“What do you mean?” Demaryius continued to lead, his pace quickening. “I thought he had been positively identified.”
“We made the assumption it was him, based on the belief Cass was the one being targeted.” Boaz shot Chambers a message to dig into any known associates. “Cleaners out in California verified he died in a fire a little over a century ago.”
“Are you wasting my time?” He whipped around, hands balling at his sides. “My mate has only hours.”
“We acted in good faith on the information we discovered.” Boaz texted a warning to the others, which was hard as hell to do while also keeping an eye on Demaryius. “The fact remains a strange vampire attacked my partner and me in the park, where Cass expected to find your mate.”
“Vampires pass through small towns all the time on their way to bigger ones. The poor or exiled have been known to live in forests like animals and prey on hikers or campers. Who’s to say that’s not who we’re tracking?”
“This is the best lead we’ve got,” Boaz said softly. “I know that’s not what you want to hear, but it’s the truth. I’m sorry. I wish I had more, but I don’t.”
Demaryius hissed under his breath, the words foreign and sharp as his teeth. He marched off in the direction of the road, his guards on his heels. Boaz let his head fall back on his shoulders. He could track the vampire the old-fashioned way, but Demaryius could have done the job twice as fast.
“Pritchard.”
Boaz turned at the sound of his name. “Yeah?”
“I can smell her.” Demaryius scanned the woods ahead of him. “Ari was here.”
Nineteen
We searched until an hour before dawn, but we turned up no evidence Ari had been taken to the lake. Demaryius thought he picked up her scent, but it disappeared between two trees. As if she had never been. His clansmen were quick to throw their weight behind his claims, but neither appeared certain.
I worried it was his imagination, that his senses were playing tricks on him. Desperation worked like that. I knew from experience. So many times, I had wished Hadley well. On every falling star, every penny in a fountain, every four-leaf clover. None of it had saved her, and I had only grown more desperate as the clock ticked down on her life.
Honey had been treated and evacuated, but Demaryius’s people showed up in numbers.
With sunrise an hour away, we called the teams to meet by the Lovers.
“She was here.” Demaryius leaned into a friend’s embrace. “I swear it, Jack.”
“I believe you.” The man stroked his hair. “We’ll find her.” He exchanged worried glances with the two women closest to him. “I swear it.” He guided him away. “The children are worried about their mother. We should go home now, let their father comfort them.”
“None of this makes sense.” Cass hung back, on the off-chance Demaryius’s guilt made her its target. “I thought I had my head wrapped around this, but I don’t.” She lowered her chin. “He’s really dead?”
“Delacorte is nothing but ash.” I showed her the report on my phone. “However guilty he was in life, he’s innocent of this.”
“I told myself he was dead.” Her expression remained pinched. “Now it’s like he’s been resurrected, and I can’t lay him to rest again.”
“You’ve had a crazy eight hours.” I rubbed her shoulders. “You’ll get through this, promise.”
“Yeah.” She forced a smile. “What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, right?”
“I’ve never liked that quote. It’s too suck it up, buttercup for me.”
“Hmm.” She thought about it. “You’re right. What doesn’t kill us usually just tries to kill us again.”
“Ready to go home?” I noticed Boaz waving off Parker and Abernathy. “We can regroup, try again tomorrow.”
“There is no tomorrow,” she said softly. “No one he—or she—has taken has survived longer than twenty-four hours.”
There was no comfort to offer, so I took her hand and led her to Boaz, who nodded to us.
We set out for Cass’s car, and Boaz called in fresh sentinels to comb the woods and the lake.
It was all we could do, and it wasn’t enough.
I didn’t know what to say to Cass when we pulled into my driveway. I offered to let her sleep over in Hadley’s room, but she passed. She wanted time alone to process all she had learned, and without her saying it, I knew she wanted privacy to grieve for her friend.
I watched her car until she cut the corner onto the main road. “I thought we had it.”
“I did too.” Boaz walked up beside me and slung his arm around my shoulder. “We all did.”
The weight of his arm was pleasant, and a companiable touch was welcome. “How’s Honey?”
“She’s claims she’s at one hundred percent, so I figure that means ninety-five or so. She’ll be fine come tomorrow.”
“I’m glad.” I leaned my head on his shoulder to see how it felt. Nice. It felt…nice. “I’m relieved neither of you were hurt worse.”
“I don’t get it.” He rested his cheek against my hair, proving himself an expert at offering comfort. “The sentinels in the area keep tabs on vagrants, for the safety of the human population. According to Parker, this area has never had a problem. They get through traffic, sure, but those vampires stay in hotels and make no effort to hide themselves.”
That was the smart approach, to make yourself seen by the local sentinels and the local vampires, in a way that made it clear you were in town for a day and would be gone the following night.
“Ready to go in?”
I noticed I was staring after Cass, even though she was long gone. “I’m worried about her.”
“She doesn’t live too far from here.” He winced, and I felt it. “Not that I sneaked around her property when I—very briefly—considered she might be the killer or anything.”
“Of course you didn’t,” I said dryly. “What are you saying?”
“That if you’d
