Page 2 of A Harmony of Procellarum

My love equates to danger, something she’s learned firsthand, and if you love someone, you have to learn to let them go, especially if you’re the reason they live or die.

She almost fucking died.

As much as I want to lay the blame at Torrent’s feet, I know it’s just as much my fault. This is what happens when your soul rips in half and each tattered piece belongs to a different person. Because of me, the two people I love most in this world are lost and in danger. Now I understand how Hail felt. His constant denial wasn’t just because he couldn’t face his feelings of unworthiness. He knew the danger our lives pose to anyone we bring inside.

So I let her go, but I had to see her one last time.

Martina Charles is standing in front of a rundown apartment building in one of the roughest neighborhoods in New York City. Her body is concealed beneath a thick winter jacket, but her honey-blonde hair shines with brilliance under the multitude of lights. The snow is falling around her in perfect synchrony, giving the illusion of her standing inside a snow globe. A perfect angel in a snowstorm.

My chest stutters with emotion as I suck in a breath, willing myself to turn and walk away. To make sure she survives, I need to leave, but at the very moment I lift my boot to move, she looks over her shoulder. I know she can’t see me, just like I can’t see the perfect hazel of her eyes, more green than brown, but we can feel each other’s heartbeat. We’re tethered together, the string taut from one end to the other.

Her heart and mine are one and the same.

She quickly rips her keys from her pocket and hurries inside the building, leaving me cold and alone once again. That’s okay, I’ve been alone plenty of times in my life. I can survive it one more time.

Once Tiny is out of my sight, I let out the breath I’ve been holding in my chest and force myself to turn away. Eleven slow steps and I finally lift my head from my feet, forcing myself to look forward and not behind.

That’s when I see him. The large hood sits on his head, ensuring most of his face is obstructed by the low-hanging front. The trench coat that covers the length of his body, the hem brushing the gathering snow on the ground. His hands are nestled in the pockets, but I know exactly what’s hiding in their depths. An engraved knife and a gun.

My first thought is Luciphia sent the Order to trail me and another wash of guilt comes over me for leading them here to Tiny’s home. But the more I watch his purposeful strides, I understand it’s not me he’s heading toward… It’s Tiny.

Panic, pure and volatile, slams through me as I turn on the spot, my quick, panting breath coming out in white puffs. I slip into an alley and grab my phone from my pocket, hitting redial instantly.

“Squall,” Raiden answers. “Where are you?”

“Brother,” I force out through my anxiety. “They found her.”

“You know what you have to do.” His voice is clear and firm. “We’ll meet you on the tarmac in seventeen minutes.”

“Raiden, it takes that long to fucking get there,” I snap as I pace the opening of the alley.

“Then you better get moving.” The line cuts dead and I growl out a curse as I peek out around the brick to find the man standing in front of Tiny’s building, his phone screen illuminating his face.

I glance up and down the street, making sure he’s here alone, and then I laugh at the situation. If he was indeed sent here to harm or take my girl, he will be sorely disappointed. Tiny would and could fight this one off on her own. She’s a prissy girl, for the most part, but I watched her take a knife to the ribs to protect the ones she loves.

This guy wouldn’t stand a chance.

With my hand wrapped around my knife in my pocket, I walk toward the man waiting with his head down, staring at his phone and that fucking hood covering his face. Then I see her, making her way down the stairs in a rush, her jacket unzipped and flying out behind her. Her eyes are on the man, her mouth turned down in a scowl, and all of it makes me feel sick to my stomach as I break into a run.

A blacked-out sedan speeds past me, the tires having difficulty finding traction on the road and the tail end of the vehicle fishtails. My mouth dries out from the pure fear settling inside of me and for a few seconds, that car blocks my view of Tiny’s apartment and of the man standing out front.

“No!” I hear her scream. I get close enough to see her thrown over the man’s shoulder and rushed to the car now idling in front of the apartment.

“Tiny!” I scream, and just before she’s thrown into the backseat, she looks up at me.

It’s not fear or surprise I find in her hazel depths. It’s anger and hatred. The look halts me in my steps as I watch her thrown into the backseat by the man who was standing in front of her building. His attire is undisturbed as he flicks his jacket out behind him and turns to get into the passenger seat, but before he does, he tosses his middle finger up in the air. Clearly directing it at me.

My pocket begins to vibrate as I memorize the license plate, knowing that won’t do a fucking thing to help us. I yank the phone out of my jacket as the car pulls away, the tail lights slowly being eaten up by the snow.

“What?” I bark into the phone.

“I’m guessing she was taken, considering your fucking attitude,” Hail huffs. “Get to the tarmac. We need to figure out what we’re doing next.”

“Did they take Tiny?” I hear Sky scream in the background as I hang up.

It’s bad enough I’ll have to deal with the guys’ disappointment at my failure, but those two females are like screeching sirens when they get going.

The car is long gone, but I continue to stare at the road, the tire marks slowly being covered by the heavy snow. No one is out on the streets during this icy-cold night, and that means no one to bear witness to a kidnapping. Not a single person to call the cops and report a woman being taken by a sadistic cult hellbent on decimating me and my bandmates. Not that it would help in the slightest. Every cop precinct here in New York is under the Order’s thumb.

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