Until it was gone.
Urian took a deep breath as he realized that for reasons unknown, Acheron had healed him. “Why?”
“I’ll explain later.” Acheron stood up and lifted the hem of his shirt until his stomach was exposed. “Simi, return to me.”
The baby shot out of Wulf’s hands immediately. She turned from an infant into a tiny dragon, then laid herself over Acheron’s skin until she became a tattoo.
A blond Dark-Hunter snorted. “I always wondered how your tattoo moved.”
Ash didn’t speak. Instead, he raised his hands.
One second they were in the Inferno. The next they were in the middle of Elysia.
Urian shot to his feet as he ran to find his wife. Horrific screams and pleas for mercy rent the air. Bodies of Apollite men, women, and children lay everywhere. He hadn’t seen anything like this in centuries. Not since the days when humans used to raid their villages.
“Phoebe!” Urian headed straight for his apartment. Fear tore him apart as every instinct he possessed told him what he’d find. And he was terrified of being right.
Why hadn’t he answered his phone? Why?
And the moment the door opened, and he saw the destruction in his apartment, he knew.
He knew.
Everything had been torn apart. Their furniture was overturned. The stereo had been ripped from the wall and Phoebe’s records, tapes, and CDs were littered everywhere, as if his father had wanted to punish them for trying to have a life without him.
Urian choked on his tears as he tried to come to terms with this moment.
With this reality.
Life with no Phoebe.
It was like the day he’d lost Xyn. Sinking to his knees, he threw his head back and cried out in fury. How many times in his life was he going to lose everything? Why? Was it too much to ask to be loved? To have one person he could keep in his heart?
One person for himself?
Was that really so selfish?
Damn you, Acheron!
The bastard should have let him die! Why couldn’t he have left him where he was?
This was so much worse. Phoebe was dead and it was all his fault! He’d done this to her. Caused it.
Blinded by tears, he heard the others outside who shared his grief. That, too, was his fault. He’d failed them all.
Shaking and heartbroken, he paused as his gaze fell to something glittering amid the wreckage on the floor. At first he thought it was a reflection caused by his tears until he realized it was something else.
Something metallic.
Phoebe’s necklace!
Incredulous, he scooped it up and let it dangle from his fingers. This was all he had of her. Such a paltry trinket for a life so vibrant. And yet it was worth more than the Taj Mahal. More than all the gold and diamonds of the earth. Because it had belonged to her and it was all he had left.
He would kill anyone who ever laid a finger to it. That was how dear and precious this worthless trinket now was. Because it was Phoebe’s.
And he wished himself dead to be with her. Not here and now to feel this pain wrought by her absence.
I can’t do this without you, Pheebs.He didn’t even want to try. Because honestly, he was too old and too tired to have one more fresh start in him. He was done with this life.
