Quiet, beautiful, statuesque Iris.
It was still hard to believe she was part of this. All this time, she’d been hanging around me, acting like my friend, when she was just thinking about how she could use me to get to my parents.
A sick feeling settled into my stomach when I thought about Xinyi in all this. Part of me hoped and prayed she didn’t know anything about all this.
The other part was telling me not to be so naïve. Iris was her mistress, there’s no way she didn’t know what she was doing in her spare time.
The thought of it made my heart hurt. I thought I’d made a friend. A real true friend that liked me for me and not my family.
“Hey.” Julian bumped me from where we hid just around the end of the building. “You good?”
“Yeah.” I sucked in a breath and jerked my head once. “Yeah. I’m good.”
“Just remember, we don’t know Iris and Xinyi’s part in all this.” He checked his gun, turning the safety off. “They could be innocent.”
“Or they could be guilty as hell,” I muttered, rubbing my brow. “I know, Julian. I just want to get this over with.”
The comm in my ear crackled, and Tristen’s voice filled my ear. “Everybody in position?”
There was a collective response of yes. Then Tristen addressed me.
“You ready for this, Durand?”
I locked eyes with Julian and then over to Tate and Kyren. I started this mission with no one. Forced to go to the academy for my parents with a mission to take out some rebels dangling over my head. Only to find so much more.
Not only had I found love, but I’d found friendship. And now, looking back at that friendship, a part of me wished I wasn’t a Durand. That I’d never come to the academy, because losing the only friends I’d ever made on my own outside of the guild was like cutting a piece of me off. I didn’t know how I’d ever recover.
“Jack? You there?”
I cleared my throat. “Uh, yeah. I’m here. And yes, I’m ready.”
“Okay,” Tristen drew out, clearly wanting to ask more but holding back because of the others on the comm. “Durand and Fawley, you’re going in, in three-two-one. Go! Go! Go!”
Shaking my head at his theatrics, I walked calmly next to Julian with Tate and Kyren bringing up the rear. We didn’t want to go in, guns blazing. That’d give away the game.
Instead, we decided for a more civilized approach — pretend we thought they were open.
Pausing at the front door, Julian locked eyes with me pointedly. I dipped my chin, giving him the go ahead. He pulled open the door and then we were in.
I really thought they’d be inside waiting to jump us at the door the moment we stepped inside. But no one was there.
It felt kind of creepy coming to the club when it was closed. The mood lights were off, and bright fluorescent lights filled area. The music that normally throbbed through the ground and vibrated up your legs was nowhere to be found.
Silence.
Or almost.
A voice came from somewhere further into the club. One I didn’t recognize.
“We don’t want to wait anymore. We grab the girl now.”
We paused around the corner from where they were talking, and I prayed the charms we wore would hold up. It would blow everything if they could smell us before we even got a confirmation on what their plan was.
“Oh,” another voice mocked, “what are you going to do? Just waltz into the Durand mansion and be like, hey, I hate your guts and want you all to die. Do you mind if I steal your daughter away to use as leverage against you? Thanks.”
“She can’t stay in there forever,” the first voice countered, “She’ll come out, eventually.”
“What about that werewolf she was dating?” a male voice with an Australian accent asked. Hamish. “Or maybe the vampire? Can we use them in some way? Iris?”
