The warmth of his breath against my skin steadied something inside me. I leaned back into him, letting his chest absorb the tension knotted between my shoulder blades.
“What do you think that creature was?” I kept my voice quiet, not wanting the others to hear the unease threading through it. “A wolf?”
His thumb traced an absent line along my hip—a gesture I didn’t think he was even aware of. It sent shivers down my spine. All I could think about was how his lips and hands had awakened my passion.
When he spoke, his mouth stayed close to my ear, his tone careful. Measured.
“Definitely a wolf. But I couldn’t tell if it was a vampire who’d shifted or one of Trystan’s.” His chest expanded against my back as he drew a slow breath. “Trystan’s home is in the bayou. That wolf could’ve been out on patrol—nothing more than a sentry doing its rounds.”
I wanted to believe that. I really did. But that wolf had been bigger than Trystan’s wolf. What if it had been Costin?
“But?” I pressed, because there was always a but with Rocco. He didn’t sugarcoat things, and right now I needed the truth more than comfort.
A long pause. “One thing’s for sure—Angelo and Costin are going to find out Raven’s helping us. She’s the only silver dragon that I know of.” A grim edge crept into his voice. “Our only saving grace is they don’t know where we’re going.”
Yet.
But Balthazar said we had to go to one of Costin’s castles. He wouldn’t tell us which one. Supposedly, we’d know it by scent.
Right now, Angelo and Costin didn’t know where we were headed—unless that wolf had been Costin. If it was, he would only know that we were flying on Raven. He and Angelo were a lot of things—ruthless, relentless, ancient—but stupid wasn’t one of them. The moment they realized we’d fled New Orleans on the back of a silver dragon, they’d tear the city apart looking for answers.
And they’d start with Tinkerbell.
My stomach clenched. They’d badger her. Threaten her. Push every leverage point they had until she cracked or caved. Tinkerbell was a powerful witch—powerful enough that Angelo kept her close—and that power cut both ways. If she decided to find us, really find us, could she? A locator spell, a tracking enchantment, something pulled from that arsenal of magic she kept tucked behind that deceptively sweet smile?
I didn’t know. And not knowing terrified me more than any wolf with burning red eyes.
I stared at the horizon where the blue of the sky bled into the darker blue of the Gulf stretching out below us. Thousands of miles of open water between us and Dracula’s castle. No cover. No allies waiting along the way. Just wind and speed and the desperate hope that we’d get there before anyone figured out our destination.
I leaned back into Rocco’s chest, letting his warmth seep into me. His fingers curled around mine immediately—no hesitation, no question.
This wasn’t going to be easy. And who knew what waited for us when we arrived in Transylvania.
Vex.
Just the name made my skin crawl. He was pure evil—not the calculated, political kind of evil that Angelo wielded like a scalpel, but something darker. Deeper. The kind of evil that enjoyed suffering. Fed on it. Especially children. Vex didn’t want power for what it would buy him. He wanted it for what it let him do to people.
My gaze drifted to where Rocco’s hands rested against my stomach, his fingers still laced through mine. Strong hands. Steady hands. Hands that had once wrapped around his own mother’s throat while something else wore his skin.
I’d been there. I’d watched it happen.
The memory clawed its way to the surface no matter how hard I tried to keep it buried. Rocco’s face twisted into something unrecognizable—his eyes wrong, his voice wrong, everything wrong. The way his mother had gasped, her feet leaving the floor. The sheer horror of watching the man I cared about become a weapon against the person he loved most. And the worst part—the part that still woke me in cold sweats—was that Rocco had been in there somewhere. Trapped inside his own body, screaming behind eyes that weren’t his anymore.
What if it happened again?
The question sank through me like a stone dropped into black water.
What if he turned? Not evil—Rocco didn’t have evil in him—but twisted. Hijacked. His body used like a puppet while the real him beat against the walls of his own mind. What if he turned on one of us?
On me.
My throat tightened. I didn’t know what I would do. Fight him? I couldn’t hurt him. Run? I’d never leave him. He was my mate.
Sometimes mates could break through madness. Did this include possession? Would I have the power to reach him through whatever demon was pulling his strings?
But his mother had called his name. Begged. And his hands had only squeezed tighter.
He’d almost killed her. And I knew—knew with the kind of certainty that lives in your bones—that he’d never forgiven himself for it. Maybe never would. The guilt was a living thing inside him, coiled around his heart like barbed wire. He carried it every single day, and he’d carry it until the day he turned to dust.
