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“Soon,” Lace said, but she wasn’t certain of that. Without the ability to check in with each other as frequently as they were used to, she had no idea when Max and the others would be back. And she especially had no idea when Darien would be back. The only good thing that came with Darien’s continued absence was the knowledge that something must be going right for him over in Yveswich. Had things ended badly, he would have already returned. Lace added, “I thought you liked having a break from Bandit. Don’t tell me you miss him.”
Cinder stopped licking her paw and twitched her tail with attitude. Miss Bandit? Never in my life have I heard something so preposterous.
Lace snickered. She slapped the magazine into place and holstered the gun. She was about to shut off the car when her phone started ringing.
She took it out and checked the caller identification. As soon as she saw his name, she answered immediately.
“Travis?”
“Lacey, where are you?” Travis’s voice was edged with panic, and she heard his engine growling in the background.
“Silverwood,” she said, her brow creasing. “I’m by Queenswater Rapids—”
“Are you in your car?”
“Yes, why? What’s going on?” As she spoke, movement caught her eye, and she looked out at the street that looped through Queenswater Rapids to see several dark vehicles approaching, the beams of their headlights slicing between the trees.
Ice dripped down her spine.
“Jewels and I were just attacked,” Travis said, his words barely audible through the bubble of adrenaline socking in Lacey’s mind. “We believe you’re a target, too.”
Her phone shook in her hand as the vehicles spread out—blocking her in. “Travis,” she whispered, “I think I’ve been baited.” The job she was hired for, the job she had accepted earlier that afternoon…
It wasn’t a real job.
Silence. And then Travis barked, “What the fuck is going on?”
“I need to get out of here. I’m being surrounded. Hold on.” She set the phone in her lap, put the car in drive, and gunned it.
The vehicles attempted to block her only way out, and she barely squeezed between them on time, nicking the left side of her car on a bumper. She pulled the e-brake, car drifting to the side, and then lowered the brake again, pushing the vehicle as fast as it could go.
Her eyes flicked to the rear-view mirror.
They were following her.
“Travis!” she shouted. “Travis, they’re following me!”
“Get to Logan’s house!” His shout crackled through the speaker. Lace pushed the car faster, the needle on the speedometer fluttering. Cinder jumped off her shoulder and disappeared into her shadow. “I’ll meet you there!”
One of the SUVs slammed into her.
She pushed the car faster. “Travis, Travis—they’re trying to run me off the road!”
“I need you to try to use your magic!” The groan of the engine was so loud, Lace could hardly hear him. “Try, okay? Use it like Darien uses his—you can do it, Lacey. Do it.”
Lacey took several deep breaths, concentrating on rallying her magic as two vehicles slammed into her back end, attempting to steer her off the road. She pushed the car faster—
And pushed the black into her eyes.
With a guttural scream, she willed a sparking mass of her magic outside of her body—willed it to crash into the vehicles behind her with the force of a battering ram.
Two of them careened and spun before colliding. One crashed into the barricade, another flipping into the trees of Queenswater Rapids and bursting into flames.
“Lacey!” Travis was shouting. “Lacey, what’s happening?”
“I’m good,” she called back, her heart pounding. “I lost a few of them, but another three are on my tail.”
“How far are you?”
