movies that scared the shit out of both of us.
“Mere?”
“Sorry. Just thinking. I’ll do it.” I raised my head.
“Really?”
“Yeah. Really. What do we need to do?”
“We need to see the crime scene. Ilayda’s power was fluctuating—something that’s normal with fae pregnancies, apparently. So Nereus had four unseelie guards on her.”
“Four fae guards and she was still kidnapped?”
“Yeah. According to Nereus, the guards took turns providing the ward to shield all of them as they were moving around the city. One of the guards betrayed the rest and dropped the ward in time for them to be attacked by a group of humans.”
“Humans? What?”
“Yeah. One of the other guards managed to get a shot off with his power. Set one of the human attackers on fire.”
“Ick.”
“Yeah, bad way to go. I’ve seen demon fire, and that’s at least…quick. This…was not. We need to check out the crime scene. I also want to see if we can get anything from the guy’s phone. Can you come with us in the morning?”
