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Damien cursed under his breath, likely calling me a number of bad names for not following his orders, as he pulled his phone out and started tapping away on it.
We skidded around the last bend and I slammed on the brakes, coming to a screeching halt behind Dash's black Camaro.
"Shit," Damien swore. "Get to Dash's now. The cottage is on fire and the barrier is down."
He said something else but I couldn't hear him because I had my seatbelt off in a flash and my door open.
"Fuck," I heard him snarl as I raced toward the cottage. "Ariel, get your ass back here."
"Dash," I screamed as I ran around the Camaro and straight toward the front door.
Smoke was coming from the back of the house in large, black clouds. My guess was that the fire was in the kitchen. Even if it had been in the front of the house, I still would have run in there looking for Dash and Binx.
I ripped open the front door and raced into the mudroom. I tripped over a pair of Dash's boots and went down hard on my knees, my palms slapping against the floor. Pain shot up my arms from where my stinging hands were pressed into the hardwood. Ignoring it, I climbed to my feet.
I opened my mouth to scream for Dash again, but got nothing out because a hand came out of nowhere and wrapped around my mouth. I didn't fight because Damien's heat and scent hit me at the same time, I'd never fight him off.
His mouth came to my ear. "Dash didn't take that barrier down himself, we need to be careful here."
I looked around wild-eyed, expecting someone to pop out and pounce on us at any second. Still, fuck careful, Dash was somewhere in here and we needed to get him out.
Damien slipped something into my palm before removing his hand from my mouth. I looked down at what appeared to be a shiny, silver dagger. What the hell did he expect me to do with this?
He stepped around me, grabbed my hand, and crept toward the living room.
I wanted to scream at him to run, to hurry as fast as he could so we could find Dash sooner, but his warning about someone else possibly being in here stuck with me, and if I wasn't careful I'd be flashing back to a time when Chuck,just call me Chucky,had shown up on our doorstep. That had ended up in heartache and bloodshed. I hoped this time would be different.
The living room looked empty but, scarily enough, the couch was turned over onto its side, as if there had been some type of tussle in here. The shelves, with all of Dash's books and movies, had been tipped over onto its side also, the contents strewn all across the floor.
Stupidly, in order to avoid what was really going on before me, I thought about how much Dash would hate to see his things treated in such a way.
Damien tugged on my hand and dragged me forward.
The smoke hit me and I tried to cover my mouth and nose with my free hand. And almost sliced my face open with the dagger I'd forgotten Damien had given me.
I jerked my hand out of his and put my mouth and nose in the crook of my arm. My eyes watered painfully.
The dining room was empty. Nothing out of place in here.
Damien turned on me, put his hand on my chest, and pushed me back up against the nearest wall. Tears trailed out of his eyes, letting me know the smoke was getting to him too.
"I’m going to check in the kitchen," he said in low, gravelly voice. "I want you to stay right here. Do not move away from this spot. I don't want you in the kitchen with me because I don't want you that close to the fire. But I don't want you that far away from me either or off on your own. We stick together and that's all there is to it. So, you stay put."
I nodded my head in agreement. Sure, I'd stay right here where he told me to like a good little girl who couldn't take care of herself.
Not.
We were wasting time with this crap and who knew what the hell was going on with Dash. I was done wasting time.
As soon as Damien disappeared into the smoky kitchen, I was off and sprinting two at a time up the stairs. There was still the basement to check, but something told me he'd be upstairs.
It was eerily quiet up here. The whole house seemed to be silent except for the fire roaring in the kitchen, which was mostly a silent killer.
I pressed my back to the wall and slid along quietly. Which was just plain stupid on my part because I had stormed up the stairs and if there was someone up here they already knew I had arrived. I reached Dash's open door and peeked inside. Seemingly empty and thankfully not a mess like the downstairs had been.
I kicked my flip-flops off, something I wished I had done before running up the stairs, and crept inside.
The bed was nicely made, like he took the time to do every morning when he got up at the crack of dawn. The doggie bed on the rug before his bed that Binx liked to snooze on was empty, no Binx to be seen.
