Rhen had carried bodies before. Hundreds of them. Cold bodies. Broken bodies. Allies and enemies and soldiers dragged from battlefields slick with blood. He had carried corpses over his shoulder without blinking while death soaked through his clothes and dried beneath his fingernails.
This one breathed.
This one carried his blood.
That made her a liability, not an exception.
The fog thickened around them as he stepped away from the wreck, rolling silently through the trees while twisted metal disappeared gradually behind them. It curled around his boots and shoulders in slow, pale ribbons but never touched him directly, parting as he moved through it.
He never looked back.
Not at the ruined car.
Not at the road.
Whatever trap had been laid there had already closed around them both.
The female remained unconscious against his chest.
Rhen tracked every shallow inhale and weakening heartbeat because his blood made her survival his problem now.
He would not risk dematerializing with her this close to death. Shadow travel strained a healthy human body; with her pulse already failing, the transition might stop it altogether.
The truck waited where he had left it earlier, black paint disappearing almost completely into the darkness beneath the trees.
Rhen opened the rear door and placed her across the back seat with controlled precision. His blood was already working inside her; he had no intention of ruining its work through carelessness.
He checked the angle of her neck, the rise and fall of her chest, and the weakening rhythm beneath bruised skin. He checked her pulse once, then withdrew his hand immediately.
Get a fucking grip.
Rhen slammed the door shut harder than intended before climbing into the driver’s seat.
The rearview mirror caught her reflection, dark hair spread across black leather like spilled ink while blood shadowed her pale skin beneath intermittent flashes of lightning.
That same unwelcome tension twisted low in his chest.
The pressure.
The command.
Whatever the hell this was.
He hated it instinctively.
The engine roared awake beneath him, low and aggressive, tires spinning briefly across wet gravel before gripping hard. Rhen drove fast from the moment the truck hit the road, devouring the distance through rain and fog while the headlights carved stark paths through the dark Louisiana back roads.
The compound wasn’t far.
Still, the drive felt longer than it should have.
He could already imagine the reactions waiting for him there. Cole would study the decision until he found the flaw in it. Malakai would look for the trap. Dax would make one smart-ass remark too many and watch for the moment Rhen decided to break his jaw.
Let them fucking try.
This wasn’t their concern.
Not this time.
