Page 10 of Scorned

“Her name’s Naomi. She said it was urgent for her to talk to Sage. She left a card with her number.”

Since I’d heard her name being mentioned multiple times around the campfire, I went on red alert. Sage had killed Naomi’s brother Sorin during the war. Unfortunately, not until after he had Luka taken.

“Naomi? What the fuck could she want?”

Drag shrugged at my question.

“Can you text me a picture of the card?” I asked Ollie and he huffed.

“You know damn well I don’t know how to use that cellphone my son gave me.”

Drag released a hard breath. “Can you just tell me the number, Dad?”

“Shit, son. Let me get my glasses.”

“Wait, is Libby working?” I asked. I sure as hell didn’t want to wait the ten minutes it would’ve taken him to find his glasses.

“She’s right here, doing prep work.”

“Can you put her on?”

Ollie mumbled something, then shuffling sounds came through the phone before Libby’s tender voice said, “Hello?”

“Hey. Can you text Winnie a pic of the card my dad has, please?”

“Of course, Drag.”

“Thanks, sweetie.”

“You’re welcome. Here’s Ollie.”

The phone shuffled again before the call ended.

“I guess he was done talking.” I laughed, and Drag’s face told me he was unamused.

A minute later, my phone beeped with a text from Libby.

“We can’t call Naomi until we get more burner phones.”

Drag nodded, agreeing. “Another reason to head into town tomorrow.”

We strolled back to the campfire and filled the others in on the news.

Chapter 3

Sage

Thirty-six.

It might seem like a low number compared to others, but it’s one I won’t forget. It’s how many people died because of me. Despite not being solely responsible, I blamed myself. Even if my society had betrayed me.

I had been scorned by Venom . . . by my own fucking father.

He sent his people to a slaughter without a care. When the fight at the Save location first happened, I thought they were attempting to take as many vampires as they could to VRC, but after gaining some runaway Venom members, I quickly realized that wasn’t true.

After killing Sorin, I went into a fit of rage before falling into an almost catatonic state. Drag insisted I hide out at his hidden camp deep in the woods. Vivi escorted me here while the rest of my friends stayed behind to help the mortuary guy deal with the dead bodies.

During their clean up, my friend Jimmy came out of hiding. He approached Peach and asked her to get in contact with me. Since I’d lost both my phones, I was unreachable—and completely okay with it. The last thing I wanted to do was to communicate with anyone. Not until Luka was safe and in my arms.

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