Page 123 of Visions of Darkness

In acknowledgment, I gave her a jut of my chin before I began to weave back through the people who were vying for a closer look.

No doubt, most of them had gathered for the entertainment. Morbid curiosity. I knocked my elbow into some chick who had grabbed her phone to record, making it topple to the floor, tossing out a quick “Sorry.” Acting as if it were an accident.

We were fucked if someone posted about this.

If someone stopped us and started asking questions.

If someone looked too closely.

I couldn’t take the chance that someone would recognize her.

I had to get her out of there.

Most of the crowd had broken up since it had turned out to be a simple medical emergency that wasn’t worthy of anyone’s time, and I strode through the store as quickly as I could, somehow managing to get out without anyone else stopping us, though there were plenty of heads turning our way, me carrying her out drawing more attention than I wanted.

Relief hit me when most seemed to go back to their day, though that relief didn’t last long, since Aria slumped into the front seat of my car when I carefully set her inside.

She moaned, and I brushed the hair back from her face, my voice clogged with dread. “It’s okay. It’s okay. I’m right here. Just rest.”

I was in the front seat and flying from the lot a second later, searching for a motel with exterior access at the light we came to, another dump where we might be able to go in unnoticed.

It took fifteen minutes to get there since it was on the outskirts of town, and I pulled into the covered area at the lobby. I hated leaving her for even a second, but I didn’t have much of a choice.

Leaving the car running, I clicked the locks as I ran inside. I drummed my fingers on the counter as I waited for someone to help me, agitation lighting me through. I kept glancing back through the windows, making sure no one got close to my car with Aria in it, not when she was at her most vulnerable.

An old man with a stained white beard and a bald head finally came shuffling out from a back office, shooting me one of those speculative glances I was accustomed to. Distrust roiled from him, though I was sure he saw plenty of seedy fucks rolling through here.

That was confirmed when I doled out the cost of the room and he didn’t ask questions when I tossed in an extra hundred.

Cash always bought you what you needed, people going tight-lipped when you paid them to do so.

Two minutes later, I was pulling into the spot reserved for Room 117.

Aria whimpered when I picked her up from the seat, so drained that she couldn’t get her arms around my neck.

A shattered breath left me as I curled her into mine.

I maneuvered her around so I could unlock the door and support her at the same time, and I managed to get the traditional key into the lock before I opened the door to the dingy room on the other side.

Heavy drapes covered the window, the room laden with a dusky gloom.

It only had one king bed, and I pulled back the covers and laid her in the middle.

Exhaustion rolled from her throat, though my name was woven in it: “Pax.”

“I know, Aria, I know.”

Except I didn’t. I didn’t fucking know how to handle this. Who she was. The power she wielded. The danger it put her in. I hated even more the way it wiped her out when she used it.

The way it stole a piece of her.

But right then, I was more worried about the wound that now soaked her shirt. I only noticed then that there was a hole in the fabric from where it’d been scorched.

I pulled the neck back enough to expose the gnarled wound seeping underneath, the skin flayed open and charred at the edges the way it always was when we sustained a burn in Faydor.

I exhaled a shaky breath.

What the fuck? How was this even possible?

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