“I agree with the Satyr,” I stated.
Kiko shifted her glare to me. “You also treated her like crap.”
Fair point,Iskar noted.
I ignored him and focused on the issue at hand. “But as soon as we bring Riley back here, they’ll use her to enact their plan.”
Cara nodded. “Which would be why we’re not bringing her to the academy,” she said.
“And where are we bringing her?” I asked.
“I will decide that,” she hedged, standing up. “But I have to go and put out some fires. As Anna suggested, once word of this spreads, my friends will want to spring to my defense. Which, at the moment, will not be constructive.”
“So we just wait here?” Havoc sounded incredulous.
“Until Riley wakes up, we are kind of stuck,” Cara pointed out. “So, sit, and eat.”
Maybe we all need a vacation in the tropics,Iskar said.Tell her,he insisted.
Wondering what the frek he was on about, I did so. “Iskar says the tropics would be an idea.”
Cara’s eyes lit up as if she’d taken it seriously. “Mountains would be good too.”
What the frek is she on about? What mountains?I asked Iskar.
The only reply I received was mental humming. Damned Gryphon.
Havoc had other concerns. “Who the hell is Iskar?” he demanded.
“The Gryphon who lives inside Marcus.” Cara stated it as if it were commonplace.
Perfect. As if the Dragon needed more ammunition against me. “At least it explains the feathers,” I pointed out.
The diversion tactic only worked with the Satyr. “What feathers?” she asked, her eyes bright with curiosity.
Cara walked over to Havoc. “The important thing is—Riley cannot Jump back here. I will have to give her an alternative.”
Havoc’s narrowed eyes blazed. “This just keeps getting fucking better and better.”
“It’s too late for you to back out now,” Cara told him.
The red Dragon pulled his lips back in a snarl. “All I want is to be free. Free from Brock. From Isobel. Fromher. And from this fucking place.”
Cara fixed him with a steely eye. “You should have thought of that before you bit her.”
In the highly charged silence that followed, she slipped out the door, and closed it behind her.
18
Rafael
The wind blasted through my hair, whipping it across my face.
I couldn’t spare a hand to push it away. Both were wrapped firmly around Riley’s unconscious form. She shivered sporadically, so I cradled her tightly. When her head rotated against my neck, her warm breath drifted across my skin.
It felt soright, having Riley lying in my arms. As if I needed further proof that she was fated to be mine.
My pulse pounded at the thought of her in Isobel’s hands. My nemesis had gated in shortly after we’d fled, and by the energies I sensed surging behind us, she wasn’t alone. We weren’t far ahead, and we’d never outrun her, not with Lucas’s Dragon being so small. The best we could do was to find somewhere to hide. Until Riley awoke.
