Page 33 of Dark Night of the Soul

On the floor, a letter opener. I crossed the room and bent to pick it up. The tip was smudged with blood.

She’d fought back. Used whatever she could find as a weapon. And she’d managed to stab him at least once. That was the shout. A way to signal me. And I was still too late.

I flung it on the top of the desk, clenched my hand into a fist, steadying myself long enough to kill the urge to tear the room apart. That was nothing but an impulse and it didn’t matter now. She was already gone.

They had what they came for.

I stood there a moment longer than necessary, cataloging the damage that wasn’t visible. No blood trail leading out of the room beyond the single smear on the letter opener. Clean work. Deliberate.

I’d prepared for an assault. For force. For spectacle.

I hadn’t prepared for restraint.

That was the lesson I should have remembered. The Brotherhood didn’t escalate unless it served them. They didn’t destroy what they could repurpose. And Anna—Anna had never been collateral. She was leverage.

The thought settled in my chest like a weight.

She’d stood in this room alone. Unarmed. Angry with me. Still willing to fight.

I pictured it too clearly. Her scanning the shelves for anything she could use, grabbing the first sharp object within reach, refusing to freeze even when the odds turned against her. That was who she was. Who she’d always been. And I’d spent the better part of the day trying to shield her from this moment.

Not because she couldn’t survive it.

Because I couldn’t.

I’d told myself I was keeping her safe. That secrecy was protection. That acting alone was faster, cleaner, more efficient.

What I’d been doing was delaying the inevitable. Pretending that if I moved quickly enough, I could keep the fallout from reaching her.

Sebastian had called my bluff.

When I turned back to the door, Ophelia stood there wearing shorts and a t-shirt with her sword in her hand, her eyes wide, and her face covered in a sheen of sweat.

“I heard—” She started then stopped. Her breath caught. Her face paled. “She’s gone, isn’t she?”

“Stay here. Guard the others.”

Then I pushed past her and went back downstairs. The front door still stood open. The dead Watcher still sprawled across the foyer floor, blood seeping from under him. And beyond the door, moonlight illuminated the lawn where they’d crossed it, two by two flattening the grass.

But Ophelia didn’t stay put. Her bare feet pounded down the stairs after me. She sucked in a sharp breath when she saw the dead man at my feet.

“Are you going after her?” Panic laced her tone.

“Get back upstairs,” I barked.

“No. I’m coming with you. I’m—”

I rounded on her, clamped a hand around her upper arm. She flinched. I eased my grip.

“No.”

Her gaze flickered to the dead man, then to the open door. “They’re still out there, aren’t they?”

They were. I knew they were. They were waiting for my next move.

She searched my face and then understanding dawned. “Oh, shit. You’re not going after her. You’re going to let them take you. That’s your plan, isn’t it?”

She’d read me. But she didn’t understand that this was the only way I stayed ahead of them.