Page 65 of Scars Beneath a Serpent’s Scales

Roremar pursed his lips. Fucking Fates, Nico. Just what he needed, another mess to clean up. He sighed, braced both hands on the railing, and tipped his head toward the stars.

What were they planning with all of this? And why the fuck couldn’t they leave the people he cared about out of it?

“We’re going to find out who did this,” Desmond assured him, much more somber than moments ago, his temper bubbling beneath the surface.

“Yeah, I fucking am,” Roremar swore.

Bruises flashed through his memory. Broken hazel eyes and a whispered please, too afraid to ask for help.

He vowed to the stars above he’d find whoever did this and shred their skin from their bones until that odd pull in his chest was satisfied.

Emmeline may be his huntress, but tonight someone tried to turn her into prey. And he couldn’t help but feel as if, thanks to this case his uncle had assigned them, it was partially his fault.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Emmeline

The room was as grey as the sky beyond the windows. Or perhaps it wasn’t the space that was drab. The sheets wrapped around her frame were a rich green, the curtains trimmed in small purple flowers. But it was all washed over with a dull filter, like someone had turned down the vibrancy.

As if the eyes through which she viewed it lacked light.

For a while, Emmeline laid on her side, facing the window above the bed and the grey sky waiting beyond, trying to remember where she was. But her mind hummed with emptiness. A shapeless memory of pain lingered in the background, but she couldn’t quite form the outline of it, an illusion just out of reach. Until a cough sounded behind her that had her nerves flinching like they’d been waiting for a reason to recoil.

She rolled over, and⁠—

“Ow,” she whimpered as she arched her neck.

It all came flooding back then. The intruder in her room, the starfire flickering against the threatening message on her wall, a foreign object choking the air from her.

“Sorry,” a gentle voice said.

More carefully this time, Emmeline pushed upright, sucking in a small breath through her aching throat. She pulled a velvety knit blanket from the foot of the bed, wrapping it around her shoulders. The weight consoled her, giving her the grace to observe her surroundings and place the voice.

“Nico,” she wheezed.

Roremar’s brother sat in one of the chairs at the small dining table, his waves in disarray and shadows lining his eyes.

“Still hurt a bit to talk?” he checked, worried blue gaze flashing to her throat where she was sure the necklace of bruises shone like a beacon.

Tenderly, she pressed her fingers to the wound, needing to feel the pain herself. She nodded once, afraid what would happen if she tried to speak. Afraid of the heat stinging her eyes.

They are the one who should be ashamed. The words came back to her, but she couldn’t place them.

Nico jumped to his feet, grabbing a glass from the small kitchen occupying one corner and filling it at the tap. “Here,” he said, moving his chair to her bedside while she drank. “Roremar will be back soon. He asked me to keep an eye on you.”

“Where are we?” Emmeline asked, voice less croaky than before, though every swallow rubbed against her bruised throat. She vaguely remembered being carried from the Academy, but it was all a blur. Her gaze dragged across the soft sheets, the wooden beams lining the ceiling. A bed, a seating area, a meager kitchen, and a few paintings on the walls, but not much else to define it.

“We’re at the apartment above Desmond’s parlor,” Nico answered.

Horror sliced through Emmeline like a freshly whetted blade. “Desmond’s?”

She couldn’t stay here. She suspected Desmond was involved in the murders. She could not be under his roof. Did he realize she suspected him? If he did, she’d be within his reach.

A hand shot to her throat, the bruises throbbing. Panic wrapped her lungs, magic pushing against it. It was all too tight, too close. The instincts she’d spent years burying were unraveling.

Emmeline shot to her feet, the blanket slipping from her shoulders with a soft hiss.

“Hey,” Nico soothed, standing, too. “Emmeline, what’s wrong?”