Page 64 of Blood on the Ice

My lips stretch into an evil smile as I listen. That sounds perfect, if you ask me. I want the people who went around me to invademyterritory withoutmyconsent to learn a serious lesson about who they’re fucking with. If they don’t, I’ll never be able to keep the college a safe haven. Gargoyles crave the creation of safe spaces in their midst and I won’t be able to control my rage if I cannot protect my home.

“Good,” I reply as we head down the hall. “Channing has contacted the board, and I dropped a bomb in the press before we came inside. That should give us cover when we leave. “

“Do you think we’ll be able to bring Lucas home tonight?” Channing looks worried as she pushes her glasses up.

Foley gives her a charming grin. “Don’t worry, lass. Our boss never loses and this won’t be the streak breaker.”

My eyes narrow when she flushes again, but I don’t have time to give it more thought.

“He doesn’t have an option. If he fails my mate, I will tear him to pieces myself and deal with the fallout later. We all knowI’ve done it before.” That stops all of them in their tracks and I pull off my sunglasses, shrugging. “What else can they do to me? Knock me off? With my mate facing a death sentence for murder, it wouldn’t be a punishment.”

“Hardcore,” Foley mutters as he rubs the back of neck. “You’re a hell of a woman, Morgana.”

Rainier jerks his chin at me as if showing his approval as well, and I cock my head at them. “Now that we’ve established I’m a badass, let’s go see what’s happening with Jackson and Lucas.”

“Right. Follow me,” Rainier says, turning on his heel and heading to an enormous door at the end of the hallway. He waves a card at a reader and we’re able to go through it, leaving me to wonder how he got clearance to wander through the station.

The Irishman winks at me, bobbing his brows when he sees my confusion. “Rain is fucking connected. There’s very little he can’t finagle with this kind of shit.”

“Good to know,” I murmur. “I’m sure it will be useful in the future.”

“When we break your boyfriend out of a supe prison?”

I laugh as the adorable hacker comes towards us. He’s carrying a bunch of devices and I assume he’s hard at work figuring out everything we need to help Lucas. “Yes, I suppose it would be very helpful if he had contacts in the prison system, then.”

“Rain has contactseverywhere,” Eli says. “Jax doesn’t keep team members who aren’t at the top of their fields. The best hacker like me, the most connected ex-military, the trickiest motherfucker and?—”

“The scariest asshole alive?” Foley cuts in.

As if he’s been summoned, Kendrick appears out of the shadows, glaring at us with his arms crossed over his broad chest.

“Maybe not the scariest, but damn, he’s quiet,” I say with a laugh.

Hopefully, they’re not all blowing smoke up my skirt; Lucas’s future depends on it.

help

“Idon’t think it’s a good idea to be so involved in the politics on this side,” Kaspar says with a grimace. He’s doing arm curls on the couch, muscles bulging with the effort of the heavy weight he’s using. “Just because the woman intrigues you…”

I roll my eyes. The first female that’s caught my eye in over a decade and he’s pissed that she’s not what he imagined. Sometimes, I want to grab my friend and shake him. Iknowhe likes her as well, but he’s too damned stubborn to admit it. The damage from his past still haunts him despite my total rejection of the Harvest Court lady who broke his heart.

Kaspar knows I didnothingto encourage her—in fact, I actively tried to discourage her crush at every turn. But his shame from not being enoughandfailing to protect me from a Fae who turned out to be extremely dangerous is a burden he hasn’t dropped over the past fifty years.

I don’t know if he ever will, but I think Morgana has a good chance of helping us both heal.

“She’s the one, Kas. I feel it in my magic… in my bones. You just have to tru—” The buzzing of my phone on the counter interrupts my measured approach to getting him to stop being such a dick.

“Answer it. You will not change my mind.”

I walk over to the island and pick up my phone with a sigh of annoyance. The name on the screen makes my brows raise, and I swipe it open quickly. “Good morning, Professor.”

Ignatius’ voice is tense as he relays the news of Lucas’s arrest and the subsequent dash to the police station. I hear Slade banging about in the background—or I assume it’s the siren—and it makes me wonder what they’re up to. Once he sends me the pin for the station and I confirm it, he tells me to let Morgana and Channing know they’ll be along shortly. He hangs up, leaving me to ponder the clues I believe I gathered while he spoke.

“What did the mage want?” Kaspar grumbles as he puts his weight away. “Some errand for us? Doesn’t he realize you’re?—”

“Morgana’s at the police station. Lucas was arrested this morning with no warning.” My friend blinks, understanding the vast amount of corruption that likely took place to produce a secret warrant, enter campus without the Dean knowing, and show up to arrest a rich, elite supe sports star in public. “He said Jackson’s team is there, but Morgana will probably need even more pull to cancel out whatever levers the people behind this pulled.”

His eyes flash with his dragon and I feel the air in the room electrify enough to make the hair on my arms stand up. He might demur about the lovely Dean, but this reaction tells me more than he wants me to know. “Did he send the big supe to investigate security?”

---