She looked right into the camera, the fire of that shitshow still burning in her eyes. “How could I forget?”
Rafe was all business. “Yes, well…we have consensus. The task force is formed. Menace, Bronc, assemble your teams get a solid plan, and move out. Wrecker, coordinate with Archon for surveillance—anything unusual, any spike in demonic activity, report instantly.”
Archon nodded once, but his eyes were on me, gentle and strong. “Brie is alive, Finn. I can feel her. She’s as angry as she is scared. Hold that bond. You are the anchor.”
I tried to push encouragement and confidence through our bond. “Thank you,” I managed.
Rafe closed it out. “If there are any packs or factions willing to stand with us, contact me directly. We will coordinate the assault and ensure no one gets left behind.” His eyes flashed, then softened. “We’re going to bring her home, Gunner.”
I believed him.
The meeting blinked off. The room was silent except for the faint pop of joints as Arsenal cracked his knuckles and Big Papa’s chair scraping across the floor.
I looked up as Harper touched my hand. I hadn’t even realized she was in the room. I caught her gaze and nodded, refusing to put off anything but that we were getting Brie back. “Go get my sister, Finn.”
Wrecker closed his laptop, then looked over at Parker. “Looks like we gotta a fight on our hands, Wren.”
She was quickly packing things into her bag. “Let’s go get that girl, Eli.”
Bronc nodded, eyes shining. “Let’s go get her.”
Arsenal grinned. “So what’s the move, boss?”
Bronc looked at me. “We hunt.”
Doc walked up more raring for a fight than I’d seen him in a while. “I’m sick of this motherfucker. Let’s go take out a demon.”
Archon glided into the room and looked me straight in the face. “I think I’ve got a fix on the demon’s location. Let’s go find your mate and bring her home.”
Every muscle in my body sang with the need to run, to tear across the plains and find her. But for the first time since this started, I felt something else, too—a cold, bright clarity. I wasn’t alone. I had my pack, and for once, the whole damn world at my back.
We’d bring Brie home, or die trying.
Either way, Maltraz was fucked.
Chapter 25
Gunner
After the Council call, the Iron Valor war room snapped to life. I blinked against the LED glare as Arsenal, Wrecker, and Doc closed in from three sides, their boots loud on the hardwood, their faces fixed with urgency. I was still seeing the after-images of the Council—every king, every witch, cold-eyed stare of the vampires with their perfect poker faces—and then suddenly I was in the middle of a live-fire drill with all the grown-ups barking orders and making plans. I couldn’t remember when I’d last slept or even taken a full breath. My hands shook so bad I dropped the fresh mug Ms. Pearl had just handed me.
Arsenal was first. “Gunner, we gotta talk now.” His grip was iron as he steered me away from the others, voice pitched low, clipped and businesslike. “Menace just said that Rafe’s sending his witch—the one who shielded us in Paris. You saw her when we got off the plane. Remember her?”
“Gwen,” I said, though the name barely made a ripple in my memory.
“Right. She got hit twice by a Renault sniper while we were getting Harper and Brie off the bridge. Should have bled out. She kept the shield up the whole time. And when we went in for the warehouse raid, she was in the hospital, still running magical over-watch for our team.”
Wrecker cut in, tone flat but with a nervous undertow. “Even patched in remote, she was enough to keep us shielded from view of humans. Never seen anything like it.”
Doc folded his arms. Never been keen on witches besides Aspen, but Rafe wants her on-site, and I gotta say, she’s the shit.”
I tried to picture Gwen. I remember seeing a fancy woman get off the plane after the Paris job, sure. White-blonde hair, fitted suit. What I remembered most was that she never flinched, not once, even wounded I felt the power coming off of her.
“Rafe trusts her?”
Arsenal barked a dry laugh. “She’s on Rafe’s jet, along with his enforcers. ETA four hours to our landing strip. That’s wheels down, assuming no Council fuckery in airspace.”
I glanced at the clock. Four hours. I looked down at my hands, flexing them open and closed. My left pinky was still sore with the ghost of a bruise from where I’d tumbled to the floor trying to grab Brie as she vanished. I pressed at it with my thumb, just to feel something, to erase the hours between now and when I’d see her again.
