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Still, I was grateful for the brief respite. Once I’d reached my table, I grabbed the wine bottle, filled a glass, and drank it swiftly. It didn’t do a whole lot for the fury boiling inside me, and I half wondered just how many bottles it would take before it did. Probably more than the bar had in stock.
After five minutes or so, Logan approached his table, looking a little green around the gills. Obviously, his enforced consumption of alcohol was not sitting well.
He picked up his jacket, said good-bye to the blonde sitting next to him, then staggered toward the exit. I picked up my purse and followed.
The air outside was cool and thick with the scent of the nearby ocean. I shivered a little as I trailed after Logan, and I wasn’t completely certain whether the cause was the chill in the air or the rising tide of my trepidation. Logan was taking more steps sideways than forward, but he was still moving at a decent pace, and in no time at all he’d passed from the bright protection of the venue’s entrance to the deeper street shadows.
The sense that something was about to happen grew. I scanned the streets around me, seeing nothing out of place. But in this darkness, would I?
And then it happened. A shot rang out.
Logan staggered and fell to his knees, just as a second shot sliced through the night. Something hit me from behind, and I found myself on the concrete, my heart racing and a fiercely warm body covering me.
“Azriel?”
“The second shot was aimed at us,” he said. “Stay here.”
His weight lifted from mine as he winked out of existence. I studied the buildings around me for a moment, then pushed to my feet. If someone was going to shoot me, then they could hit me as easily lying down as standing up.
“Mr. Logan?” I flared my nostrils, taking in the scents of the night.
Blood ran on it, thick and fresh.
He was dead. I knew he was dead, even though I couldn’t see a reaper waiting to claim his soul. Still, I had to check. I approached slowly, but stopped several feet away. Logan had twisted as he’d crumpled and his dead eyes were staring at me balefully. The bullet had entered his forehead and blasted its way through his head, leaving an exit wound bigger than my fist. Blood and bone and brain matter had splattered onto all the nearby surfaces.
Someone had wanted to make very sure that even in death, Logan’s mind couldn’t be read—which all but confirmed that someone had been aware that we’d been intending to speak to him. But how? And who?
Frowning, knowing they were questions I wasn’t likely to get answers to anytime soon, I took out my phone and rang the cops. I should have rung Uncle Rhoan, but I really wasn’t up to answering the questions that would undoubtedly follow.
Azriel reappeared as I hung up, his fierce expression suggesting things had not gone well.
“You didn’t find the shooter?”
“I did. He was stationed on top of the stadium roof, but by the time I got there, he’d thrown himself off it.”
“He killed himself?”
“Yes.” He glanced behind us. “People are approaching. We should leave before we are seen.”
“Azriel, I’m a witness. I have to—”
“Have you forgotten the councillors’ edict?”
I had. I closed my eyes, breathed deep, then glanced at my watch. It was close to twelve. Shit. “I need to change,” I said wearily. “I’m not going to that place dressed like this.”
He didn’t answer, just stepped close, took me in his arms, and whisked us both out of there. But the minute we were back in the hotel room, he stepped back. It didn’t stop the awareness that trembled across my skin, nor did it ease the heat of desire shimmering between us. I might be angry with him, but that didn’t stop me from wanting him.
“Azriel—”
“Get changed,” he said curtly. “Or we’ll be late—and I suspect that would not be wise.”
“There’s lots of things that wouldn’t be wise,” I muttered as I headed for the bathroom. “But I suspect that’s not going to stop them from happening.”
“Some things are destined and can never be changed,” he agreed flatly. “No matter how much we might wish otherwise.”
I changed quickly into my jeans and sweater. “And here I was thinking destiny was a fluid thing.”
“Destiny is fluid,” he said. “And sometimes so is death. Logan was not destined to die this night, so his soul will roam.”
