Jenna stood on the opposite side of the bed, along with Jordana and two of the elder warriors’ Breedmates, Elise and Corinne. As Darion approached, the women all glanced at him with worry in their eyes. And fear.
“How is she?”
Savannah offered a gentle half-smile. “She might be better now that you’re here. Come and sit with her.”
His stride felt stiff, his throat ash-dry. He’d never seen either of his parents as anything less than indefatigable, individually and as a couple. They were an enduring force of strength and unshakable support that had formed the bedrock of his own existence. Now, in the space of a few hours, he was witnessing both laid low by the same offensive strike.
Possibly never to recover.
No.He refused to think it. He refused to let Opus take so much from him.From them.
Savannah moved so he could take her place on the edge of the bed. With the cold compress in his hand, he brushed it tenderly along his mother’s cheek. She stirred, groaning with the pain that coursed through her, bringing her limbs in tighter, her body clenched into a ball.
Darion frowned, stricken to see her like that. Gideon’s trance had a hold on her, but the blood bond was stronger. She moaned and whimpered, tears leaking from the corners of her closed eyes.
That she was still in agony meant Darion’s father was still alive somewhere. A cold comfort to be sure. Still, so long as Lucan was breathing meant there was a chance of finding him.
Finding a way to reverse his Bloodlust before it completely consumed him was an impossibility Darion refused to consider. Right now, all his attention was on offering what comfort he could to his cherished mother.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured, pressing the cloth to her brow as beads of perspiration formed there. His deep voice rasped thickly as he stared down at her suffering. “I’m so sorry I can’t take this pain away for you.”
Another pained groan racked her, but her eyelids cracked open just a bit. Her dry lips moved, barely able to form words. The question that came out of her was more breath than sound.
“Lucan?”
Darion frowned. “No, Mom. He’s not here.”
She moaned, and the anguish in it seemed less about any of her physical discomfort than a bone-deep heartache. The sigh she released was jagged, a shudder that shook her frail-looking body. The trance pulled her under, mercifully, and she slipped into a motionless doze.
Darion swiveled a look at Savannah. “Has she been like this the whole time?”
A sober nod. She motioned for him to follow her out of the bedroom. Elise walked over to take the cold compress from Darion, offering his arm a tender squeeze before she sat down to tend Gabrielle.
Darion stepped out to the living area with Savannah.
“We’ve sent for Tess,” she told him. “She and Dante should be arriving from Boston any minute now. I don’t know if Tess’s healing ability can do anything for your mom, but we’re going to try everything we can to make her comfortable.”
“Thank you.”
Savannah offered a tentative smile. “Tess and Rafe were able to work a miracle once when they combined their healing touches. Maybe they can help Gabrielle and Lucan too.”
Darion had his doubts, but he wasn’t about to rule out anything. “First, we have to find my father and bring him home. That’s assuming he comes without a fight. What I saw in his eyes tonight, Savannah . . . it was almost worse than seeing him dead.”
Her brow knit over sympathetic brown eyes. “Don’t give up hope. Right now, that’s all any of us are clinging to.”
“Not all,” he said. “Rage. Hatred. Vengeance. I want Opus heads to roll for this. Every last one of them.”
As he spoke, Gideon appeared in the open doorway to the apartment. From the animated look on his face, at least it didn’t appear to be more bad news. “We’ve got something.”
Darion’s attention snapped to full alert. “Tell me,” he said, crossing the room to meet Gideon in the corridor. “What’s going on? Is there word about my father?”
Gideon grimly shook his head. “It’s something else. Remember that photo Devony brought back to us from her family’s house in London?”
Darion nodded. Rafe’s mate was the daughter of the late Roland Winters, a JUSTIS director who was killed along with Devony’s daywalker mother when Opus Nostrum blew up JUSTIS’s London office a few weeks ago. Before he died, Director Winters had been gathering intel on a personal investigation he was conducting--one that got a little too close to Opus for their liking.
As it turned out in the end, it was Devony’s own brother, Harrison Winters, who had become a traitor to both his family and his oath when he helped Opus orchestrate their murderous attack.
“You’re talking about the photo Devony’s father had tucked away for safekeeping--the one she’s certain he wanted her to find if anything happened to him?”
