Page 92 of Petals for Vicious Secrets

Pity that Lenna had already heard him say enough bullshits for the rest of her life and many others. Pity that her hands were already tracing a vertical cut in the air as she visualized pulling the East petal from her mark and cutting Theon’s heart in half. As her own felt right now. There was no point in making him suffer for longer. Not when Lenna didn’t want to waste another second of her life with this being.

Theon’s body dropped to the floor, and Lenna bit her lips to resist the urge of tears made of anger and despair.

Jake lifted her chin and kissed her deeply, as if they weren’t surrounded by quite a few still-alive roixers and the damn Roix Reigner herself. He took his time, savoring her lips and allowing her to get lost in his. Lenna didn’t care if he had Given some sort of panom barrier around them to protect them from unwanted attacks, or if he believed the roixers wouldn’t dare interrupting them. Lenna didn’t care, because all that mattered in the world was him and the feelings that the warm contact of their tongues made clearer than ever.

Jake gently pulled his lips away. “I’m so fucking proud of you, sweet fire.”

Lenna would have loved to reply if she hadn’t felt so dizzy from his kiss. Not his kiss. From the Harming. That was her inner panom balance totally tilted, and she didn’t know if she could focus enough to Heal anyone in time before she fell to the—

Jake’s powerful arms grabbed her waist in time to avoid a pathetic fall to the floor. Cardinals. The world was spinning so badly around her. Lenna pressed her shut eyes against his very comfortable chest to avoid seeing the dead roixers above her instead of underneath her. She inhaled his leather and ginger scent deeply, as if it could somehow help. Thank the Fifth, it helped her feel safe, even if her uneven scale was still very much present. Jake walked somewhere, bracing her against him.

Lenna opened her eyes enough to see they were inside the security vault. That she saw a moving bed with a white head jumping from side to side was likely to be a good indicator that Raoul was indeed inside there.

How were they going to get out of the Beftac Center? Even if between Jake, Ciaran and Hope, they killed every single roixer and the Roix Reigner herself, there was no way they could walk all the way through the maze this place was back to the alley. Especially with Lenna unable to stand by herself, and Raoul unconscious.

The epitellia wards made it impossible to moure in or out of any part of this building. And yet—

“The windows,” Lenna whispered.

Jake either caught her trend of thought or had already formed the idea himself, because he said, “Everyone better be good at jumping in turns.”

61

Hope

The security vault was a mess of dismembered, strangled, or impaled bodies.

Jake was barely a few steps from the door, with Lenna snug against him, frowning. His hands moved and the bodies not-so-neatly piled in a corner of the vault. A high pile. From Ciaran’s hands, a swift of air passed through the room, drying the blood on the floor.

“What the fuck are they waiting for?” Ciaran spat, looking at the door that led to the corridor where a few fights were still taking place.

As if on cue, Nina and Ayla entered the security vault running, Nina dodging a knife thrown at her head from a roixer still standing. Ayla was bleeding from multiple different places, but was good enough to be gaping at Raoul’s body. Nina continued running until she was holding her brother’s hand in hers, crying, stroking his equally white hair.

Hope took the couple of steps that separated her from the doorway and threw a blade to the heart of the roixer who had attempted to kill Nina. The corridor was another mess of bodies, but at least a dozen of roixers and the Roix Reigner were still standing, putting up a fight against Indianna, Brendon and Sasha.

“Can you do the body-moving thing with Carson?” Hope asked Jake, and it somehow was weird to ask her brother a simple question.

Jake was helping Lenna sit at the end of Raoul’s bed, but Ciaran’s blue eyes flickered as he nodded and said, “I’ll do it.” A few seconds later, Carson’s cold, dead body was laying by the glass window of the security vault, ready for launch.

Jake, Ciaran and Hope were by the door, waiting for Indianna, Brendon and Sasha, who had their hands busy trying to stay alive. It was impressive enough that they were still breathing after fighting these military-trained roixers. Hope had no doubt whatsoever that they had received some training themselves from very expert—and maybe even metallic—hands.

Jake cut the legs of the roixer fighting against Sasha in half, his fall allowing her to run to the vault. Ciaran’s shadows were on the loose again, blinding and strangling one of Indianna’s opponents. Hope’s blades stuck in the eyes of the other roixer fighting against her.

“What about me, fuckers?!” Brendon shouted.

“Move your ass here!” Ciaran shouted back, moving from the door to let Sasha and Indianna run inside.

The Roix Reigner was running right after them, shouting, “Over my dead body, you leave this place!”

Jake lifted his hands with a macabre smile. “Over your dead body, it is.”

Indianna gripped his forearm and placed her body right in front of Jake’s. “Don’t kill my mother. Please,” she begged, her voice trembling.

Jake looked at her, hesitation lining the silver eyes that seemed from another world. After a few seconds that felt like a lifetime, he nodded. “I won’t kill her this time. Consider it a personal, returnable favor.”

His hand was moving and the Roix Reigner’s body slammed against the corridor wall, leaving her unconscious on the floor but still breathing.

Indianna’s eyes widened, but she said, “Thank you.”

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