She yanked her wrist out of his grip like his touch was electric. “You can’t be serious,” she spluttered.
“Do I look like I’m joking?”
Valary stared at him as if he’d sprouted horns, her mouth hanging open. But her shock and fear barely lasted two seconds.
Stubborn was fucking right.
Valary huffed a laugh. “That’s alright. I’m sure you’ll get sick of that blonde tramp soon enough. And then you’ll be crawling back to me to help you with your Surges when her perky little tits no longer get you off.” It felt like Darien’s teeth were cracking from how hard he was clenching his jaw. Valary reached into her bra and pulled out a small pendant attached to a gold chain. She held it up, where it glimmered softly under the strobe lights, the closed eye at the centre of the pendant a cruel wink. “Though you might want to find her before someone else does.”
A roaring sound swept into Darien’s head, followed by a sharp ringing that made him feel like he was floating. Every rational thought in his head scattered to the wind.
He stalked into the crowd, slamming his shoulder into Valary’s as he passed and ripping the talisman out of her grip. She shouted after him in anger, but he paid her no mind as he swept across the dancefloor, looking for Loren. He tried using the Sight, but he couldn’t find her, couldn’t breathe—
He dug his phone out of his pocket and found her name in his Favorites list. “Pick up, pick up,” he muttered, pacing across the dancefloor as he scanned the club. The look on his face must be lethal, for several people within his vicinity made for the wall like he was sick with something contagious.“Pick up.”
The call reached the final ring before her soft voice drifted through the speaker. “Darien—”
“Where are you?” he bit out.
“I’m by the bar—”
“I need you to get to the car, Loren.” He turned in the direction of the bar she’d mentioned. It was too far away—too fucking far. The fact that they were in a building protected by wards provided him with no relief, for he knew the owner of this drinking den didn’t give two shits about protecting his paying customers; the magic here wasn’t meant to keep people safe the way the wards covering the Avenue of the Scarlet Star and Angelthene Academy for Magic did. No—the ones shielding the Advocate were only to keep the back rooms and the dealings that went on within them inaccessible and hidden.“Now,”Darien barked. “Valary took your talisman—”
His sentence was cut short as he caught sight of three men who were practically running in the same direction he was headed, shoving people aside as they moved. Running straight for the bar.
Straight for Loren.
Darien hung up, shoved his phone into his pocket, and grabbed hold of two male dancers within arm’s reach of him and banged their skulls together. They fell to the floor in a tangled heap.
He didn’t have to punch many people before the whole club broke out into a brawl—before the men who were making a beeline for Loren were intercepted by right hooks and invisible walls of magic. Glasses shattered on the floor, and people screamed.
Darien spotted Loren heading for the staircase that would take her up to the top floor—to the doors of the club and outside. She was too far away for him to feel at ease.
Darien followed behind her, shoving through the crowds. People scrambled to get out of his way, the odd person throwing hooks that barely grazed him before he was knocking them out cold. He caught the eyes of his Devils from across the room, who were all making for the exit in the sea of thrashing people, adding to the drunken brawl with uppercuts and boots thrust out to trip people.
His plan was working.
He only hoped itkeptworking.
—
There was something wrong with her. Something must’ve happened at the bar when she’d stopped for a drink after being accosted by that Warg, and now she felt like she was going to throw up. The music was louder than it had been before, every thump of it clawing at her eardrums, and her body had turned colder than the mist undulating through the room. People were fighting, slamming into her as she made for the staircase, nearly knocking her over, and the floor beneath her feet surged and dipped like ocean waves.
Everything was a blur as she reached that first step and grasped onto the icy handrail. Cold metal bit into her palm, and her teeth chattered. She pulled herself up bit by bit, swallowing the nausea roiling in her gut, blinking fiercely to stay awake—to stay alert. She had to keep going, had to get outside, had to get to the car.
She lurched up the last step, her vision as staticky as a television that was turned to the wrong channel. People felt her up as she stumbled through the crowds, grabbing onto parts of her where Darien’s touch still lingered. She didn’t want to feel any hands on her but his, no other handsever.
Every thought in her head had jumbled together into a tangled mess she couldn’t make sense of when three men closed her in between their bodies like she was a stray dog. A warlock and two werewolves who reeked of hard liquor and cheap drugs.
“Hey honey,” the warlock said, his voice a low croon. He stooped so his head was at her level, and a big hand reached for her hair. “You lost?”
“I have to go home,” she tried to say, but it was more of a gurgle, and they kept cutting her off, herding her farther away from the doors of the Advocate. The faces surrounding her were blurry, the club a whirlwind of color and light. She shouted for the Devils, but her words were swallowed up by the yelling and the thumping music. The features of the three men distorted until they looked like demons—like walking, talking nightmares. “Please—”
“She doesn’t like that,” one of the wolves laughed as he grabbed a fistful of her ass, his clumsy fingers hot and sweaty through the sheer fabric of her skirt. Loren nearly hurled. “ButIdo.”
She tried to back away, to get away from them, but she only ended up pressing herself harder into his vile touch—
A shout ripped through the club, audible even over the clamor and the pounding music. It was a voice Loren recognized, a voice she longed to walk toward but couldn’t move her feet to get to him. The words the voice had shouted had two of the men that were fencing her in dropping her immediately, though the third still hung onto her like she was his precious toy, one hand in her hair and the other squeezing her waist tight enough to bruise.
