What the hell?
The empty apartment offered him no insights, but Hadley might see more than him. He took out his phone and recorded every inch of the space, aware Ares would smell him in her den and know it had been violated. This was his one and only chance to document how she had been living before she hid or destroyed any evidence he might find.
Part of him hoped the truth was simpler. That Liz had left Ares, and Ares had invented the baby story to give herself time to grieve and cope in private before having to answer hard questions. And the pack, being nosy as ever, would be full of them. But this felt bigger than a domestic situation.
Aware time was short, he made quick work of his task and exited the apartment. He hesitated in the hall, tempted to knock on her neighbors’ doors to ask if they had scented or heard anything peculiar, as well as when they last saw Liz. But that would spread damaging rumors if this all turned out to be one big misunderstanding, and Midas didn’t want that for Ares or Liz.
The ride down to the lobby gave him a moment to process, but he still wasn’t sure what he saw meant.
As he stepped out onto the sidewalk, a car with a Swyft sticker on the windshield appeared, and Ares climbed out of it.
His heart gave one solid thump, but it couldn’t catch its normal rhythm.
Hadley hadn’t called him. He tried her and got punted to voicemail. He tried Linus. Grier. Same result.
A growl rose in his throat when Ares spotted him, eyes wide, and the beast in him lunged for her throat.
Eleven
I woke staring at the ceiling, which was weird. I had been standing a second ago, with a glass of wine I had no intentions of drinking in my hand. I didn’t hurt, but I didn’t not hurt. I was sore, maybe. Muffled. It was a weird sensation I had trouble naming, but I was experiencing it in full force.
Warm fingers brushed my outstretched arm, delicate but strong, and I struggled to turn my head.
Grier joined our hands, her smile a hesitant thing, and mouthed the words, “You’re okay.”
Or maybe she had asked if I was okay.
I sucked at lipreading.
Her eyes flicked past me, and I fought to roll my head in that direction.
Linus lay on my other side, his hands laced at his navel, his legs crossed at the ankles.
The wraith rode on unfelt air currents, its fingerbones clacking, clearly agitated as it drifted in this void.
I must be dreaming.
This was too frakking bizarre to be reality.
A pinch in my chest twisted into a full-blown ache, but I had no injuries I could see. Though the black fabric of my dress could be hiding an ugly secret. I might be bleeding. Or maybe it was Ambrose rousing.
That I couldn’t tell was not a great indicator of my present state of being.
Unable to do more than twitch my limbs, I resumed staring at the ceiling, which was starting to blacken.
Goddess.
The building was an inferno, burning down around us, ash sprinkling us like rain without hitting our skin.
An explosion?
Had a bomb gone off?
Was that why it was so quiet?
I hoped it hadn’t burst my eardrums, then I decided it was better than the alternative. That I was dead, which would also explain why I couldn’t hear a frakking thing.
About to come unglued, I began fighting whatever compulsion held me down until Grier hauled herself closer, flung her body over mine, and pinned me.
The girl had definitely been eating churros on the regular since the last time she body-slammed me. I was in greater danger of her bony elbows puncturing one of my lungs than her weight suffocating me, but still.
Ouch.
A sense of timelessness swamped me, and I started drifting off again. I might have taken a nap if I hadn’t heard my name bellowed from a great distance. I knew in my bones it was Midas, but I couldn’t budge to comfort him. I couldn’t so much as twitch with Grier starfished above me.
An eternity later, my ears popped, and smoke clogged my lungs. Sirens wailed, and water filled my nose. I shot upright, knocking her off me, and choked until the deluge from the firehose became a sprinkle. And still I heard that raw and ruined voice screaming my name. Over and over and over.
“Midas,” I rasped, gaining my feet. “Midas.”
Our collision would have knocked me onto my butt if he hadn’t caught me before I fell.
“You didn’t call.” He crushed me against him. “You didn’t call.”
“Shh.” I pressed my hands to his cheeks. “I’m okay.”
I stroked his face, his throat, his chest, reassuring myself he was here, that I was alive.
Around us, the others began stirring, and it was as if they were waking from a dream too.
“The circle held.” Linus helped Grier to her feet. “You are remarkable.”
“You’re just trying to butter my biscuits.”
“I’m not sure what that means,” he confessed, “but I suspect the answer is…yes.”
“I’ll explain later.” Beaming, she kissed Linus hard. “Let’s evacuate the others.”
“What happened?” I didn’t have the heart to tell Midas I couldn’t breathe past his hold. “A bomb?”
“Oh yeah.” Grier dusted off her palms. “It smacked us all around like pinballs.”
Uncertainty mingled with confusion, but everyone looked okay. “Did the sigil work?”
“You wouldn’t know if it didn’t,” Linus said darkly. “You would be ash.”
“Good to know.” Swallowing hard, I focused on the devastation. “I don’t get it. The pinball analogy.”
Maybe my brain was still too rattled to make all the dots connect. No, wait, I couldn’t even find the dots.
“I used a sigil on each individual person,” she explained patiently. “Think of it as a bulletproof bodysuit.”
The impervious design, the one no one was supposed to know existed because in the wrong hands, para or human, invulnerability could prove world-ending.
“I’ve never tested it
