“You need to shift,” he said clearly, praying the words would sink in. “You can’t handle the drug, but your unicorn can.”
Iris just stared at him. Her golden-brown eyes, usually so sharp, couldn’t even focus.
Keith waited for another lightning bolt of fear, but this time it didn’t come. Heknewhe could reach her somehow. They had always been waiting for each other, even if they hadn’t known it. There was nothing that could keep them apart.
He cupped her face in his hands, letting the warmth of her ground him and keep him steady.
“Shift, Iris. Trust me.”
Her long black eyelashes came down, like she was passing out again, but Keith felt her tense.
She flowed naturally into her unicorn form, and Keith wanted to cheer as she found her feet and tossed her head, getting used to having a full range of motion again. He wrapped his arms around her neck to hold himself up.
“Blake ran that way,” Keith said. “We have to catch him. This house is like a maze, and you know it a lot better than I do. You’ll have to take the lead if we’re going to find him.”
Iris tossed her head again, her eyes glittering with decisiveness.
She’d just been walloped with the awful, unexpected truth behind the biggest tragedy in her life, and she was ready for action. God, she was amazing. Keith gave her a brief hug and then shifted too.
Let’s go.
Iris set off at a brisk trot, and she seemed to know exactly where she was going. She must have had a good guess about where Blake had retreated.
To Keith’s surprise, she was taking him deeper into the house. Maybe there was an elevator up a rooftop helipad, and Blake planned to make his escape from there. He had the kind of money that made stuff like that plausible, and Blake loved his high-tech toys.
He also had the kind of money that meant that if he disappeared, it would be easy for him to slip off the radar for good. People like Blake could afford to buy new, completely untraceable identities.
Keith couldn’t stand the idea of Blake getting away with what he’d done to Iris. There was no way he was going to let that happen.
If this had to end with him doing a running jump off the roof to knock Blake’s helicopter out of the sky, he would do it.
That had been the wildest thing he could imagine, and it still didn’t prepare him for what actually happened next.
The house seemed togroanaround him, like it was about to collapse. And then parts of itdidcollapse ... but not the walls.
Bars slammed down over the windows. Doors shook in their frames.
Blake had just sealed them in the house.
