She splashed me.
I dunked her.
We’d started the night nearly drowning each other in the Salish Sea. Ended it with me drowning in the taste of her as I made her come on my tongue, again and again and again. She was wild. Insatiable. So passionate her touch set my skin on fire.
Of all the exotic drugs we served at Saints and Sinners, the fae magick, the cocktails that would’ve been illegal in a human bar, Haley Barnes was still my favorite fucking addiction, and I’d never stopped fantasizing about her.
Now she was here. In New Orleans. In the club I’d built for the sole purpose of giving people the very escape I could never truly find for myself.
One good tug on that door, and she’d be out of my life again—probably for the last time.
Let her walk, asshole. Just let her go…
It was the smart thing to do, sure. Cut it off, forget she’d ever set foot in my city. Forget how damn good and right she felt in my arms when I’d knocked her away from that bloodsucker tonight. Forget the way my insides twisted up when she’d looked into my eyes and whispered my real name.
Elian…
Yeah, letting her go was definitely the right call.
But no one had ever accused me of being a fucking hero, and they weren’t about to start now.
“Wait,” I said.
One word. Barely a whisper.
But Haley heard me. She always knew exactly what I was thinking anyway, whether I said it out loud or not.
She sighed, then turned to face me, her face etched with so much sadness it made me want to choke the life out of something with my bare hands.
“I’m not here to fuck with you, Elian,” she said softly, a tear sliding down her cheek. “I’m in a jam, and I don’t know where else to go. I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t life-or-death.”
I closed my eyes and sighed. Her pain was too close, too raw. It took everything in me not to go to her, gather her close, and promise I’d find a way to fix this without her ever having to set foot in that hellhole.
But that was a fantasy evenIcouldn’t produce.
“We’ll figure something out,” I said instead. “Tomorrow. We’ll make a plan to get you where you need to go.”
Even with my eyes closed, I felt the red-hot burn of Jax’s scornful gaze as deeply as I felt the hope rising in hers, but for all my protests, the demonhadto know how this would play out.
Hell, I’d known it from the moment he stormed into my office ranting about the witch at the bar holding a one-way ticket to hell.
After two years as free men, barely outrunning the ghosts forever nipping at our heels, it’d finally come to this.
We were going back to Midnight.
And this time, we probablywouldn’tescape alive.
But Haley would. I’d make damn sure of that.
6
JAX
It was an hour before sunrise when the last inebriated vampire stumbled out of the club and I finally tracked down Elian again.
Damn it. Saint, not Elian. The witch was getting in my head—definitely not a good sign.
He was holding court on one of the velvet couches in the former choir loft that overlooked the club, the VIP lounge he’d designated for our more exclusive clientele.
