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As I lowered the jacket, I noticed a tiny white and gray strip poking from one of the pockets. My chest tightened as I pulled the narrow piece of paper out and gazed at the images. Dianna laughed in one, smiled in another, and scowled at me in the last. But the middle one was my favorite. She gripped my face, turning me toward the camera.
My heart ached. I was so afraid I would never see her laugh or smile again. I had not realized how deeply my feelings for her had grown over the months we spent together. How utterly attached I had become to my fiery temptress. I had not realized it until it was too late, and she had already left, taking a part of me with her. My head spun as thick, blinding rage swept over me, eclipsing the sadness. They did this. They took her happiness away, and they would pay greatly for it.
I slid the pictures into my pocket and strode from the room with the jacket gripped in my fist. Several celestials passed me in the halls as they went about removing every single thing from the Vanderkais estate. I stopped a young female who had several sample bags lined with red tape.
“Take this and load it into the van with the rest of the evidence,” I said, thrusting the jacket at her.
She nodded and placed it inside a plastic bag before disappearing down the stairs. I took the steps two at a time, voices filling the main floor, heads bowing as I passed. The front doors remained open, celestials passing through to place various items into the vans out front.
I came around the banister, moving fully into the main room. Logan stood with his arms folded across his chest, two celestial guards flanking him. More guards surrounded the vampires, watching them closely.
“Everything you own is mine now—every property, home, item, relic, and bank account. Mine,” I said. Drake looked at me before glancing at Ethan and his wife, Naomi. Ethan loved Naomi so dearly he’d doomed the world for her. “You own nothing any longer. You will own nothing in the future, assuming you have one once your trial is done.”
The rage that had risen within me upstairs bubbled in my blood as I prowled closer to Drake. “Was it worth it? Do you sleep well knowing what you destroyed?” I asked, my eyes boring into Drake’s as I stood over him. The sweater, slacks, and scuffed shoes he wore were not the overpriced items he usually sported. The once flamboyant, gleeful prince seemed a shell of the man who had flirted, laughed, and joked with my Dianna. No, he seemed almost broken. His eyes, bloodshot and empty, stared at me.
Ethan cut in, interjecting as I continued to stare at Drake. “I did what I had to for the one I love. For my family. I would think you’d understand?”
“She hid you and your family from Kaden, and in return, you took hers!” I bellowed, the lights in the room flickering in response. “You let him take Gabriella. You stood by and allowed him to murder the last living member of her family, and you think I would understand that? Do you really think you can justify what you have done? I hope you enjoyed your short time together because, by my power, none of you will see the other again.”
I saw Drake’s head drop from the corner of my eye as Ethan inhaled sharply. The wife, the short, dark-haired woman at his side, gripped his arm tighter. “That was not part of the plan, I assure you. Kaden wanted to lure Dianna out. That was it. He has always wanted Dianna, and he always will. He is willing to do drastic things to get her back. I’m sure you understand that, too.”
My jaw clenched. He did not know the lengths I would risk to get Dianna back. I needed her. I needed her happy and whole and with me.
“You will all be taken to the Council of Hadrameil to stand trial. You and Drake have committed treason. Not only did you kidnap Gabriella, but you also took a member of The Hand, a crime punishable by death. All of that, and we haven’t even touched on accomplices to murder. You will be lucky if I do not send you all to Oblivion by the time this is done.” I glanced at Ethan, then at Drake. “Have I made myself clear?”
Ethan looked at his wife and reached up, squeezing the hand she had tightened on his shoulder. The matching marks on their fingers caught my eye before he turned back toward me. “We are very aware of the consequences, but I cannot say I regret it. I love my wife, and I knew the risks. We did not feel there was another way—”
“There was!” I snapped, my resolve slipping. Several lights burst, raining shards of glass onto the floor. I felt the room condense a thousand or more atoms vibrating with a power I barely had control over these last few weeks. Charged. That’s the word Logan used. Everything around me felt charged. I felt Logan move next to me. A slight shift as if he was on guard, protecting not them but me. Thunder cracked on the horizon before I reined in my temper. “We spent how many weeks in your home? You could have told me, told her. I could have helped you, all of you, and yet you did nothing. You’ve damned your family not saved them. Had you told us, maybe the outcome would have been different.”
“He is not what you think he is.”
I scoffed, my fingers grazing the bridge of my nose, my headache growing. “Besides an arrogant megalomaniac. I know what he is.” Drake and Ethan looked at me as if I were a fool. “He is one of the Kings of Yejedin. It does not matter. I have fought kings, beasts, and gods and won. You all knew that, yet you expect me to feel sorry that you aligned yourself with a psychopath? Pity is not what I feel for you.”
Ethan spoke, but I did not hear what he said. I did not care for any more excuses. My eyes shut, and I rubbed a hand over my forehead. The headaches were returning. I hadn’t slept since it happened, since she left, and neither had Logan.
“You know we have a name in our world for what you are,” I said, speaking over Ethan, my eyes opening. “There is no translation in your language, but it means the lowest of men. You are cowards. Traitors. I’ve met skinless grizzly beasts who fight harder than you two have. You’re even less than the shit rodents leave behind. You claim to love and care for her, yet you let him have and take the one person she loved.” I paused, trying to rein in the thundering in my chest and the clouds growing outside. I took a breath, shaking my head as I studied them. “You have taken someone from me with your actions—someone very precious to me. And now you have helped a lunatic corrupt her already damaged heart, shattering it into a million pieces. They are pieces I will pick up and fix, but what you have done is unforgivable. I plan to make you suffer for that transgression. Death would be a kindness, and you deserve none.”
I turned toward Logan, disgust eating away at me. “Get them out of my sight. I want separate cars and prison cells for them. They will not speak to one another until the trial, and they will be lucky if I even let them eat.”
Drake nodded and glanced at his brother as Logan’s celestials moved toward them. The guards took out cuffs and securely locked them around the three vampire’s wrists. Ethan and his wife were compliant until the celestials pulled them apart.
“You can’t do this!” Ethan shouted as they took Naomi from the room. The guards escorted Drake out next, his head hung low. Ethan continued to shout. “Please, Samkiel! I just got her back. Just let me rot in a cell with her. I don’t care what happens afterward. Please!”
I did not respond as Logan nodded toward the celestial standing beside Ethan.
“Look, I know how you feel. I get it. I know you love her. Kaden knows it too. Why do you think he did what he did?” Ethan said, his voice filled with desperation.
I narrowed my eyes at him. Every word he spoke just added fuel to my rage.
“He will keep her away from you if it’s the last thing he does. You’re too strong together, too powerful for what he has planned, what they have planned. If she’d stayed with you, it would have messed up everything. You two were never supposed to meet,” Ethan said, struggling against the grip of the celestials.
The blistering rage that threatened to consume me went cold at his words.
“What?” I raised my hand. The two guards stopped just inside the door. “What do you know?”
“We knew we couldn’t fight him, couldn’t kill him, but you two together? The two of you are enough to shatter worlds, and he and everyone else know it. You are a threat to him and to others, and so is she. Why do you think we pushed so hard while you two were here? Even Camilla tried. Regardless of us being bound to Kaden, we had to try,” Ethan said.
Had to try. Had to see.
