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“No shit.”
“Don’t get mad at me just because that guy used you like one of those fancy dinner napkins.”
I huffed. “I was so stupid.”
“Men get the best of us, Lottie. That’s what they like to do. And then when they’ve gotten the best and see no better use for you, they throw you away.”
“I don’t need another one of these lectures.”
She sighed. “Sasha told me not to warn you, but I should have intervened. We could have avoided this entire mess.”
“And miss out on helping his pack?”
“Honestly, it’s not your problem his son got taken. We’re supposed to be neutral, remember?”
I scoffed. “I didn’t realize that was supposed to topple our moral system.”
“It was going to happen whether you were there for it or not,” she said sternly. “That’s all I’m saying. This isn’t your fault.”
But itwasmy fault. It hurt to think people were refusing to see that. I was charged with Henry’s safety and I was the one who botched the whole thing. Swarm of vampires or not, it was up to me to make sure he came out of it alive.
And it was starting to look like that was going to be another mark on my soul.
“You keep worrying like that and you’re going to get even sicker,” Nina observed in a flat tone. “There’s some water in the glove box. Take a sip. You look awful.”
“I’m surprised you’re not spraying the Lysol.”
She grinned. “There’s still time for that.”
Seeing her smile softened my anger. This was one of my closest friends talking to me. She wasn’t my enemy or my guilty conscious. She wasfamily. And she was just doing what family does best.
She was trying to protect me.
A few sips of water helped ease my fever. The sweat dissipated when we drew close to the inn and I felt better by the time I got to my suite. While I wanted to check in on my kitchen, I didn’t think I had any strength left to handle any of it. The inquisitive looks, the tiny jabs, the judgments—no, I didn’t need that right now.
I just needed sleep.
I snorted as I dropped onto the bed.Like I deserve to rest after everything that’s happened.
My brain wasn’t going to allow me a reprieve. As much as I fought against the tidal wave of guilt swarming my consciousness, I couldn’t resist its dark allure. I fell into a depressive fit that forced me to curl into a ball, every molecule in my body vibrating with pain. It was an unfamiliar ache, one that made it feel like I lost something.
Like Adam.
But how could I have lost something—orsomeone—when I never had it to begin with?
Chapter 17 - Adam
Shrubs crowded a rusty gate where Nina peeled the chain links back carefully. She peeked over the edge of the stone wall and then motioned for us to follow, ushering us quickly through the opening to the stone steps on the other side. An abandoned set of train tracks came into view, gravel crunching under my feet as I landed next to the ancient rails.
I turned to help Charlotte down, trying to ignore the frigid energy billowing between us. Something happened back at my cabin. I couldn’t stop wracking my brain for answers, trying to go over everything that led to this sour moment.
Was it something I said? Had I snubbed her by accident?
Whatever it was, she didn’t seem keen on talking. And I wasn’t about to push it. Our mission was rapidly coming to life and focusing on anything else would cost us our lives—or the life of my son.
Ahead of us rose the opening of a train tunnel. Nina strode beside us with Lucius coming up on my right, his three guards trotting around us in a protective formation. Silence ushered us into the tunnel and the darkness beyond, the only sound around us that of a dripping pipe.
The torturous repetition echoed in my brain, inviting my headache to return. It was madness worrying about my son all the time. It reminded me of my early days as a single father with a two-month-old infant sobbing hysterically in my arms.
