Only once we are moving do I allow my shoulders to ease by a fraction.
Sera turns toward me, her voice quiet but searching.
“What did he mean when he apologized for not making it to me sooner?”
I study her face in the dim interior light.
“He was there,” I tell her gently. “The night they came for us.”
Her eyes widen slightly.
“He was part of the team that went in. Everyone felt like they failed you when my dad—when Johnathon took you.”
The words taste bitter.
I do not add the rest.
That I felt it more than any of them. That I felt frantic when I could barely hold a thought together. That not knowing where she was nearly broke something in me.
Her hand slides into mine, fingers lacing with quiet certainty.
“You didn’t fail me.”
I hold her gaze for a moment before looking away, my jaw tightening.
“I let him get close,” I say. “That’s on me.”
She shakes her head softly.
The city lights streak past the tinted windows as we ascend the ramp and merge into evening traffic.
I draw her closer, my arm sliding around her shoulders until she fits against my side. I lower my mouth to her hair, breathing her in as though reaffirming, again and again, that she is here.
“I won’t let it happen again,” I murmur against her temple.
Not Johnathon. Not Gideon. Not anyone.
The Strip unfolds before us in a blaze of light and glass, every surface reflecting excess and illusion.
And yet—as our convoy approaches another towering structure, something twists in my gut.
The Fontainebleau.
I thought this place was abandoned.
Wasn’t this place supposed to be haunted?
Panic slips in—just a niggle, a frayed edge of worry.
Don’t look at Chace.
Don’t look at that smug fucking prick. I bet he’s gleaming—bastard grinning from ear to ear like he contracted that “Smile” virus.
Shit film. Horrible.
Nope. Fuck this. Fuck Chace.
Or is it Valentingly.
