“The mages. You have to—”
“I’m getting you out of here.” He glanced around frantically, searching for the nearest exit. Though they hadn’t yet been spotted, a dozen mages and vampires stood between them and their only escape. “Fuck.”
“Listen to me, Prince,” Jacinda said. When Gabriel met her gaze, she sighed softly, bringing a hand up to cup his face. “You know what we have to do.”
In those heart-stopping blue eyes, Gabriel read her darkest thoughts.
Fear gripped his heart, worse than what he’d felt when he’d found that vampire on top of her tonight. Worse, even, than when Duchanes had first called for her return.
“No,” he said. “Absolutely not.”
“We’re not leaving Cole. Or Renault, for that matter. We have to fight, and our best shot is—”
“I’ll come back for Cole. You need to—”
“They’ll kill him the minute we walk out of here!”
“Jacinda. We’re outnumbered, unarmed, and—”
“I told you I didn’t need a weapon tonight. Iamthe weapon.” She claimed his mouth in a fierce kiss, then flashed a devilish grin—the kind that would either end the world or save it.
In a dangerous whisper, she issued her command. “Detonate me, Prince.”
Another explosion, grays and vampires closing in from the other end of the row, brimstone and magic sizzling in the air.
They were out of options.
“Fuckinghell, woman.” Gabriel met her gaze one last time, then shoved her behind him, shielding her from the advancing beasts. “Go.”
“Gabriel—”
“Go!” he shouted over his shoulder.
She took off at a run, and Gabriel blurred into the advancing attackers, slaughtering a pair of female vampires and pulling a huge shelving unit down on top of the grays. No use wasting time killing them—those feral ghouls wouldn’t stay dead for long.
He needed to get to the mages. Now.
Back out in the open, a war erupted before Gabriel’s eyes—total fucking chaos.
Grays and other half-resurrected supernaturals running rampant, vampires chasing them down, mages casting dark spells on the demons, demons attacking vampires with hellfire. No loyalties, no clear sides, nothing but violence. Duchanes cowered in a corner, slumped against the wall and vomiting blood. From the looks of it, he’d tried to make for the exit but lost steam halfway there.
Gabriel couldn’t see his woman in the chaos. Couldn’t scent her. Couldn’t feel her presence. He could only hope—trust—that she was out there somewhere. That this insane plan of hers would fucking work.
Without another thought, he plowed into the closest mage, baring his fangs and ripping out his throat. He went for the next mage, then another, and another still, dodging their magic attacks, rending hearts from bodies, severing heads. It was the cave beneath Shimmer all over again, and for those brief moments, a calm settled over Gabriel, muting everything around him but the mission. The kill. Right now, there was no Cole, no Jacinda, no tomorrow. Only the exquisite taste of blood and mayhem, the raw scent of it, the feed, the blur of carnage that didn’t abate until the last mage was dead and Gabriel stood panting and wild-eyed in a pool of blood, two dozen mutilated corpses scattered at his feet.
He still clutched the bloody heart of his last victim, and as the warm slickness ran down his arm and dripped onto the floor, he finally felt it. A ripple in the air, a dark, electric thrill racing up his spine.
Jacinda.
Everything in that warehouse went still, a last collective breath before the impending annihilation.
Gabriel glanced up, caught Jacinda’s gaze across the room. Dozens of demons and ghouls stood between them, the floor littered with bodies and blood, the air thick with the scents of death and rot.
But for Gabriel, there was only his witch. His demon. His entire fucking life.
Magic flared around her in bursts of silver and blue, her eyes flickering from the brightest cobalt to the darkest black. He’d slaughtered more mages tonight than he had at Shimmer, but when their dark, violent energy hit her now, she was ready for it. Didn’t run from it. Didn’t succumb.
She claimed it. Fuckingownedit.
