by JL Madore
Well, everyone except her and Zander.
When the doors hissed shut, the elevator began its descent. Kyrian shifted and joined Seth in blocking her from the glass walls of the elevator. The pair scanned the flurry of shoppers below muttering observations of the humans and Otherworlders flitting and filling the atrium below. Mothers with strollers sat along the edge of the fountain, and shoppers laden down with bags rode up and down the escalators in a life-sized game of chutes and ladders.
Of course, the humans couldn’t see the daemons among them, but they could. The Seraph blood running in Nephilim veins allowed them to see past the enchantments that disguised the identities of both Dark and Light. And now, she could see those things too. Things she’d never known back when she’d lived life as an oblivious human. Things she sometimes wished she couldn’t see now.
Seth retrieved his phone from the hip pocket of his long, leather slicker and raised it to his ear. “Side door in two, my brother.”
Outside the confines of the elevator, the sharp echo of a thousand voices bombarded. It lowered decibel by decibel as they made their way from the main floor of the center, down a side hall, and toward the parking garage. Austin knew the drill. Reaching the inside of the metal fire door, Seth looked out the hatched-glass window and waited the few seconds until a quick, sharp horn sounded on the other side.
She tucked in tight to Kyrian’s side. Zander was crazy overprotective, no doubt, but after experiencing the evil tip of the Darkworlder iceberg she would never argue. She followed Kyrian’s lead through the door. If a security force made her angelman feel better when she was out in public, she’d deal.
One parking garage was the same as the next—the chill of concrete construction, the hum of fluorescent lights, the dank air that smelled like sweat and the reverberating sounds of unseen activity above, below and beyond. It was that activity that set her boys on edge.
Kyrian’s grip tightened. His pale green gaze swept their surroundings. Fixated on all the gray and gloomy, his gaze hardened. She felt it then, that itch she’d gotten a few times since Zander brought her back. The needle-tip prickling at the back of her neck. A Nephilim early warning system that never came early enough.
“Gun!” Kyrian tackled her to the side. Bullets hissed past her ears. Concrete exploded. They hit the garage floor. Pain exploded. The chill of the floor beneath contrasted the heat spreading over her. Commands ricocheted as Seth and Phoenix closed in on them.
One minute she was flat on the ground with Kyrian blanketing her, the next she was tossed into the back seat of the truck, bullets raining down on them. The reinforced glass of the Navigator’s windows puckered and pocked, but nothing penetrated. Car horns sounded. Cries of shock and fear rang through the air as people scrambled to take cover.
Kyrian leaned into the back seat and ripped open her bloody shirt. Searching her skin, his fingers trembled, his eyes wild and filled with rage.
“Her arm,” Seth barked over his shoulder from where he was covering Kyrian’s back.
Ripping a cloth strip from his shirt, Kyrian wrapped it round and round the wound until the pinch and ache had her crying out.
“It’s superficial. Seth, you’ve got her.” Kyrian rolled out of the truck and drew his weapon. “Phoenix, get her to the clinic. I’m on the shooter.”
“No!” Austin grappled to catch him, the slamming door jarring her hand. White-hot pain shot through her shoulder as the truck interior swirled around her head. “Seth, don’t let him go alone. Don’t let him go.”
Too late. Seth had piled in beside her. “You’re priority, cowgirl. Always.”
The truck barrelled past the rows of parked cars, out the gate, through the honking, screeching traffic on Young Street and up Shuter. The roar of the engine drowned out the shriek of tires as they wove through Toronto mid-day traffic.
“I’m fine, Phoenix.” She scrunched her eyes shut as brakes screeched and they swerved. Her stomach lurched and she snapped them open again. “Don’t kill us trying to save me, please.”
“Shots fired on your Ishah,” Seth said into his phone. She heard Zander’s fury from two feet away. “Superficial . . . yes, I’m sure . . . I’m sure . . . It’s a fucking chicken wing, boss . . . we’re on the way to the clinic now.”
The violent baritone of her husband’s voice matched the rumble of thunder outside. Austin leaned closer to the window, imagining the sky darkening above. A crack of lightning burst across the horizon. She flinched. Zander’s connection to environmental energy had intensified when he’d gone through his transformation. What used to rattle pictures and burst a few light bulbs had grown to mortally dangerous levels.
Seth shook his head. “Okay, boss man, we’re on our way.” Shoving the phone back into his pocket, he leaned toward the front seat. “Change of plans. Z wants her brought to the loft. He’s calling in the archangel to heal her.”
“Raphael?” Austin shook her head. Her arm hurt but it wasn’t that bad—not like last time. She ran a finger over the platinum wrist cuffs Zander had commissioned to hide the ugly pink scars on her wrists. She gathered the tattered halves of her blood-soaked shirt and winced. “Shoot. If I look like a Freddy Kruger victim. He’s going to flip.”
Seth moved to pull his black T-shirt over his head.
She stopped him. “I can’t have your scent all over me when he’s panicked, Seth. His beast will rip you to shreds. Grab me the bag with the sweater I bought.”
Seth helped her out of the rag that ten minutes ago had been her favorite blouse and eased her new sweater along her grazed arm and over her head. When she winced, he pegged her with a scowl. “You’re sure you’re not hurt anywhere else?”
“I’m sure, why?”
He held up his hands and though she couldn’t see the fabric, she could see the glow of Seraph blood. “That’s a lot of blood, isn’t it?”
Seth nodded and cursed.
Kyrian. All the blood drained from her head and the truck interior spun again.
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR
JL Madore is a romance novelist of many genres: fantasy, paranormal, timeslip historical, and contemporary. She loves to twist Alpha heroes and kick-ass heroines into chaotic, hilarious, magical situations and make them really work for their Happily Ever After.
JL lives outside Toronto, Canada with her soulmate of over 30 years and a menagerie of family, friends and animals.
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