“I’m so sorry for ruining Christmas for everyone.”
I shook my head. “Fuck all of that. Don’t even worry about it. You didn’t ruin anything. None of this is your fault, Sweetness. None of it.”
Byrd choked on a sob. “I love you so much, Quinn.”
“I love you back, Byrdie.”
“Is it weird that this is the most real thing I have felt since being here?”
I laughed. “I can’t wait until I can touch you for real again.”
“I can’t wait either?—”
A lock clicking and the ear-piercing scrape of the door interrupted Byrd as the heavy door to the cellar opened behind me. Both of us turned toward the grating noise. Footsteps echoed against the stone, slow and sure, before a man stepped inside.
He was very tall and white. His broad shoulders filled the door like he’d been carved for it. Every single move he made was precise and severe. His blond hair was slicked back from his clean-shaven face, all of which was so pristine it looked almost clinical. Freckles dusted the bridge of his nose and across his high cheekbones, making him seem boyish and almost innocent if it weren’t for the cut of his jaw and the ice in his blue eyes. Those same eyes scanned the room with a deathly sharpness. When they landed on Byrd, he didn’t look at her like a person. He looked at her like she was a problem that he wanted to simply get rid of.
Rage boiled in me so fiercely and harshly that my hands shook and I stood up immediately, putting myself between him and Byrd.
No.
No fucking way was it him.
“C-Cooper?!” Byrd cried out, her eyes widening larger than I had ever seen before.
His lips twisted into a sneer as he stormed toward Lilah’s unconscious body. He crouched beside her. He was calm and cold when he asked. “What thefuckdid you do?”
“Are you fucking serious right now? What didIdo?!You’reworking with Lilah?!Why?”
Cooper didn’t even glance at her. He pressed two fingers to Lilah’s throat, checking her pulse. “That’s none of your concern. What did you do to her?”
“I didn’t doanything!In case you haven’t noticed, I’m kind of tied to this chair, so I couldn’t have done anything. She just passed out right in front of me!”
Cooper’s head finally turned toward her. The blue in his eyes narrowed to icicle pinpoints. “I knew something was weird when I didn’t hear her talking. You really do ruin everything, don’t you?”
My body was vibrating with my fury. Howdarehe think he can talk to my mate like that? Howfucking darehe think he can act like this toward her? Oh, I was going to kill him. He had signed his death warrant tonight. I started rifling through all the different forms of torture my father had taught me and all the different ways you could dispose of a body.Fences don’t float. Millions are buried in the desert without being found until they are too decomposed to be identified. Pigs eat everything but hair, which can be burned, and teeth, which are very easy to dispose of.A growl built up from deep inside me, escaping before I could stop it. Feeling my anger through our bond, Byrd’s head snapped up to look at me.
Cooper studied every twitch of her expression and body language, just like the good little hunter he had been raised to be. I felt my stomach turn. After a few moments, he finallynodded and said slowly. “That’s fine. It’s about time something was ruined for you for once.”
He stood from his crouch and pulled a gun from the holster under his jacket. The barrel shimmered faintly with Lilah’s magic, woven into the metal like a curse and turning it a shade of red so dark it verged on being black. Smoky tendrils bounced off the gun, just like the harpoon that was used to capture Byrd. My heart stopped the second he aimed it.
No, he fucking wouldn’t.
Then, the gun fired.
Before I could process anything, Byrd screamed.
She collapsed forward slightly, as much as her bindings would allow her. Blood was starting to pool around a dark hole in her thigh. It didn’t spread into much of a stain before a shadowy worm of blood magic swarmed the wound, ensuring it would never heal as long as Lilah’s magic was at work.
And then, there was the pain. The gunshot wound and the power of Lilah’s spellwork tore through our bond like barbed wire, hot and instantaneous.
It didn’t matter that I wasn’t in my body.
It didn’t matter that I wasn’there.
Ifeltit.
“Quinn,no!I’m so sorry!” Byrd gasped through sobs, her wrists struggling against the restraints and only causing us both more anguish.
