My phone kept ringing. Buzz…buzz…the constant sound grated on my nerves. Not now. Not fucking now. I gripped the wheel and punched the accelerator, watching the speedometer climb.

Streets blurred as I wound through Harbor. Cold, stony fear had melted inside me…and panic was punching through. I needed to get to her…needed to find her before…before they did.

Her life was forfeit…there wasn’t a soul on earth that could change that. But none of that mattered, not now, probably not ever. I’d leave everything behind if she gave me a chance.

We could hide, here or in the Unseelie realm. I’d spend a goddamn eternity fighting to protect her, spill my blood just to keep her safe.

The irony of that wasn’t lost on me. It felt like only yesterday she was running away from me, her mouth filled with words of hate.

The phone vibrated and buzzed once more. I reached over, and as I snatched the damn thing from the seat, movement out the window caught my eye.

A black Mustang cut across the lane toward me. Tires skidded, white smoke billowing in their wake. I gripped the wheel, glanced at the message…

I know where you’re going…pull over.

My heart hammered as I gripped the wheel and looked at the caller…Hall.

Fucking Horton…goddamn sonofabitch. “You couldn’t give me a goddamn hour, could you?”

I slid my hand down the side of the seat and pull out the Sig Sauer. Hall’s black Mustang was headed toward me, eating the distance.

Too much attention. I’ll have the entire fucking city behind me. I clenched my jaw as the shifter pulled alongside me. Dark eyes glared at me. He waved two fingers toward the shoulder of the road.

I strangled the wheel. Goddamnit! I’d worked with Hall for over eight years. Eight fucking years. I’d been to his house. I knew his wife…his kids.

Friend, he called me.

I downshifted the gears and hit the turning signal.

But not anymore. Horton had left me no choice. Dust and rocks kicked up as I braked hard and pulled to a stop on the shoulder. The sun caught the Mustang, the gleam all I could see. I gripped the pistol, reached for the door, and climbed out.

It’d be quick, painless, one silver bullet to the head. He’d never know…never know anything at all.

Cars flew past me, blowing strands of my hair with the wind, but I never saw them. I never saw anything at all but the Mustang.

The driver’s door of the Mustang opened and Hall climbed out. He moved like a soldier, ramrod-stiff spine and long strides. I searched his black leather pants and sleeved shirt for weapons.

“Why don’t you answer your goddamn phone now?” He growled and lowered his gaze to my hand.

I could see it all now. His hand would slip behind his back and then return with a pistol. It’d be too late…always too late. The Sig would kick in my hand, his life over before he moved.

“It’s like that, is it?” he murmured. “You’d kill me for her?”

“Yes.” The answer was so easy, just like falling in love.

“Lucky I’m not here to fucking hunt then, isn’t it?” He turned over his hand and stepped closer. “You need us…Lorn needs us. We’re in…all of us.”

A car slowed behind me and the crunch of tires on the graveled shoulder of the road followed. Car doors slammed as a trail bike cut across the road in front of us and skidded to a stop alongside Hall’s car.

I glanced over my shoulder at the four hunters who’d climbed out of the car. Prescott, Hank, Gabriella, and Sloth headed toward us.

“You think we were gonna just let you leave?” Hall growled. “She’s our friend, too. I’m paying for my daughter’s schooling with the money I make now. Sloth just paid for his home. Gabriella can afford to look for a decent car, instead of the piece of crap she’s driven for the last fifteen years, and none of this would’ve happened if it wasn’t for Lorn.”

I’d forgotten all the things she’d done for them…all the missed opportunities they now had a chance to recover from, and it wasn’t just about the money. It was about her. Lorn sacrificed for them, she cared for them…she cared for all of us.

“You’re going to protect her, so we’re here to protect you. You say the word and we’ll take down anyone they send your way.”

I flinched. “Horton, does he know about this?”

There was the hint of a smile as he shook his head. “You think we’re gonna worry about what that asshole says?”

I gave a smile. “It never stopped you before.”

“Exactly,” he growled.

Riley took off her helmet and climbed from the motorbike. She strode toward us, sleek moves like a damn predator. “Capture’s going after her,” she muttered. “His entire line is talking about it.”

“Fucking vampires,” Hall muttered and then cut Riley a look. “Except you, Riles.”

“Fucking vampires indeed.” She lifted her middle finger toward Hall and then found my gaze. “You want us to go after him?”

I shook my head. Six hunters on one was a bad move. My mind raced. “No, I’ll find her before he does. I need you to hold off the rest, threaten, take down…do what you need to. I know it looks bad, but there’s bigger things at play here. Stuff I can’t mention out loud yet.”

“Dude, we just lost the greatest hunter that ever lived,” Hall shook his head and then lifted his gaze to mine. “Alma was more than the founding member, she was The Circle. We want revenge just as much as Lorn does.”

And suddenly that choking sense of fear lifted. “Then do what you can, however you can.”

Every one of them nodded before Hall turned away. “Let’s lock and load!”

Dark clouds gathered, sweeping in with a gust of bitter wind. Car doors slammed and engines started, they were gone in an instant, kicking up the dust in their wake.

I lifted my head to the darkening sky. Gray and black and blue like someone had beaten this world bloody. The gust of wind turned violent, like a summer’s squall had set in…

Only it didn’t feel like Mother Nature…it was filled with anger and pain. The hairs on my arms stood on end, whispering something’s wrong here…something’s very wrong…

I went to the truck and climbed back into as the warmth of the sun faded, and the dark, threatening scent of rage closed around me. I leaned forward and started the engine as an unseen fist squeezed my heart.

There was a crack of thunder as a savage bolt of lightning ripped across the sky…and out of the blinding neon light something fell from the sky.

Dirty white feathers and hate, the Archangel Gabriel hit the earth like a bomb, shaking the ground, trembling the sky. I gripped the wheel as the truck shuddered and shook, and slowly the angel rose to his feet in front of the truck.

Only he was different, no longer the man I knew…

His once-bright, crystal-clear blue eyes were now dark and hostile, mirroring the bruised clouds above. Torment and pain echoed deep.

He moved stiffly, as though the weight of this was barbed and cruel as he took a step toward the driver’s side of the truck.

I shook my head…I didn’t have time for this…I didn’t have time for him. Not now…not when Lorn needed me more.

“I made a mistake,” his ragged words were gravelly and raw. “I don’t know what to do. I don’t know how to save her.”

Jesus…I glanced at the highway and the ass end of Hall’s Mustang as it slipped into the traffic and out of view, and then back to this bleeding-hearted sonofabitch.

I leaned forward, turned the key, and killed the engine as a peal of thunder rattled the sky. He never moved as I yanked the door handle and stepped out once more.

You left her…the words surfaced somewhere in the back of my mind. There was a gunshot of anger, resentment…jealousy… “She won’t care about that.”

“I do. I care…she can’t see me…not like this.”

His wings trembled as they spanned upwards. Dirty white feathers clumped together as he stretched them out wide. Joints and flesh were covered with angry red scars where there were once perfect, soft white plumes.

The guy was a mess…on the inside and the out.

He took a slow step toward me. “I feel her, you know. I feel her calling me, desperate for me…for all of us, and it fucking tears me apart.”

“Get your shit together. Angel the fuck up, and do what you’re supposed to do. You think she gives a fuck about what you look like?” I tried to swallow the words, but they spilled free. “You think she gives a shit about anything other than staying alive right now, and that isn’t for her own benefit. I know her too fucking well for that. She’s got a purpose now, and if you’ve never seen a woman possessed, then you’d better steel that weak-ass spine of yours up, because it won’t be pretty…whatever we walk into won’t be pretty at all. But it’ll be her, wounds, weapons, and all…it’ll be her.”

He had everything…everything I wanted and he was letting it slip away.

“Or don’t. Whatever you do is up to you. But I know one thing…” I glanced at the darkening sky as the clouds swirled around us. “She’s out there…she’s out there all alone. You’re hurting because you’re alone. You left her, hell we all left her in one way or another, except for the cop. She deserves better…she deserves far better.”

The storm seemed to shift in his eyes, growing colder, hungrier, as though what I saw in the sky was only a fraction of the rage he held inside.

“Get your shit together,” I snarled and took a step closer.

Pale lips curled in response, quivering. Yeah, that’s it. Hate me all you fucking want.

“The cop’s in a goddamn coma and her world is falling apart, and you know what she’s doing right now? She’s tearing apart her own fucking soul to save us…so how about we start to do the fucking same?”

Fear gripped me as I turned away. This wasn’t the same archangel, nor the same man. This one was violent and unpredictable. I swallowed that icy shard of fear, stilled, and glanced over my shoulder. “By the way, easy on the storm, yeah? I gotta get through this shit to find her.”

Hate glared back at me, hate so foul I could almost taste it as the archangel folded his broken wings against his body and answered with a sneer. “That isn’t me…but I’ll make sure to pass your request on to my brother…”

His thighs bulged as he dropped to the ground on one knee and skimmed the earth with his fingers before he drove his body upwards and leapt into the sky.

Cars fishtailed on the road beside me and then skidded to a stop. There was a flash of lightning, one so bright it detonated like a bomb before Gabriel was gone, slipping through the foreboding clouds to disappear from sight. “Goddamn archangels…pain in my fucking ass.”

I turned from the sight as the first fat raindrops hit the truck with a ping. I pulled the door closed behind me, turned the key, and put the truck into gear.

I’d lost time, lost a lot of time. But there were others helping me now. Others that would hunt, and fight, and kill if need be. “I’m coming for you, Lorn…hold on baby, I’m coming for you.”

I spun the wheel, eased back out onto the road, and then punched the accelerator. I’d drive all night, stop long enough to get fuel, and then keep on driving.

She wouldn’t stay in Greenwich. She wouldn’t be that dumb. She’d be out of there, heading toward Jerry Leander, so that’s where I’d be.

I leaned across the seat, grabbed my phone, hit the number for Betty, and put it on speaker. The phone rang three times before she answered. “Redemption.”

“I want all the information you have on Leander, address and business. I want to know how many people he has working for him and what kind of supes they are. I need everything, Betty, everything that will get me there first. Killing one human was one thing, but a crime spree like this will be her death for sure. Can you do that? Can you get me what I need?”

There was a second of silence before the older woman answered and I heard the pain in her voice. “You shouldn’t have to ask that. I’ll get you anything you need.”

I wanted to say more, to say…I’m sorry. But I couldn’t, not to her, and not to Gabriel. I needed them sharp, hungry…fucking hating me if it came to it.

That night filled my mind in the rush of a breath. I was back there in that old apartment as Betty pounded on Alma’s door. She was all fire, all flames that night…a sixty-year-old woman ready to take me on…

Only that wasn’t the only thing that had come through the door.

The fucking hellhound barreled in after her, ready to drag me to the bowels of Hell. We were honed that night…honed like a razor’s edge fresh from the stone.

We were hungry. We were desperate…just like I was desperate now.

Cars flew past, moving in the opposite direction. I caught the silver grille of an unmarked cop car before it was gone. Streets and buildings flew by until I hit the city limits and then headed out into the arid landscape.

My phone buzzed. I glanced at the screen and then hit the button. “What have you got for me?”

Betty started talking, listing off addresses and details of his business. The man was a self-made millionaire many times over, with at least thirty mercenaries on his books. Vampires, wolves, a centaur, for Christ’s sake, and a rogue Unseelie henchman…one of the Queen’s own guard, according to Betty.

Not one of the things you want to advertise…

Not when the Queen had a wicked, volatile temper.

What was hers was hers…those old dark memories sank in fangs and took hold. I knew that better than anyone, and I had the damn scars to prove it.

No one left her without suffering, and very few made it out alive. I gripped the wheel and tapped the button, ending the call. I wanted to talk to this Unseelie henchman. I wanted to talk to him very much indeed.

I passed the bullet-riddled sign at the turnoff to Alma’s house and fought the urge to turn the wheel. The woman had been a damn constant in my life. Coming to me in a night of desperate need. Lorn had to be protected, and to do that I’d had to break her heart.

But love was a double-edged sword, cutting me just as deep. I hid my pain, hid my sorrow. But I never stopped loving her.

And it was that love that gripped the wheel. It was that love I felt urging me to punch the pedal to the floor…

Night swallowed day in a heartbeat as the clouds moved in to claim the sun. I hit the lights and then the wipers, as a few heavy drops turned into a torrent.

This isn’t me…but I’ll make sure to pass it on to my brother…

I leaned forward to catch the jagged bolt of lightning across the sky. But instead of heavy dark clouds behind it, there was red. Blood painted the sky as though Hell had leaked into the mortal realm.

And that thought was terrifying. “Easy, old man. Don’t do anything rash.”

The needle climbed on the speedometer. Miles ticked by as I headed toward Killman Bay. I lifted my gaze to check the cars behind me and caught the familiar sight of the unmarked police cruiser.

Vampires.

Archangels.

And now goddamn humans.

All after one thing…the goddamn woman I loved…