He had to escape.
His strength was returning, the rage blazing inside him fuelling it as he thought about Emelia at the mercy of the bastard standing before him.
Never.
He roared and pulled on the chain.
It gave, the sound and feel of metal grating against stone the sweetest damned music to his ears.
Hope soared.
Zephyr slammed a fierce right hook into the side of his head.
The world went black again.
CHAPTER 29
Sweat rolled down Emelia’s spine beneath her tight black tank. She breathed hard, attempting to settle her heart as she tore the gloves off and discarded them on the bench lining the dark grey wall. She sank onto it, grabbed her towel, and rubbed herself down, her focus turned inwards.
The dragon would come again.
She was going to be ready for him this time.
Returning to Archangel had made her feel weak. Zephyr had her running scared, and she hated herself for it, so she had doubled down on her training, spending a third of her day in the gym and the practice room, putting herself through manoeuvres with blades, crossbows, and her tranquiliser gun. She ran circuits and obstacle courses, and sparred with some of the stronger male hunters in the building.
She wished those experienced men had been assigned to her team.
Mark hadn’t been joking when he had said she would have to handle a few rookies. It turned out she hadn’t exactly taken over Sable’s old team. Mark had assigned all the hunters Sable had led to new squads and left Emelia in charge of new recruits.
Eighty percent of her team were greenhorns, and she had the feeling she was being tested. So far, nothing out of the ordinary had happened during their patrol shifts in the city.
Although, some of them were going to get themselves into serious trouble if they continued down the paths they had chosen. She was reaching the end of her tether, and if Carter and Franks didn’t heed her advice, staying away from the illicit place she had seen them entering when Archer had been driving her back to headquarters after a meeting at one of the satellite facilities in London, she was going to have to do something.
She didn’t want to be a snitch, but she also wouldn’t tolerate such behaviour in her team.
Emelia rubbed the back of her neck with the towel and swigged her water, her pulse settling now she was laying off the punchbag.
Her thoughts shifted away from her team to the male that had been on her mind from the second he had teleported out of her life.
Wolf.
He had gone to Hell again. She knew it in her gut. He had distanced himself and then left, and she wasn’t sure whether she had done something to cause that cold gulf between them or whether it was just the product of the dragon playing on his mind.
He had told her to run to Archangel, sent her to safety while he threw himself into the lion’s den for her. She cursed herself. She should have been stronger, should have rallied more quickly after what had happened and convinced him to take her with him. He hadn’t given her a chance, though.
And now she hadn’t seen him in over a week.
Was it his vengeance that consumed his every waking moment?
Or was he in trouble?
Her heart ached at the thought he might be, and she rubbed the spot between her breasts, her eyes dropping to the rubber mats beneath her black trainers. She should have made him take her with him. She should have been stronger.
But even now, the thought of entering Hell had her strength faltering. She clamped her hands down on her knees to stop her legs from shaking. It didn’t stop the panic that flooded her, had her throat closing and mind hurling images at her, flashes of Wolf at the mercy of demons, or worse.
At the mercy of Zephyr.
What if the dragon had him?
She shoved that thought away because she couldn’t contemplate it. The last time she had allowed herself to think that way, she had almost broken down in the middle of a meeting with Mark. He had been worried about her, had even mentioned her taking another sabbatical and returning to her home.
That had made the panic spike, and she had lost control, had begged him to let her stay at Archangel.
He had eyed her closely but hadn’t questioned why she desperately wanted to remain in the building, or why she had made excuses about going out on patrols, choosing to train her squad in the practice rooms instead of in the field.
Three nights ago, Mark had ordered her to take her team out for the night. He had reassured her that she was a competent leader, believing her reluctance stemmed from worrying about whether she was good enough to be the commander of her own team. She hadn’t told him any differently.
She should have sat down with him the night she had returned and told him the real reason she had come back to Archangel, but she hadn’t wanted him to think she was weak. She already thought that about herself. She didn’t need others looking at her as if she was liable to break. Not again.
She was stronger than before, even if she wasn’t strong enough yet.
Her thoughts shifted back to Wolf. Where was he? Her heart whispered that she knew where he was and why she hadn’t seen him. She was only fooling herself if she thought he was anywhere but Hell. If he had returned to Heaven, if he was anywhere but that dark realm, he would have come to her again by now.
Twin needs warred inside her, a desire to find the courage and strength to enter that realm and somehow locate him battling against the fear that gripped her whenever she came close to doing just that. The tiny voice at the back of her mind whispered that Wolf would be safe, that he was fine, that she didn’t need to return to Hell.
She cursed that voice and how easily she listened to it and let it sway her, so afraid of stepping foot in that realm again that she was willing to risk Wolf ending up hurt or worse, all because she was terrified of running into Zephyr.
Terrified of becoming a slave to him again.
She aimed her next curse at herself for being so weak.
She loved Wolf, and every instinct she possessed screamed that he was in trouble and he needed her. She had to find a way to help him.
There had to be a way.
Her phone buzzed.
Emelia picked it up and looked at the screen. A message from Sable. She unlocked her phone and scanned it. It was one line.
Can we talk?
Emelia fired a message back. Sure, call me in five.
Her pulse picked up, a trickle of nerves running through her as she slung her dark red hoody on, grabbed her things, and exited the gym. What could Sable want?
That question pounding in her mind wasn’t the cause of her sudden spike in adrenaline. It was the other one that ran around her head, one she was afraid of in a way, even when it could be the answer to her prayers.
If she asked them, would Sable and Thorne give her the help she desperately needed?
Thorne commanded an army, and he knew the dragon realm. With him and Sable protecting her, she might be able to find the strength to face her fears and head into Hell. Even if she failed to find the courage to go there herself, Sable and Thorne knew where to look for Zephyr, and maybe Loke would help them.
They might be able to reach Wolf before anything bad happened to him.
Her gut clenched, heart squeezing tight as that tiny voice inside her said something bad had already happened to him.
That was the reason she hadn’t seen him in days.
She swiftly took the steps up to the roof access door and pushed it open, sucking down a deep breath before she eased out into the late afternoon light. Her pulse ticked faster, heart beginning to thump painfully against her breast as she glanced around the roof and the sky.
She was safe. No one was there, and she needed this conversation to be private. She couldn’t risk someone overhearing her. If anything happened, she could be back inside the building in less than a second.
Her phone rang, and she jumped, fumbling as her heart went wild, and brought
it to her ear as she swiped her thumb over the screen to answer the call.
“You alone?” Sable’s voice rang clearly over the line, a slight echo to it that made her sound as if she was in a large room.
Underworld?
Emelia nodded. “I am. I need to ask you something.”
“I need to ask you something too.” Sable sounded so serious that the skin on Emelia’s nape prickled. Her friend continued before she could speak, “I know this is going to be asking a lot, but I really need your help. We really need your help.”
“We?” Emelia pressed the phone closer to her ear and glanced around again, listening hard to make sure she really was still alone, because she had the feeling Sable was about to ask her something monumental.
“Me, Sherry, and a tiger shifter called Talon. He broke out of Archangel, and they want him back, which is where you come in.”
She frowned at the flat black roof as something hit her. “It sounds a lot like you’re asking me to open doors for him.”
As in, bring him back through them in restraints.
Damn, it was hard to speak in a coded manner, finding ways to say what she was thinking without saying it straight. She couldn’t risk it. If someone overheard her speaking, she needed them to hear nothing out of the ordinary.
“You always were astute.” Sable sounded like she was smiling. “That’s exactly what I’m asking you to do.”
Emelia found that hard to believe. “Why would someone want that?”
She had seen the cell blocks, and they turned her stomach every time. Humans were bad enough at wrongly imprisoning other humans. She knew without a doubt that not everyone who was brought into Archangel should be there. Not all of them were a threat to humankind.
She had always been careful not to pick up a non-human if she wasn’t sure whether or not they were a danger to people, had always opted to monitor them instead and do her research before targeting them and taking them down.
Sable sighed. “Because he has friends still in there. He needs to get them out and, hell, I think the bloke is crazy too, but I promised to help him. Archangel… I know you still feel loyal to them, Emelia, and I know this is a huge ask, and if I could do it myself, I would, but you’re in good standing with them and I’m on the way out. You know it.”
She did know it. Archangel had given Emelia the position that Sable had been removed from once it had become apparent to those in command that Sable had done more than just have a fling with the demon king they had assisted as their first mission in a realm that they hadn’t realised existed until a few months ago.
Hell.
“I can still access the building, but no one trusts me there anymore, and my access to certain areas has been revoked. I can’t blame them.” Sable sighed again as Thorne mumbled something in the background, his deep voice soft, as if he was soothing her. “It was going to happen sooner or later. I’m surprised it took them this long to realise I’m mated to a demon king and my allegiances have shifted because of it.”
Emelia tried to stifle that feeling she had been having over the last few weeks, that sense that all her friends were leaving her behind, going off on a new adventure together without her.
Into a realm where she feared to tread.
They had given up on Archangel.
She still wanted to try to save it, to steer it back towards a noble and righteous path, the one it had sworn to follow decades ago when it had changed from hunting all non-humans to capturing and eliminating only those who were a threat to people.
“I don’t know. Can’t you just pop him in?” She hated the waver in her voice as she said that, the note of uncertainty that seemed to echo in all of her, in every feeling she had as she stood on the rooftop, staring out at the city that had been her home for the last five years as dusk fell.
How could she be so unsure of everything?
She loved Wolf. She knew he was in trouble. She knew what she needed to do. She knew, God, part of her knew that Archangel were beyond saving.
Why couldn’t she bring herself to admit those things? Why did she want to keep pretending nothing was wrong?
Her gaze fell to the roof at her feet.
Because she was afraid.
Archangel was all she knew now. It was her home. Her family. She had already lost one family. She couldn’t lose this one too.
“If I could, I would, Emelia,” Sable said, bringing Emelia out of her thoughts. “Thorne can’t teleport in without triggering the alarms since they upgraded the sensors to focus heavily on demons, and Bleu is going to help, but he can’t teleport Talon in when he doesn’t know where to go. Talon says he was being held in a hidden area I’ve never seen or heard of, which means we need someone on the inside for this mission. Bleu will give you some fancy-pants elf device, you get Talon in and activate it to ping his location to Bleu, and he will get the tiger and his friends out. Me and Thorne will provide a distraction.”
“A secret part of the building? Why would they have a hidden facility in HQ?” Those questions left her lips before she could even think about saying them in code, the shock that ran through her tearing them from her.
She found the thought there were hidden areas in the building difficult to swallow, even as a feeling bloomed inside her, a cold and insidious one that ate away at the piece of her heart that still loved Archangel.
Visiting the cell block had always left her feeling off, unsettled, and horrible because of what happened there and the fear some of the prisoners were innocent. What if other hunters felt the same as she did? Sable had never liked bringing non-humans in either. Neither had Anais.
What if there was another side of Archangel? A side where the darker among the hunters could bring non-humans they had captured. A place where the old Archangel still existed and operated, experimenting on non-humans to uncover weaknesses and discover better methods of dealing with each species.
She shook off that thought. She was reading into things again. Archangel had left that method of operating behind decades ago. They were different now. She had to keep believing that and believing in them.
They were her family.
“I don’t know why they have a secret area in HQ, but I want to know, Emelia. I want to know what Archangel are doing and why they’re suddenly raiding fae towns,” Sable bit out, a hard edge to her voice that sent a chill through Emelia.
“They’re doing what?” She stared blankly at the roof as that hit her.
“Talon was taken in a raid on the fae town in Scotland. He was a lucky one. Others were killed. None of them were a danger to people, Emelia. They were just going about their business. I need to know what’s going on in there. We all need to know… and you can get the answers for us.” Sable drew down a slow breath. “They put him through hell. They did terrible things to him and the female tiger who was taken with him. She died. There are four more innocent non-humans left down there, and he’s afraid Archangel will kill them if we leave them there.”
Another chill swept down her arms and thighs.
Her ears rang.
The part of her that kept trying to deny Archangel were up to nefarious things fell silent.
“You’re a commander now. You can access the main archive room with your security pass. You can get Talon in and activate the transmitter thingy Bleu gives you, and then you can help Sherry recover the files on this tiger and his friends, and maybe find some answers for me there too.” Sable’s voice darkened. “I know my login won’t be worth shit now, but yours should be able to grant you access to enough data that we can piece together what’s happening.”
Part of Emelia still wanted to say she wasn’t sure, even as her heart screamed at her to do it.
Because Sable needed her to do this and something had just dawned on Emelia.
Archangel had become her home.
But it was Sable, Olivia, and Anais, and some of the other hunters who had become her family.
And a member of that new family was asking f
or her help.
It would be dangerous, might end badly for her if Archangel discovered what she had done, but that feeling she had been having since returning from Hell was only growing, and now Sable was saying there was a secret area within the building and that Archangel were doing terrible things there.
Emelia needed answers too.
She needed help.
“I’ll do it.” Emelia drew her courage up from her toes. “But on one condition.”
“Shoot,” Sable said.
“You’ll help me in return, and when I tell you what I need you to do, you can’t turn me down.”
“That sounds ominous.” Sable paused. Thorne mumbled something. Her friend sounded more cautious when she spoke again. “But I’ll do it. Whatever you need, Emelia. I’ll help you.”
All the tension that had been building inside Emelia suddenly flooded out of her as if a dam had burst, and she sagged against the door behind her.
She closed her eyes, pressed her hand to her chest, over her heart, and willed Wolf to hold on if he was in trouble.
An army was coming for him.
Even if she couldn’t find the courage to lead them.
They were coming for him.
Coming to bring him back to her.
CHAPTER 30
Emelia tilted her head back so the spray of the shower cascaded over her hair as she closed her eyes. Nerves threatened to rise again, but she tamped them down.
A trip to the central archive room and a little light research had revealed that Talon hadn’t been lying and he had been a captive of Archangel until recently. She had been careful not to probe too deeply, afraid someone might be able to trace her actions and she would get into trouble, ruining tonight’s plans, but she had needed proof that the tiger shifter had been telling the truth.
Since Sable’s call yesterday, she had been worried that the shifter was up to no good, had lied because he wanted to get into Archangel and cause trouble. Now, her mind was at ease, even if the rest of her was nervous as hell. She was doing the right thing.
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