Midnight was a brutal place, every square inch fraught with the kind of horrors that could reach into your chest and carve out your heart—the kind of horrors that would send most men to an early grave just to escape the memories of what they’d seen. What they’d endured.
But no, the prospect of going back there didn’t scare me. I was largely incapable of fear, rational or otherwise—all part of the forced indoctrination of my particular demonic breed.
Didn’t mean I was completely immune to it though. And right now, one thing had me by the fucking throat.
Haley Barnes.
After two years of walking through life like a lukewarm corpse, Saint was coming back to life.
And he could say whatever the fuck he wanted about assassinating Keradoc, but I’d seen his truth, and it wasn’t the prospect of spilling the warlord’s blood that’d suddenly set his cock on fire.
It was a gorgeous, green-eyed witch who’d shown up at the club with a devious smile, a portal to Midnight, and a heart full of fury for the man who’d broken her.
I’d seenhertruth too. Yes, she had eyes that lit up the room and a smile that could bring a man to his knees. But that pitch-black flame inside her burned so hot, it was a miracle she hadn’t incinerated herself.
She wasn’t just an angel.
She was an angel of darkness.
And we were about to see just how far she was willing to fall.
“What do you say, brothers?” Saint asked. “Up for a rendezvous in the old stomping grounds?”
Hudson scratched a claw behind one of his horns and nodded.
I took another hit of bourbon first, but yes, I nodded too.
And Saint…
Well. That asshole just laughed, as if he’d known all along his brothers wouldn’t let him walk into the fires alone.
“Excellent. We’ll finalize the plans with Haley at my place over lunch. In the meantime, the sun’s almost up.” He popped another pill into his mouth, grabbed a fresh bottle of bourbon from the bar, and headed for the exit. “If anyone needs me, I’ll be in the cemetery furiously jerking off to the smell of flambéed vampire.”
8
HALEY
Iwanted to hate it.
The lawn was overgrown, the paint chipping, and the humidity so thick my hair needed its own zip code.
But the sight of Elian’s butter-yellow mansion made my heart ache with longing.
He’d stolen it. The future we’d always planned. The dream we’d created together.
A new life in a city drenched with magick that made our skin tingle. An old home in the Garden District—an original we could restore from the ground up. Businesses in the Quarter—a club for him, a witchy café and bookstore for me. Music and revelry floating on the air at night, the song of crickets drifting through the windows, the soundtrack of a beautiful life.
Had this house always been his—some weird double life he’d never confessed to? All the lovely pictures he’d painted in my mind… Was it all just to torment me?
Or had he bought this place after his return from Midnight, trying to tormenthimself?
Yeah, and speaking of tormenting yourself…
That’s exactly what I was doing with all this pointless speculation. I’d spentyearsmissing him. Now I was going to miss some pie-in-the-sky daydream about a future that’d never stood a chance? Screw that. I had areallife to miss—with people who actually cared about me. Sisters and friends. A coven of witches waiting for me back in the Bay.
Elian was nothing more than an escort service now—a means to an end. The sooner we wrapped up this mission, the sooner I could get back home.
No one answered the door when I rang the bell, and peering through the thick, dusty windows didn’t reveal any signs of life either. So, after a quick walk to a corner café for a coffee refill, I stashed my bag on the porch and headed into the backyard to wait.
