One day. That had been my longest relationship for the past…forever, and here I was practically living in Avianna’s bedroom, knowing that she was about to willingly give herself to another male. My Avianna. And yet she wanted to make the most of “our time together.” It was more like she wanted to visit the darkest sides of me and then get back on her appropriate path. I might be good for a couple of weeks of bachelorette-worthy sex, but I wasn’t the guy she wanted to come home to in the long run.
Ajax jogged back toward us, breaking me out of my pity party.
“What’s wrong?” Benedict asked.
“There’s something…” Ajax shook his head, his dark brow furrowing. “...wrong. Like a disturbance in the force.”
“You’ve been watching too much Star Wars.” Benedict grimaced. “I told you that shit is sci-fi, right?”
“Can you sense him?” I asked, my eyes widening with an idea. “Saint, I mean. You’ve spent centuries together.”
“Not my power, man.”
“Not what I meant. You’ve been through centuries of battle and you’re telling me that none of you have offered your blood before?”
Ajax’s brows lifted. “You’re joking.”
“It’s not sexual,” Benedict explained.
“Well aware of what it is.” Ajax shot him a look. “Saint has always walked that line between hunter and hunted, so fuck no, none any of us thought about exchanging blood. The ability to track another vampire down goes both ways.”
“Noted.” I sighed, my last hope sinking.
Benedict’s spine stiffened, and his gaze widened, focusing somewhere in the distance.
“What is it?” Ajax spun, looking for an enemy to face.
But I knew that look. It was the same look I’d worn when Avi had been attacked and taken. The same look I’d seen in the mirror for the month she’d been missing.
“Where is she?” I asked softly, herding both males into the nearest alley.
Benedict snapped out of it and fumbled for his phone, panic lacing every move. “Pick up, pick up, pick up! Fuck!” He jammed the phone back in his pocket. “Something is wrong with Jocelyn. I can fucking feel it.”
“Where?” I repeated.
“Wonderland.”
I grabbed his wrist and Ajax’s, unwilling to risk Benedict’s frenzy or Ajax’s unfamiliarity with Edgemont, then I wended all three of us. Night bit at our skin, cold and frosted, as space folded around us, blackening my vision and roaring through my ears.
We materialized in the men’s restroom, which was blessedly empty. Not that anyone would be confused by vampires wending around here, but still.
Screams echoed down the hallway, and the hair on the back of my neck stood at attention.
“Jocelyn!” Benedict shouted, already on the move.
My stomach hit the fucking floor. Avi wasn’t here, was she? She would have told me if she’d been planning to come. Would she though? The female doesn’t really ask for your opinion on her activities.
Fuck me, what if she was in there? Adrenaline shot through my veins.
We shoved our way through the door and down the hall into pure chaos. Humans and vampires screamed as they ran in every direction. Flames shot up the curtains that draped from the balcony to the first floor.
I glanced over the crowd and fully welcomed in every one of their fears, searching for Avi.
Terror blasted at me from every person who fled and those who didn’t get the chance to.
Death.
Pain.
Failure.
Not saving his wife.
Not one of them was Avi.
Assassins.
I spun toward that fear, shoving Benedict out of the way as a flash erupted from a human’s gun barrel. My reflexes kicked in, unsheathing a blade and snapping it toward the human’s throat. The bullet hit my chest a millisecond after the dagger flew from my hand, propelling me backward—into Ajax.
“Damn it!” He threw his hands out as we both tumbled to the floor, and everything around us went still.
I sucked in a wheezing breath, pushing the agonizing pain from my mind as Ajax flipped my six-foot-four frame around like a top.
“Where are you hit?” He yanked up my Henley, letting the sides of my leather jacket fall to the floor.
“In the vest. Don’t worry.” I surged to my feet, Ajax following.
“Vest,” he repeated, poking the hole in my shirt and feeling the bullet that had flattened upon impact with the Kevlar.
“Vest,” I said again, taking quick stock of the world around us. Time had frozen for everyone outside the little bubble Ajax had created.
“I fucking love technology.” He grinned like we weren’t in the middle of a fucking battle.
“A discussion better left for another time.” Maybe this was why the guy seemed so easygoing. He had all the time in the world when he wanted it.
“Right.” He slapped me on the back. “You nailed that human in the trachea. He’ll be dead before we can get to him.”
“Good.” I looked around again, this time thinking strategically. “There are two up there.” I pointed to the balcony, where humans aimed blowtorches at the structure.