AllFreeNovel
Share Us
I wrapped my arms around her. The surge of relief so brutal through my veins I didn’t think I could move.
But we had to. Time wasn’t on our side.
I pulled away from her slight frame, my hands finding her face and feeling the wetness on her cheeks, blood and tears. I clasped her head, forcing her look to me. “Do your limbs work?”
“Y—yes.”
“Then we need to leave. Now. You know what that means?”
Her head bobbed in a nod between my hands.
I let go of her face and grabbed her hand.
We had a mountain to escape.
Chapter2
{ Damen }
ONE YEAR LATER
Ishould have known.
I hadn’t paid the slightest attention to the coordinates the last time I was here—the one and only time—but it all made sense.
Like father, like son.
The southwestern pink adobe hut sat stark in the sheet of snow that blanketed the Badlands of South Dakota. Oddly out of place. But that was the point of it in this barren landscape.
I hiked up the collar of my black wool coat and stepped out from the SUV I’d driven here, the icy wind pelting me with a chill as I walked toward the hut.
The other black SUV was already here. I’d rather have been first. But one didn’t always win. And lately, I’d been losing.
A lot.
Into the hut, I slammed the door closed behind me and Triaten’s head popped up from looking at the phone in his hands. He didn’t stand from the simple wooden chair he sat in. “You’re late.”
I bit the inside of my cheek. I needed him more at the moment than he needed me. “I just came from halfway around the world for this. You didn’t exactly choose an easy location.”
His fingers flicked out from his phone to me. “You’re the one that demanded this meeting. I didn’t think you were in the position to determine the locale.”
I stifled the instant reaction I had to argue with him—my testosterone always spiked around him for so many damn reasons.
Not to mention, things had been…tenuous…between us since Netherstone came down. As Triaten was one of the ruling members of the panthenites, our uneasy alliance had been hanging from a fraying, thin thread for a long time now.
Triaten pointed to the chair opposite the small square wooden table. “Sit? Or is this a quick meeting? I’ve a million other things I should be doing right now.”
I imagined. I understood just as well as he that keeping the panthenites and the malefics from all-out war was a never-ending battle that needed constant attention and a Machiavellian mindset. There were always fucking chess pieces scraping across the board.
We’d both inherited our roles in our respective species. Alike in that way. Alike in many ways I didn’t care to admit. At least we were both sane. Or what passed as sane. Him more than me.
I gave him a quick nod. The smallest of thanks for meeting with me. “It can be a quick meeting or a long one depending on your answer.”
“To what?”
“Where is she?”
“Where is who?”
