“We need to kill that demon, Joseph.”
“The lives of a woman and child are at stake. I’m not asking you. Find Connal and stop him. That’s an order.”
Chapter 27
Something was wrong. Rory could feel it.
Cain’s body had gone still. Not even his chest moved with his breath. He hadn’t tried to put up another wall between them, and even though it was a raging invasion of privacy, Rory couldn’t help herself. She tentatively poked at their connection, looking for what had upset him.
Fury hit her in a hard slap that made her bare her teeth. Fear wove around his fury, along with a heaping mass of guilt. Rory had no idea what it meant, but the emotions were so strong, she knew that something terrible had happened.
“Of course I want to help,” he nearly screamed, “but Rory has to come first. You know that.”
“No, Rory doesn’t,” said Rory.
Cain ignored her, making her want to punch him in the stomach. She hated being left out of the conversation, as if her opinion on whatever was going on didn’t matter.
“I understand perfectly. And you need to understand that I’ll do what I have to do. You and your orders can go f**k themselves.” Cain hung up, his face mottled with anger.
She’d never seen him look like this before. He was beyond furious and well into homicidal rage.
“What happened?” she asked, unsure if she really wanted to know.
“One of the Sanguinar has kidnapped a human woman and her son.”
“Well? What are you waiting on? Let’s go find them.”
“You can’t go anywhere until I kill the demon—not with your degrading condition. And Ronan’s.”
“Are you kidding me?” she demanded. Touching his anger had sparked her own, making it burn bright. “Who the hell cares about my condition, degrading or otherwise, when there’s a terrified woman and child who need us to save them? I’m sure Ronan will feel the same way. He nearly killed himself helping me. What do you think he’d do for an innocent child?”
“Others will be on the Sanguinar’s trail soon. We need to get you somewhere safe.”
“Safe? Really? Are you that stupid? Where the hell can you take me that I don’t tote my brain along for the ride? Because as long as I’m wearing my head, and as long as there’s a demon inside it, I’m pretty much f**ked. I might as well be f**ked while saving that poor woman and her kid.”
“Once the demon is dead, then we can go after Connal.”
“You really think that I’m going to worry about myself while there’s a missing child at stake?”
“It’s not safe for us to wait—not now that I’ve given the demon reason to fight even harder to free itself by implanting that knowledge in your head. Ronan can’t help you again. He’s too weak.”
“Screw safe, Cain. I saw what your life was all about. You never once thought about your own safety when there were others in danger. Don’t you dare try to feed me any bullshit now, because I know better.” She sucked in a long breath, trying to find enough calm to sound reasonable. “Now, you and I are going after the a**hole who abducted those people. We’re going to find them and make sure that they’re safe. And then we’re going to find the demon in my brain and kill it. And then we’re going to find the person who blocks my visions and take their magic ring or whatever so that I don’t have to walk around blind half the time. Got it?”
She felt a heavy throb of frustrated anger pulse out of him, but when he spoke, there wasn’t a single hint of it tinting his calm tone. “Is that what you really want?”
Rory didn’t bother with words. Instead she gathered up her determination to do the right thing and shoved it at him. She let him see how he wasn’t going to stop her, even if that meant she ditched him. Whatever it took, she would not let that woman and child end up trapped in a flooded basement filled with monsters the way she’d been.
Cain shuddered and gripped his phone until his knuckles popped. “This is the worst timing possible. You realize that, don’t you?”
“Don’t f**king care. It’s the timing we’ve got.”
“And if the demon emerges and takes control of your body again?”
“Knock me out. Kill me. Whatever you have to do. Until then, I’m going to fight.”
She felt his grudging acceptance stomp through their link. “Get in the car. We don’t have much time.”
Cain said nothing as they drove back to the nearest highway. It was well past midnight, and there wasn’t much traffic.
The car accelerated until they were pushing ninety. Regardless of what he said, Cain wanted to find that kid as much as she did.
His voice was hard, leaving no room for argument. “We keep the link open. That way I can monitor your thoughts. If the demon breaks free or starts whispering things to you, I’ll know.”
“Agreed. Though I would guess the first thing the demon would do would be to shut you out.”
“Likely. Which is why if you try to block me, I will render you unconscious.”
She still wasn’t used to the idea of having Cain in her mind, touching her in such an intimate way, but so far, he’d been the one who’d been putting himself out there, exposing his entire life. He hadn’t asked for much in return, and his request now was completely logical.
“You have my permission,” she said. “Don’t you dare let me hurt anyone who doesn’t deserve it.”
He nodded, his face grim. He handed her his phone. “Call Nicholas. Ask him where Connal is. He may be able to track his vehicle.”
Rory didn’t waste time asking questions. She didn’t know these people, but she was willing to do anything that might help save that kid.
Nicholas answered fast. “Tell me you changed your mind, Cain.”
“Hi, Nicholas. My name is Rory Rainey. I’m with Cain and he asked me to call you and have you tell us where Connal is.”
“Thank God. Is Cain okay?”
“He’s driving.”
Suspicion was clear in his tone. “Let me speak to him.”
Rory sighed in frustration, but held the phone to Cain’s ear. “She’s with me, Nicholas. . . . Yes, with me with me. Tell her what you know.”
When Rory got back on the line, all of Nicholas’s suspicion was gone, replaced with a kind of excited reverence she didn’t understand. “Sorry about the confusion. I had to be sure who you were before I gave you information.”
“Sure. Whatever. Now spill. This Connal asshat was the one who stole the woman and kid, right? Where is he?”
“Connal disabled the tracking device in his car, but Ella has a cell phone on her. We’re tracking that. I’ll send his coordinates to Cain’s phone.”
“Thanks.”
“Tell Cain we have warriors on the way now, but they’re at least twenty minutes behind you.”
Rory relayed the message.
Cain nodded. “Ask him—”
She didn’t need to hear the rest of his question. It had already slipped into her head fully formed. “Cain wants to know if you’ve got Gerai on the way to intercept him.”
“No. It’s too dangerous. We didn’t want any more human victims. Connal has already killed one woman and damaged two men’s minds with brutal force. Gerai don’t stand a chance.”
She didn’t have to say a word. She felt Cain absorb the knowledge from her.
It was such a cool process she didn’t spend time thinking about how creepy it was. Or would have been with anyone else. With Cain it wasn’t so bad.
“Call us if anything changes,” she said.
“Will do.”
By the time she hung up, Nicholas had already sent a message with an attachment to Cain’s phone. She opened it, and rather than listing coordinates as she expected, she saw a little dot moving across a map. She zoomed out and saw another dot where they were.
“He’s heading south. If we turn east up ahead, we’ll be on course to intercept him.”
Cain gunned the engine. Apology laced his voice. “We’re going to hit the edges of civilization soon.”
“It’s okay. I can take it.”
“You’re taking an awful lot right now.”
“Good thing I’m tough then, huh?”
As they headed east toward the suburbs, visions began to flicker more frequently inside her eyes. The unpredictable motion of a dozen other people moving about made her queasy. She gripped the seat and focused on her breathing.
Cain’s hand slipped under her hair, stroking the back of her neck. Like a switch had been thrown, the visions disappeared, giving her some visual peace.
“Thanks.”
“I wish I could do more. I wish that taking my luceria would have given you the ability to control the visions.”
“Yeah, me, too. But having you touch me is a hell of a consolation prize.”
“I won’t always be around.”
The thought made her heart squeeze with anxiety and something else she refused to acknowledge. “I know. But you’re here now. That’s good enough.”
As each mile passed, she felt the demon swell with power. They were getting closer to it, making it hard for Rory to concentrate on anything else.
She checked the phone again and saw that Connal had just passed the road they were on. “Go right at the junction ahead. We’re close.”
Cain went where she told him, and once again they started leaving the populated areas for more isolated countryside.
The demon shook inside its cage. She could hear it now, growling in hunger and eagerness. It knew she was getting closer.
“How far away?” asked Cain.
She wasn’t sure if he meant how far away was the demon or Connal, so she picked the one she could actually answer.
“Connal is a few miles in front of us, and he’s flying.” She watched the flashing red light as it seemed to slow. “Wait. I think he’s stopping.”
Rory zoomed in on the map until she could get a satellite image showing photographs of the area. It was an old picture that looked like it had been taken in the green heat of summer. All she could see was trees, and open expanses of uninhabited land.
“There’s nothing there, but his dot isn’t moving.”
“Let me see.”
She zoomed out so he could get an idea of the location and showed Cain the map. After a quick glance, he gave her a grim nod. “I know the area. It’s riddled with caves.”
“Great. Fun times.”
“You know you don’t have to—”
“Stop right there before you piss me off. I know I don’t have to do anything. As if you could make me even if you tried. Quit reminding me of the obvious and let’s go rescue a kid.”
He let it drop, though she could feel a throb of his frustration sink into her. Alongside that, she also felt a slight tug, urging her to come closer. The demon.
Cain pulled off the road. A few yards away, a black van sat parked at the edge of a field, next to a jutting, rocky cliff. There were no houses in sight—no lights other than the stars overhead. They were too far out for streetlights. There weren’t even any power lines, which reassured her that when Cain moved his hand from her neck, she wouldn’t get blasted with a bunch of blinding TV images.