Page 144 of Married to the Devil

“Sorry.” My smile is wry. “I thought I could keep it professional.”

Silas rolls his eyes. “Yes, detailing all the ways you’d wage war for him. Thank you for that. Thank the gods Stella would talk you down.”

I shrug. Perhaps.

Andrew enters the library. “I have the report on the north side you sent for.”

I frown. “What are you doing here? You’re supposed to be guarding Stella with Connors.”

I saw him leave with them.

Andrew looks confused. “No, you messaged me this morning that you wanted this report. Said you were sending someone else.”

“I didn’t message you,” I say at the same time Silas says. “I did those reports yesterday.”

The confusion falls from Andrew’s face, and he pales as the reality of the situation becomes known.

Panic is a foreign thing to me, but that doesn’t stop it from flooding my veins.

“Who is with my wife?”

48

STELLA

Once we leave the city,it doesn’t take long to figure out where Andrew is heading.

Apparently, the Leonid compound is not so abandoned anymore

“Fuck, fuck fuck,” I whisper. We should have leveled the whole thing, or at least dismantled the stupid spell that only admits blood relatives and those invited.

I tighten my grip around my phone, willing it to work. To create a lifeline that will get me and my little disturbance out of here.

Fear and frustration mix. Just when I felt like I was getting a handle of the situation, this shit happens.

Maybe Stoneheart sent Fiona after I argued against it. But wouldn’t she have swooped in already?

Bargaining it is. I don’t know what is making Andrew do this, maybe he’s been a spy from the beginning, but surely, he can be reasoned with.

“You don’t have to do this,” I say into the intercom.

He laughs, again sounding so different from the young man I know. “Of course I don’t. I want to.”

“Stoneheart—” I start.

“Will get exactly what’s coming for him. And you’re going to help.”

That’s not ominous at all. Think, Stella, think.But nothing comes to me.

The building rises past the trees, and I swallow on the impending doom. I have nothing against modern architecture. I love the Firefly. But the Leonid compound more closely resembles a prison in shape, and the dark color doesn’t do it any favors. It’s brutal. There may be no barbed wire fence, but the defensive magic is heavy in the very bricks of it. The trees of the forest give the space its own berth.

The feeling of the place had been oppressive enough the one time I snuck in there to take back what they stole from Kalos.

If they get me inside there…

The car slows as we pull up to the entrance. There’s a group of men there. Two of them are familiar, but it takes a moment to recognize them. I’ve only met them once and they’re looking a little haggard even if they still wear suits, trying to project an air of authority.

Being in hiding hasn’t been kind to them.

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