When he finally broke away, he brushed the tears from my cheeks and smiled. “I meant what I said. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for you.”
“I know,” I whispered, smoothing the hair back from his face. “I just wish we—”
The phone on my nightstand buzzed with a text.
“You should check that,” Ronan said, sitting up. The moment between us faded, reality settling back in. “We should probably let someone know we’re still alive.”
As much as I hated to leave the warm, safe cocoon of this bed, of this man’s arms, Ronan was right. We needed to check in with the guys, find out if Darius had any luck with his contacts in New York. Hopefully he and Emilio were working together on that part of things now.
I sat up and grabbed the phone, figuring it was just Haley checking in.
It wasn’t.
The text—a photo—had come from an unknown caller, but I recognized the man in the picture immediately.
Behind a bruised and bloodied face, eyes the color of the deepest part of the ocean stared back at me.
Oh, Asher.
He’d been chained to a chair, shirtless, metal biting into his skin. Blood ran red over the black tattoos on his chest, dripping onto the wooden floor, activating the ancient magical symbols painted there. The whole thing was surrounded by a circle of salt.
They’d put him in a devil’s trap, a powerful demonic prison that could only be destroyed by its maker. Eventually—hours, maybe a day—it would drain him. Suck the life out of him until there was nothing left but a husk, and his soul was banished to oblivion.
Behind him, moonlight filtered in through a stained-glass window in the shape of a star.
“Gray?” Ronan’s hand on my naked back jarred me out of my shock. “Everything okay?”
“Call Darius and Emilio,” I said, jumping out of bed and snatching up my clothes. “We need to go. Now.”
Forty-Two
Gray
Fifteen minutes later, I was stuffed into Waldrich’s van with Ronan, Emilio, and Darius, parked on a dead-end side street halfway down the block from Norah’s.
“It might be a trap,” Emilio said, peering through his binoculars into the rainy night.
“It’s definitely a trap,” Ronan said. “But we’re not leaving Ash in there to rot.”
Headlights cut through the rain, and the four of us ducked down until the car crept passed.
“So what’s our plan?” Darius asked as we sat up again.
“You two go in the front door,” I said. “Ronan and I will take the back. With Norah gone, I shouldn’t have any trouble with the wards. Once we’re inside, I need to get to the attic. So whatever’s waiting for us in that house, you guys need to deal with it. I’ll get Asher, and hopefully we can regroup on the main floor.”
All three pair of eyes turned to me in the dark space of the van, each one heavy with apprehension.
“Are you sure about this?” Ronan asked. He’d been going along with me up to this point, but I knew he was worried. “We don’t even know if you’ll be able to break the trap.”
“I can break the trap. You guys are gonna have to trust me on that.”
“I don’t like it.” Darius shook his dark head. “Asher may not be the only one waiting in that attic. There has to be another way, love.”
“What if I take the attic,” Emilio said. “I can shift before we head in. If anything’s up there, I’ll be able to sense it.”
“Guys.” I held my hands up, quickly losing patience. “Please. Asher doesn’t have time—”
Lightning split the sky, and the crash of thunder that followed rattled the van windows and set off several car alarms on the block.
