And she was home early.
The cabbie removed her luggage from the trunk and set it on the sidewalk.
Leya shot a glance over her shoulder, gingerly rubbing her bruised, bleeding palm down her jeans—no sign of the blue-haired gangster. Exhaling roughly, she loosened and smoothed strands of her hair over the injured side of her throbbing face and hurried to her sister.
Hana turned. A wide smile graced her mouth. Eyes, the color of bronze ingots, brightened. “Ley!” Pink streaked her tan cheeks as she hurried over and hugged her. “I missed you.”
“I missed you, too.” Leya squeezed her sister tight, her hammering heart still looking for ways to escape her chest.
Hana drew back. “You like?” She patted her hair.
“You look like a marshmallow confection.” She was grateful for the darkness, making sure to keep to her sister’s left side.
Hana chortled. “It’s not real, just clip-on, silly.”
“Come on, let’s get out of this cold.” She grabbed one of the bags.
Hana snagged the other, and they towed the cases into their building. Leya shut the security door behind her and hurried for the ancient elevator.
As it chugged up, she breathed a sigh of relief. “What happened to the three-month sabbatical visit withNani?” she asked.
Hana groaned. “If I didn’t leave, I’d be as huge as a house. See?” She pinched her curvy hips. “This is what happens when you live withNani. Or marry a nice Indian boy.” She rolled her eyes. “If I went to Korea, then ourHalmoniwould pull out her list of eligible young men, too. What is it with our grandparents thinking we can’t care for ourselves without a man in our lives, huh?”
Smiling, Leya pushed back her hair—
“What in all the blazing hell happened to your face?”
Aw, crap. Leya winced as her much taller sister glared at her, her mind scrambling for an excuse. “Would you believe I evaded a runaway pup, tripped over the curb, and hit the asphalt?”
Hana’s posture remained stiff, then her shoulders sagged, the door of the elevator trundling open. “Only you. You have to be more careful, Ley,” she said as they stepped out into the hallway. “C’mon, let’s get you cleaned up, and hopefully, Appa won’t notice tomorrow. Or you’ll be packed off to New Jersey to live with him. You know how overprotective he is.”
Didn’t she just? Appa was hypervigilant ever since she’d hurt her head as a child and ended up comatose for two days. Then Hana fell sick when she was eleven, and later, after her mother took ill, too, and she passed—no, he would never take a chance with their well-being.
And now she’d narrowly escaped getting involved with a dangerous gang member.
* * *
Vae!Aerén glared at the busy sidewalk where Leya had vanished. Even the man he’d saved from a chilling death had disappeared.
Jaw clenched, he headed back into the moonlit alley, kicking a rusty can out of his way. The female had no idea of the truth and who else shared her world. The little inroads he’d made talking to her earlier had turned to dust because of those damn demoniis! But he couldn’t ignore the pained, terrified cry.
Since living in the human realm, he’d taken to destroying the soul-sucking lowlives. It gave him something to do while scouring for the Chosen. Those hellscums could have hurt or killed one of the Chosen his world so desperately needed.
Growling, he kicked something else in his path and stopped.
A book. He picked it up. Its dark cover looked new.
It had to be hers. He must have missed it when he shoved her fallen things into her bag.
He tapped the tome against his palm… No, right now, he needed to get out of there, needed some quiet and to get the chaos in his head to ease the hell up. He checked his cell, and sure enough, Thrase had texted him the address and coordinates of the cabin in upstate New York.
He dematerialized and reformed on the grassy slopes of a wooden cabin near a peaceful lake surrounded by tall firs and evergreens and clean, brisk night air. Inhaling deeply, he tried to calm down, but a faint, coppery smell teased his nose…
Blood?
He wasn’t hurt…then he remembered.
Aerén stared at the dried smears on his fingers from when he’d wiped Leya’s bloodied cheek.
