Adrianna came alert, jerking upright in the driver’s seat of her sports car. No longer a high performance car, though, with the front end, rear and both sides demolished.
Water drizzled in where the windshield should be.
Stars flickered in her gaze. Blood ran down through one eye. Her head felt like a pile driver hammered into it from every direction. Her chest hurt and face was bruised from when the airbag deployed upon impact with ... a building.
The air smelled of chemicals and dust floated around her face in a swirl. No, maybe all of her surroundings swirling was due to having her brain jarred.
Energy zapped around the inside of the car.
She opened her hand, calling up Witchlock as she did. Luckily for the city of Atlanta, she and Witchlock had not exploded.
The ball of energy shimmered to life, spinning in place.
Speaking carefully so she didn’t destroy anything, she called upon the ancient power to energize her healing. Slowly, her head eased to a dull headache and her vision cleared.
Anything else could wait until she went to a place where she could push the limits of her ability with Witchlock.
Why hadn’t Evalle come to check on her yet?
Looking around, Adrianna saw very little from her scrunched up position. She sent power to the fingertips of her free hand and shoved against the crumpled dashboard.
Metal screeched as the car stretched away from the building.
Once she could force her door open, she shoved it away and eased her boot to the sidewalk.
“Ouch, ouch, ouch.” She was a forgiving person when it came to an accident, but she’d seen that maniac purposely accelerate around the corner.
This was no accident.
Forgiveness was not on the agenda.
Once she had her balance under control, she reached in to lift her phone off the floorboard. Everything she and Evalle had done prior to the wreck was coming back to her. She’d been in the lead so she could get updates on the chaos at the Five Points intersection next to Woodruff Park.
The stupid phone had not worked correctly the entire drive from the woods where they’d left Kit. She hadn’t been able to reach anyone to get an update.
Looking around, she stared at the intersection she’d cleared right before getting hit.
Where was the crazy driver and his car?
And where in the devil was Evalle?
Adrianna’s pulse jacked up.
Her friend would not have left her voluntarily.
She closed her hand, putting Witchlock away for the moment so no human would see it. None were around at the moment, which was odd. Walking back toward the intersection, she noticed the streetlights were now dark.
It wasn’t until she reached the intersection that she saw a white van seventy-five yards away on her right. Heading that way, she passed debris from a vehicle.
She froze. Not a vehicle.
Evalle’s motorcycle was lying between the white van and a building.
Adrianna ignored her hurting body and ran forward. She caught the scent of fresh blood first. “Evalle!”
What had happened?
Out of the quiet night, Adrianna sensed a powerful being approaching fast. She spun around and opened her hand.
Witchlock bloomed bright on her palm.
Terrifying snarling and glowing yellow eyes burst out of a dark shadow, racing forward at inhuman speed.
Adrianna quieted her majik, leaving it just bright enough to light the area. This was no threat to her.
A massive black jaguar slid to a stop and stood eye level to her. He inhaled deeply and roared a vicious sound.
There was no way to make this better for him. Adrianna said, “I don’t know what happened, Storm. Someone wrecked me. I just got here myself.”
In a blur of black fur and claws, Storm changed back to his naked human body and stood from a crouched position. The look on his face was too brutal to describe.
“Where is she?” he demanded in a hoarse voice.
“I don’t know,” Adrianna admitted. “Evalle was following me. Someone intentionally crashed my car into a building so I didn’t see what happened after that. As soon as I came to, I climbed out and found this. You were maybe ten seconds after me.”
As the best tracker the VIPER coalition of preternaturals had in the southeast, Storm’s gaze darted everywhere, taking in every inch in seconds.
He looked through a window on the van then gave the bike and the wall a second look.
Adrianna waited silently for him to find out what he could, but they both knew Evalle had not left here of her own free will.
He jumped over the wrecked bike and grabbed up Evalle’s helmet and stared. Then he turned his head up and released a gut-wrenching wail of hurt and fury.
Someone was going to die a painful death.
She hurried over to see what he’d found. “What is it?”
Reaching into the helmet, he withdrew the emerald chakra stone in a trembling hand. His fingers closed around it in a fierce, shaking grip. Tears poured from his eyes.
Adrianna wanted to throw up. Blood ran from the skin still attached to the emerald. Someone had ripped that stone from Evalle’s chest.
Headlights glowed on the other side of the van from an approaching car.
Flicking her hand in Storm’s direction, she cloaked him before the car came into view and snapped her glowing hand shut.
The driver called out, “Hey, what’s going on, mama?”
Before Adrianna could answer, Storm growled in warning. His eyes hadn’t lost the yellow glow.
“What the hell?” the young guy said, looking around. “You got some animal over there?”
Storm had demon blood. He might lose control, break out of the cloaking and rip everyone who came near this place to pieces.
Adrianna couldn’t let that happen.
Evalle and Storm were close friends. With Evalle gone, Adrianna would watch both of their backs.
Smiling took a monumental effort when she wasn’t far from lashing out herself. Adrianna told the couple, “Got a team working on special effects for a movie.”
“Oh, really? What movie?”
“It’s a secret right now. Come back tomorrow and you’ll see the whole cast. We’re just doing tech work and I have to ask you to move on or we’ll get off schedule.”
Thankfully, Storm’s face was no longer visible to anyone but her right now. There was little humanity left there.
“Okay, thanks.” The car drove off.
Adrianna dug into her jacket pocket and tried her phone. It actually worked this time. She called Trey and started talking as soon as he answered, explaining the situation and that she needed Daegan.
When she finished the call, Storm was staring at the emerald he held, but instead of bright yellow his eyes now glowed red.
Bad, bad, bad sign. Adrianna removed his cloaking and asked softly, “Storm, are you with me?”
He growled in answer and stalked away, sniffing at everything around the white van.
Streetlights started coming back on.
She heard a truck driving past the crash intersection. Two men walked along the street, pausing to look at her car up against the building. They moved closer, no doubt looking for a hurt driver.
One of the men inspecting her car had his phone out. He would be calling emergency services.
This was going to get out of hand quickly.
Power boiled next to her, close enough to send her hair flying around her face.
Daegan, the dragon king who ruled the Beladors, materialized inches from her.
She was short on patience and snapped, “Did you have to teleport in right on top of me?”
“Yes. Trey told me to locate you to find this place. What’s going on?” Then his gaze dropped to take in her face. “What happened to you?”
“I’ll live, but ... ” She looked at Evalle’s bike.
That’s when Daegan noticed the busted motorcycle. “Is Evalle hurt?”
Storm came around the front of the van at that moment. Red eyes glowing, face contorted with pain and rage, he looked like some monster from a horror show.
When he spoke his words pushed out past fangs. “Someone took her.”
Daegan was as old as Witchlock and could shift into a mighty dragon. He could have used his power to contain Storm, but he treated the Skinwalker as the trauma case Storm was at the moment.
“Storm, we will find her, but not if you lose control. Can you track her?”
“I could have, but they ripped this out of her chest.” He opened his hand that held the bloody emerald.
Adrianna explained, “Storm had placed that chakra stone on Evalle with majik, which allowed him to find her anywhere.”
Storm’s chest vibrated with a deep rumbling sound that belonged in a nightmare. So did his demonic voice. “I will destroy everything in my path until I find her.”
Frowning, Daegan said, “That is your right, but if you start killing without cause you force me to stop you.”
Growling got louder.
Daegan kept talking in that calm tone. “I promise you when we find her, the right to punish her kidnapper will be yours.”
Adrianna kept an eye on people entering the general area. Soon, more humans would show up.
A siren sounded, but was a couple of streets over and not coming this way. Maybe the men looking at her car had not called in the wreck. If they were looking to scavenge parts, they could have it.
She had bigger things to worry about.
She told Storm, “I want my pound of flesh, too, but we both want Evalle back first. I will be with you, watching your back while we hunt the bastards who did this. You’re our best tracker. Please, for Evalle’s sake, lock down your control.”
Storm’s entire body shook as he drew heavy breaths, but his eyes finally lost their glow. The black pits staring back didn’t look any more welcoming, but he had returned to them.
Daegan turned, taking in the surroundings, then asked, “Would you like clothing, Storm?”
“Yes.”
In the next blink of an eye, Storm wore jeans, a black T-shirt and boots. He wiped his mouth with his hand and kept dragging in deep breaths. “I smell human and no scent trail leaving the scene.”
Daegan jerked back around. “Human?”
Nodding, Storm said, “But a human couldn’t do this alone.
“You’re right,” Adrianna agreed. “Someone cloaked their scent then teleported Evalle and the humans away. Sounds pretty powerful.”
“That may help us narrow our list of kidnappers.”
“Maybe,” Storm allowed. “But what powerful being would need the help of humans?”
“That is strange,” Daegan admitted.
Sirens blared as an ambulance finally drove up to Adrianna’s car. A police cruiser approached from the opposite direction.
She told the men, “We’re going to be discovered any moment now.”
Daegan walked halfway to her car, paused and lifted his hands above his head, then whipped them down in wide arcs. When he stepped around to return, Adrianna could see the fine film protecting them from the humans.
Impressive cloaking.
“That will give us time to search this area,” Daegan said, walking back to them. “We need intel. I’m thinking the Nightstalkers in this area could be of help.”
Storm swallowed and found his voice again. “Evalle has a favorite one that treats her like his grandkid. Once he learns this has happened, he’ll shake down all the other ghoul informants until he gets anything that can be had.”
“Evalle, where are you? Evalle?” the muffled voice of an old man called out.
“Who the devil is that?” Daegan asked.
Adrianna supplied, “Speaking of Evalle’s favorite Nightstalker, from what she told me, that could be Grady.”
“It is,” Storm confirmed. “I’ve met him when Evalle and I tracked together.”
Within seconds, the old guy wavered in and out of view. Grady’s weathered face wrinkled with sadness and worry above the gray beard, which stood in sharp contrast to coffee-colored skin. A flannel shirt and baggy pants he’d worn the day he died hung on his skinny frame.
“Can you let Grady in here?” Storm asked Daegan.
“Sure.” Daegan lifted a hand and curled his fingers closed as if calling the ghoul in.
Grady’s image sharpened, though still wavering in and out of solid form. He demanded, “Where’s Evalle? Who hit her bike? Where is she? Ghouls all talkin’ ’bout a crazy Alterant biker gettin’ wrecked down here. I knew it had to be my baby girl.”
Adrianna didn’t think anyone could sound more destroyed by what had happened to Evalle than Storm, but Grady came in a close second. Walking over to the Nightstalker, she spoke gently. “I’m Adrianna, a friend of Evalle’s.”
Grady said, “You the one stomped that evil witch Veronika.”
“That’s right.” She caught him up on what had happened and said, “Someone intentionally wrecked Evalle, then snatched her. It appears the kidnapper teleported away with Evalle and the humans. We need any help you can give us.”
Grady’s face went from upset to angry when he swung to face Daegan. “You that dragon king?”
“I am.”
The old Nightstalker addressed Daegan as if the dragon king were his subordinate. “I will find out who drove that van and what preternatural was here, but you got more power than me. You better handle it. No Nightstalker gets a handshake until I’m done with them. Understood?”
He was talking about how a Nightstalker traded preternatural intel with a powerful being in exchange for a brief handshake. That moment of power surge allowed the ghoul to take corporeal form for ten minutes.
Showing no sign of insult, Daegan agreed. “I can speak for the Beladors who will receive that order shortly. I’ll go to VIPER next and warn them to not interfere.”
“You do that,” Grady said. Then his gaze moved to Storm. “She said you majik-glued a rock to her so you could find her.”
Lips clamped tight, Storm nodded.
“But you ain’t runnin’ outta here like you can track her.” His old voice turned pitiful. “It ain’t workin’?”
Storm opened his hand to reveal the bloody chakra stone. “It would if she still wore this. Based on the jagged edges, someone clawed it out of her chest.”
“Oh, mercy.” Grady sounded like he was going to cry when he looked at the stone. “My poor baby girl is hurtin’.” Looking back at Storm, he said, “I know they got to be smarter than to be anywhere close to here. I want to make ’em pay, but you have to be the one. When you find who did this, you send ’em to hell in pieces and bring her home to us.”
Clearing his throat, Storm said, “Bet on it.”
“I gotta git out of here and start findin’ out who knows what,” Grady announced.
Daegan said, “Thank you for your help. Go to your left. I’ve opened a spot in the shield.”
Grady floated past the white van then slowly faded from view.
Storm’s gaze moved past Adrianna, focusing on something and turning even more dangerous. “He better get the hell out of here or he’s the first one I’m taking out of my way.”
Adrianna twisted around to see who or what Storm referenced.
Three Hummers had spilled into the intersection.
Isak Nyght and his black ops team had arrived.
Turning back, she said, “I’ll deal with him. I think we all need to vacate this spot right away.”
Daegan asked Storm, “Can we move the van and Evalle’s bike to your place where we can go over everything more thoroughly?”
“Good idea. Send it all to our garage. Teleport me first, then I can open the ward for all of this and you as well.”
Daegan silently took in the entire scene and said, “I have it all in mind. What about you, Adrianna?”
“Go and I’ll catch up to you once I deal with Isak.”
Storm came over to her. “Sorry I lost my shit.”
“Understandable. But we’re going to do this and I’ll be there with you every step.”
“Thank you.”
Storm told Daegan, “I’m ready.” With a last glance at Adrianna, he said, “Call when you’re ready and I’ll pick you up or Daegan will teleport you.”
“Sounds good.”
Storm gave Daegan a thumbs-up.
Adrianna started walking toward her car where Isak was stomping around it. What had him upset?
With his intel, he had to know it was hers.
She was nonhuman, which meant he shouldn’t be concerned, right? Yes, her inner bitch was having a Roast Isak party, but he should be glad it wasn’t her outer bitch, who could actually set that party into motion. She’d been a fool to open her heart to him. A fool to trust that he would stand by his words when he’d said her being nonhuman didn’t matter.
Those words had been uttered when they were physically entwined, after all, and she should’ve known better. Human or not, men were all alike when the little head started talking.
When she reached the outer limit of Daegan’s protective shield, power rushed around behind her, then everything outside the shield came into clear view.
One of Isak’s men spoke to him.
Isak whipped around and headed for her like a bull charging a red flag.
She reminded herself about maintaining control.
But if he pushed her right now, Kit would not have to worry about Isak discovering his mother was training a preternatural being. He’d be too busy trying to figure out how to find his way home from the other side of the world.