Total pages in book: 130
Estimated words: 121008 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 605(@200wpm)___ 484(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121008 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 605(@200wpm)___ 484(@250wpm)___ 403(@300wpm)
“I don’t know.” Ci slides to the ground and starts jogging toward the brugh. “We can feel her when she’s sleeping. She’s unconscious then, too. This is different. Something’s gone wrong.”
I know. I don’t need to tap into Ci’s intellect to know something is wrong with our wife. I shove down the bile rising in my throat at the idea of something bad happening to our Meggie.
Nothing can happen. We just began our lives after years of waiting for her. She has to be alive.
“I’ll go around the right. You take the left.” I sound far more in control than I am.
Cian runs. I pull my sword and force myself to move with caution. She cut the connection for some reason. That’s all. Sometimes she cuts it so we won’t feel what she’s feeling. There are all kinds of reasons for that to happen. She might think we need all our faculties to conduct the investigation.
Except I felt a jolt of fear before the connection cut. It slammed into me, seizing my heart and threatening to overwhelm me.
“Beckett!”
All caution is gone when I hear Cian yell. I run toward the front of the brugh, and what I see stops me in my tracks.
Niall’s body is crumpled near the front porch, left there like a piece of trash someone forgot to sweep away.
“Meg!” I can’t help the shout that comes from my throat. It threatens to shake the ground.
No. That isn’t my shout. It was the thunder that accompanied it. Clouds, gray and ominous, are suddenly darkening the sky above, and it’s all coming from me.
I don’t miss the way the trees shake all around us.
“Something took her,” Cian says. “I felt her fear, but she knew what it was. Not who it was. What. She didn’t know the name of the creature who scared her. I don’t think it was a Fae.”
A pit opens in my gut. “Goblins?”
Ci shakes his head. “They wouldn’t dare. They’re afraid of you, and she made a good impression on them. She trades with them. They take that seriously.”
“Then it’s Torin.” It’s everything I fear. Torin will take her and offer to trade. Her life for ours.
We’ll do it because our lives don’t matter without Meg.
“We can’t know that for sure,” Cian says.
“Then who was it?” My fear and frustration threaten to take over. We have no idea where she is. Someone could be torturing her as we stand here. We must find her. I take a deep breath because panic isn’t going to help our wife.
“We’ll gather the villagers and start searching.” Cian’s face is drawn in tight lines. “She can’t have gotten far.”
We look at each other and the words are left unspoken about exactly how far she might be from us. There are whole other planes she could be taken to.
“We should send word to Dante to have him search the Vampire plane.” A few scenarios play out in my head. “There were a lot of vampires at the arena who felt like they’d been betrayed. Any one of them could have stolen her.”
“They’ll go into hiding then.” Cian paces, his irritation obvious.
“Then we’ll have to use our assets to find her.” And then I have a plan. A stupid plan, but the only one I can think of. “Have you heard the rumors that Liadan has skill with magic?”
Cian goes still. “I don’t know that’s such a good idea. I don’t like that woman.”
Cian never liked Lia, but I can’t concern myself with Cian’s picky nature. “She’s the only one I know who can do a locator spell. I know Meggie won’t like it, but I would make a deal with the devil if I thought it might get our wife back. Can’t you say the same? If you won’t, I will.”
I start to run toward Liadan’s cottage. My brother falls in step beside me.
We will do whatever it takes to get our wife back.
Chapter Forty
Meg
“Get moving, you bum.”
It’s the first thing I hear as my head starts to pound and I try to figure out where the hell I am.
I’m underneath something. Not a blanket. Newspaper. Someone covered me with an old-school newspaper. What happened? We don’t have newspapers in our village. I blink, forcing my eyes into focus as I stare up. It’s night, but I can barely see the stars. There’s too much smog and too much light. The stars are so bright outside the cottage. Where am I? Only a few nights ago, I laid out on the grass with Cian, watching the stars and talking. Cian told me his people’s stories for the constellations, and we made love on an old quilt beneath the nighttime sky.
I can’t see the stars now.
“Cian.” His name is on my lips as I sit up. Everything hurts, but nothing worse than the fact that they aren’t here with me. “Beck.”