Blurred

out, trying to connect a punch into Noah’s side, but he jerked out of the way and chuckled.

“Let go!” she shrieked.

“If you wouldn’t have run like that, maybe I wouldn’t have had to grab you by the hair in the first place,” he said.

His eyes landed on me and they brightened. “Look at that. You got one on your first try. Aren’t you just an overachiever?”

I stepped out of the hall, shaking, but keeping my grip on the kid. Everything in me was screaming to let him go, but I couldn’t seem to make my fingers follow the direction. “What are we doing with them?”

He rolled his eyes. “You know damn good and well what we’re going to do with them. Unless you’re willing to take their place.” He raised a brow.

The kid wriggled under my grip. My heart pounded so hard in my chest I could feel it in my toes.

“Well, are you?” he asked again.

I thought about those things at the foot of my bed at night. Trying to get to my soul, right through my skin, the day of Dad’s funeral. They’d do that and worse to Anaya if she went down there trying to save me.

I couldn’t let that happen.

For a moment I let myself linger with her memory. The way her lips tasted, the little sounds she made when I kissed her. Her smile, warm and sweet against my skin. If I did this, she’d hate me.

Memories would be all I had left. I took a moment to mentally lock them all away with the piece of myself I’d never give to the shadows, then steeled myself for what was to come.

I looked at Noah and shook my head. The fear thrumming in my chest for the girl I was pretty sure I was in love with wouldn’t letting me answer any other way. A satisfied look spread across his face and he nodded.

“Good,” he said. “Let’s get this over with.”

Chapter 30

Anaya

Ash rained down from the sky and the heat of the underworld swallowed me. Easton stepped up beside me and looked out over the barren wasteland to the skull-lined cliffs.

“How are we supposed to get him out of there?” I asked, watching shadows scream and dive from the cliffs.

Easton narrowed his gaze as if trying to find a way in. “I don’t know. But we better come up with something soon. He’s not going to last long down here.”

The memory flooded over me in an instant. The pain. The moment when I realized Tarik was never coming back. I couldn’t go through that again. There would be no escape from it this time. No blade to take me away. He’d be gone. And I would have to live with the absence of him…forever.

I forced the panic exploding to life in my chest down until it was just a faint throbbing in my gut.

We would get him out. We had to. I hadn’t found him after a thousand years only to lose him now. Not like this.

Easton nudged my arm and walked out ahead of me, his boots crunching in the rocks and ash. “Let’s go.”

I hurried after him, one hand on my scythe. I didn’t know how much it was going to help me against a horde of shadow demons, but I held on to it anyway. Ready to destroy anything that got in my way.

When we were close enough to the cliffs to see the flaming shadows leaping up from the waves, Easton grabbed me and pulled us behind a skull. My shins hit the thick ice base and I winced. It… burned. I stared down at the red slashes marring my skin.

“You okay?”

I looked up at Easton, trying to conceal my horror. I could feel pain in this place. It stung and throbbed and reminded me of the end of a life I didn’t want to remember. The memory of the blade slipping between my ribs almost caused me to cry out, but I held it in. They could end me here, just as easily as I’d ended myself. “I…yes. I’m fine. How do we know where to find him?” I placed my hand on the stone to brace myself and looked down the coast at the endless row of skull caverns. “He could be anywhere. Where do we even start?”

Easton stared into the flaming horizon where Hell beckoned him. He was ignoring a call. I could see the pain written all over his face. The scythe smoking at his side. Here, where we became flesh and blood, it had to be burning him right through to his skin.

“Easton?”

“We need a diversion,” he finally said, wiping the sweat from his brow with the back of his wrist.

“There’s no way we’re going to get inside to search. And even if we do…we won’t make it out. We need something to draw them out. We need to empty those caves.”

A shadow slithered around the side of the cavern as if drawn by our scent and we froze. My fingers curled around the pearl handle of my scythe and Easton placed his hand over mine to stop me.

“You’ll attract more of them,” he whispered. The shadow swooped down until it hovered right in front of my face, hissing, wanting a taste. I inhaled and the black scent of death swirled down into my lungs. It burned like fire and my eyes watered. Even when my body had been living, I’d never felt anything like this. Everything inside me screamed for self-preservation. Telling me to run away and never look back. But I couldn’t give in to that fear. There was too much on the line. Easton squeezed my hand and I shut my eyes. I couldn’t look at it, this thing that had Cash. I wanted to destroy it. After an excruciating moment, an awful shrieking sound escaped the shadow’s throat and it whipped around the skull and dove into the frothy gray sea. I sagged against the skull and Easton blew a long breath out, releasing my hand.

“Is he worth this, Anaya?” Easton stood up. “If he is, we’ll do this. But we are about to reach the point of no return. In fact, I can’t promise you any of us will make it out of this. So I’m going to ask you this once, do you love him? Do you love him enough to face the possibility of this being your end?”

Easton stood in front of me, waiting. He’d jump in feet-first whatever I decided. I knew that. I knew it because whether he wanted anyone to know it or not, Easton had a heart. So did I. And it belonged to

Cash. “I love him. I won’t leave him here. But you should go. I don’t expect you to risk yourself for this.”

Easton stepped back and rolled his eyes. “I don’t bow out from a fight. You should know that about me by now.”

“What I know is that you don’t give a damn about some human. No matter who they are. No matter what’s on the line.”

“You’re on the line here, Anaya!” He glared at me. “Don’t you get that? Don’t you get how valuable this kid is? How badly Balthazar wants him?” he said. “If we don’t bring him back from this… you will play Balthazar’s price.”

“And you are willing to risk yourself for that? For him?” I asked, my voice shaky.

He sighed and scrubbed his fingers through his black hair. “You. I’m willing to risk myself for you.

Don’t get some preconceived notion that I give a damn about the human. I don’t.”

Despite the heat and the pain and the danger of the place around me, I smiled.

“But you give a damn about me.”

Easton caught sight of the look on my face and groaned. “Don’t you dare tell anyone I said that. I’ll leave your pretty little ass down here if you do.”

“You’re a good friend, Easton,” I said. “Thank you.”

Easton ignored me and bounced on the balls of his feet as if he were pumping himself up for what came next. “I hope you’re ready to do this.” His violet eyes narrowed on the cliffs, determined.

“What are we doing?” I said, panicked. “We…we don’t even have a plan.”

“Yeah we do. The distraction thing.”

“That’s not a plan, Easton! That’s an idea. A suggestion.”

Easton ignored me. “Whatever happens, just make sure you get in and out of those caverns before they