Justice.
Leaning against the building like the embodiment of fury itself, glare locked on me like a missile. I freeze. Panic. Pure, stupid panic. Then I bolt.
I turn, heels slamming against stone, dress flaring out. I make it four steps before, damn it, I trip. Hitting the ground, being well acquainted with gravity, I roll and come back up with one shoe and zero dignity, and keep running, hitching along with one high heel.
He’s behind me. I hear him. Heavy, fast, relentless. But this isn’t his playground. It’s mine.
I know this estate. I’ve been to Alana’s father’s place too many times to count. I dart left through a patch of decorative brush, ducking onto a hidden trail only a handful of people know about. His footsteps falter behind me. He’s lost.
Two more sharp cuts, and I’m clear. Out front. I sprint toward the nearest parked car, which is some kind of sleek black town car, with its engine humming and the driver slouched over. I yank open the back door and launch myself inside. “Hi! I’m a bridesmaid. You have to go. Now.”
The driver blinks once. Shrugs. Starts driving.
Bless him.
I glance out the back window and see Justice reach the Italian tile drive just seconds too late.
He stops.
His suit’s dusted with dirt, shirt slightly open at the collar, and fury is written across every inch of his face. Lightning cracks in the distance, of course it does, and for one horrifying second, the flash paints him in stark silhouette.
Panic takes me. I have to get to a safe house.
He doesn’t look like a man anymore.
He looks like retribution.
THREE
Justice
Fury lances down my spine as I watch the car vanish down the gravel drive, taillights bouncing like they’re mocking me. How the hell did I let her get away again?
Ella Rendale is too damn clever, too fast, and too fucking cute for her own good.
She thinks I want her dead. I should. Except I don’t. I want to trap her at my house in the woods and have her sing. Talk. Joke. Hum. Any sound out of her magical mouth.
I’m not good. But I’m not evil either. I don’t like the idea of killing a sprite. Not even a volatile one with champagne on her lips and code in her blood. However, I’ll do my job and lock her down to protect my brother.
Right now, I want her under me. For an entire night. One good night to fuck her out of my system is all I need. And I’ll get it.
I turn and head back through the trail. Brambles slice at my pants and dirt sticks to my boots. My mood doesn’t improve. Then I see something in the mud.
Sparkles against the sludge.
I take three more steps and find her heel—citrine-stoned with the spiked heel half hanging off as if it snapped when she was running. I pick it up and laugh under my breath. Of course it’s hers. No one else would weaponize jewelry and sabotage in the same night. I keep moving, brush the worst of the forest off my clothes, push open the door, and step back inside.
That’s when he hits me.
Not physically. Vocally.
One of the IT techs, some kid in a suit too expensive for his social skills, steps directly into my path. “Mr. Beathach,” he says, too loud, too sharp, too wrong.
His voice scrapes through my nerves and explodes in my elbow like a sucker punch of cold pressure. I bite back a grimace, rolling the joint once like I’m adjusting a cufflink instead of trying to force sensation back into the limb. Every word this guy says feels like sandpaper grinding bone, and unfortunately, affects me physically. “We had a woman come into the tent. She typed something into the system, and the guys think it was just a change to the music. I’m not sure.”
I nod. “Do a deeper dive and then send me the logs.” His instincts are good, but I doubt he’ll uncover what Ella did. She’s too good. I’ll check it out later. It’s not like I haven’t hacked into Aquarius Social before.
He hesitates, clearly wanting to keep talking. I narrow my eyes. He gets the message and clears out.
