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“Margie?” Adrenaline hit her for what felt like the hundredth time that night, turning the blissful afterglow of being with Mikel in the woods into yet more fear.
Mikel crouched down beside her and held a hand over her mouth. “She’s breathing.”
She looked for all the world like she was asleep with eyes closed and white hair splayed on the dark hardwood.
“Margie?” Violet shook her shoulder gently, but she didn’t stir.
“Mikel.” Her heart dropped. “Where’s Lila?” Unease crawled down her spine. “She should be here.”
“Hold on. I’ll call Dani after the ambulance.” He already had the phone to his ear, voice steady, but Violet could see the concern in his eyes. She looked around the bookstore again, getting up to check behind the counter and take a pillow from the chaise to prop under the old woman’s head while he rattled off their location.
“Violet,” he said when he was done. “Go upstairs and find her a blanket.” The phone was already to his ear again. She was desperate to stick around, to hear that Lila had just decided to go home with Dani, but something inside her already knew that wasn’t the case.
She hurried quickly up the stairs, fumbled in the dark, and snatched the first thing she found—a plush throw from the back of the sofa—then clattered her way back down. His face was steely.
“No,” she demanded.
“We’ll find her, baby,” he promised, and her stomach flipped.
He stood and took the blanket. He barely had it tucked around Margie when a flood of red and blue light entered through the store’s bay window. The medics burst in seconds later, and Violet’s panic was lost for a few moments to getting them up to speed, watching them load Margie onto a stretcher.
“I don’t understand. Where could she have gone? Why would she leave?” she asked him as they watched the stretcher be loaded into the back of the ambulance. His face was a grim mask, and that terrified her.
“There’s one person who was hurt more than anyone by what happened tonight.” He took her hand and led her across the street and back to the square where his truck was still waiting.
“I… Someone on the council or Kane?”
He opened the passenger door for her and lifted her up in the seat when she didn’t move, still staring at him and waiting for answers. He pulled the seat belt around her and jumped up on the frame to click it into place before finally, he looked at her.
“Tim.”
THE TRUCK CRUNCHEDdown a gravel road that dissolved into forest and shadows on either side of the headlight beam.
“This is it?” They stopped outside what looked like a body shop—a long, rectangular building made of sheet metal. Cars in various stages of dismantling sat in neat rows on the concrete pad in front. Mikel was already scouring the darkness ahead.
“You’re not stayin’ put even if I ask, are you?”
Violet had already unclipped her seatbelt. She shot him a look, opened the door, and slid down into the night. The air felt thick. Her stomach rolled, and she hoped that Mikel was wrong about this. The Tim from her memory, who had pulled her out of the smoky shop, sat her on the grass, and stayed with her, refused to align with this Tim, who he suspected had left Margie unconscious and possibly hurt Lila.
She was already halfway to the door when Mikel grabbed her arm and tugged her back. “Let me go first.”
Any other time she would have fought the demand, but something in the stillness of the air and the tight set of his shoulders made her bite her tongue. “You just going to march up and knock on the door?” she asked instead.
“Yup.”
Mikel had barely confirmed it when bright light flooded the area. He caught her round the waist and pushed her behind him again when she stepped forward to look. Metal on metal screeched. Violet peered around the bulk of him and saw the roll-up door was rising.
“Tim?” Mikel called, one hand up to shield his eyes against the floodlights. “That you? We don’t want any trouble, just out here lookin’ for someone.”
“You found her.”
Ice slid down Violet’s spine.
Tim stepped into the doorframe with Lila in front of him, his arm wrapped tight across her chest while she blinked her golden eyes, desperately searching the dark night.
“My dad was a good man,” Tim declared, voice thick. “You took him from me.” Violet’s stomach bottomed out.
“Lila—”
“So, I figured it’s only fair I take something of yours too.” Tim reached up, bizarrely gentle while he brushed back Lila’s dark hair and tugged the collar of her shirt to the side. He bodily turned her into the light.
There on her pale shoulder was a still-bleeding, fresh mating mark.
