Damien had said to grab Ismerelda and run. Clearly, he knew what was coming.
The lycans, I imagined. Not these feral wolves but the clear-headed alphas.
Fuck,I raged again.Fuck. Fuck. Fuck!
Ismerelda was lost in a vent somewhere. Hazel was still flying around the room. Helias was losing his battle—something I didn’t mind at all.
And my brother…
Just killed Jenkins,I realized as Cane dropped the lycan’s heart on the ground and crushed it beneath his boot.
He phased to my side to snap the neck of another lycan. “Come with me,” he demanded, leaving the room.
I shared a look with Hazel, then teleported after him into the hallway, where six more lycans were clawing their way across the floor. It seemed they were all coming up—or maybe down—via the stairwell.
Cane took off in the opposite direction, his speed superior to the wolves’. I chased after him, not because I intended to hide with him, but because I needed to end this. To endhim.
He was too far gone to be saved. Too jaded to be reasoned with. It didn’t matter how many times I explained Ismerelda’s importance—even in a practical manner regarding her memories—he still wanted her dead.
That much had been clear when he’d so easily dismissed her life moments ago after Helias had attempted to snap her neck.
Using humans as a barricade,I thought.Fucking pathetic.
Once I finished off Cane, I’d come back for Helias. Assuming the wolves didn’t eat him first.
Cane slipped into a room and moved with purpose to a nearby closet. I arched a brow as he slid open what appeared tobe a hidden door inside. “This seems pointless with the system shut down,” I told him. “The lycans can simply pull the door open like you just did.”
He snorted and stepped through the threshold. “I’m not proposing we hide, brother.”
Frowning, I followed him and arched a brow at what I found. “Guns?”
Cane hummed, his focus on a box in the corner. “Not everything requires a network connection,” he mused as he put something in his ear. “In fact, most of my weapons don’t link to the mainframe at all.”
A blistering sound seared my skull, causing my knees to give out beneath me.
Fuck!
I pressed my palms to my ears, my entire body jolting beneath waves of electric pulses that seemed to radiate from my fucking brain.
What the hell is this?I wanted to demand, my eyes squeezed shut.What the fuck is going on?
A low pulse of heat vibrated my spine, sending me sideways to the floor. It was like being fucking electrocuted. Only it all appeared to be in my head.
Ismerelda’s concern spiked via our bond, her fear hitting me straight in the heart.
Can she feel this, too?I wondered.Is she in pain? Do I need…?
That last thought trailed off, my brain blanking for a moment.
I’d just considered cutting her off from the agony.
Is that what I did before? Built a wall to protect her from the pain?
It’d been my instinct just now, my need to ensure her safety superseding everything else.
But that hadn’t worked before. It’d nearly destroyed us.I can’t do that again. Iwon’tdo that again.
Another jolt hit my spine, causing me to arch on the floor, my nerve endings suddenly on fire. I could barely process my need to breathe, let alone see or move.
