LOGINAlexThere is nothing in my head but red violence as I sprint out onto the ice. Students out for a stroll in their wolf forms dart away, but I’m a blur of motion. I’ll pay dearly for this. I can’t return to campus, that’s for sure. The ever-present darkness is my only cover. I have no idea where I’m going, but forward is my only option. Forward, forward, running miles in minutes I’m not sure I have. I’m a fucking idiot. I underestimated her. I think I underestimated her love for me, if I’m being totally, brutally honest with myself. Skye protected my secrets with her entire soul. I should have seen it in her eyes when she began to notice something was gravely wrong when I asked her to marry me. I should have seen it in her eyes when I left her this morning. She knew Kai tried making a deal with me. She’s so powerful. She might have had a shot at fixing this for both of us if Kai wasn’t like me–but worse. Wind rips over the ice, nearly knocking me on my side, but I keep going, ignori
SkyeAlex takes my trembling hands. “Everything is going to be okay.”“How?” My heart races. Guilt and uncertainty tangle into a ball of yarn in my brain that I’ll never be able to unwind. “You don’t–you can’t possibly want this. Especially not now.”“I do, and we’re going to figure it out. I’m more concerned about the fact that you’re about to go through a hybrid pregnancy.” He sits beside me on the bed, smoothing his hand down my back. “My great aunt Emory,” he explains, taking a deep breath. “She was a shifter, similar to you. Full shifter, though, and her pregnancy with my uncle Michael was… terrible.”“How so?”“I don’t have all the details given that this story was told to me as a teenager–something meant to keep me from pursuing shifters for their own safety, I suppose.” He grits his teeth, but I feel oddly light. “Were you a major flirt or something?”“No.” He laughs, winding his arm around my back and tugging me close. “I was not. If anything, I was awkward and terrified of
AlexThe Beta of Aurorium levels me with a look from one end of a long, wooden table. The packhouse in the city is one of the only buildings that isn’t drenched in artificial neon light. A massive stone fireplace heats a wide, open room decorated rustically with animal hides and leather galore. It would be comforting in a shifter-like way if not for my current situation. The Beta flings a file toward me and folds his hands on the table surface. “I’m sure you’re aware of the situation at the university,” I say, opening the file. “My lab is completely demolished. I can’t run–” I stop my voice in its tracks. The pictures on the top of the stack of paperwork in the file are of Laney and Dean Kanten. Laney in shambles. Dean Kanten in one piece, but pale, his body sunken in and distorted but in a way I find grossly familiar despite the wreckage of the ice tunnel he was found in after an extensive search.“I’ve spoken to the university about you, Dr. Scarlett. I was told you had a tumultu
SkyeAbby crunches into a candy bar while I dump copious amounts of salt into a bowl. “Why salt water?”“It needs to mimic the water the mystics use in Moonrise to scry, but I don’t have access to the water sources that run between Maatua, Veiled Valley, and Moonrise here, so I’m going to try this instead. I’ve read that salt acts as a conduit for energy and might keep bad things from interfering in the connection.” I glance at her, and she grimaces, stuffing the rest of the chocolate into her mouth. I’m grimacing, too, because for whatever reason, the smell of chocolate and peanut butter is making my head spin in a bad way. I shove my sudden nausea aside, chalk it up to nerves, and pour a pitcher of tap water into the bowl. “Can I ask you something before we get started?”“Of course.” I mix the concoction briskly until every salt crystal dissolves. “Why do you study astrophysics when you can just, I don’t know, see everything anyway?”I get what she means. It’s a good question, bu
SkyeAlex shuts the door of his condo with a crack that echoes from one end of the space to the other. I turn in a circle, tapping my chin in thought as he moves aimlessly through the kitchen, opening and shutting cabinets like the answer to this mess will be found on a shelf between pieces of glassware he never uses. “Obviously, it was Kai,” I say, and Alex braces his hands on the counter. “I find it hard to believe that Kanten was in the lab at all.”“So this other vampire killed him and took him there!”“No, Skye, not with all the maintenance workers around securing that section of campus.”“Then he was in the lab, and so was Kai, while you were drilling. Abby’s data points toward tampering. What did Toby say in your office? Explosives?”“We would have heard it.” He smooths his hands over the counter. “Skye?”“Yeah?”“I need you to consider something.”My stomach drops to my toes. I already know what he’s going to ask before his lips part. “No. I’m not going back to Moonrise. Don
SkyeAlex holds my gaze for several seconds. Two weeks of separation and the gravity of the last six hours crush the space between us, turning the rest of the world to nothing but static noise. He runs his fingers through his damp hair and nods to himself like he’s just made an executive decision. Toby lingers just within view–waiting for the same thing I am. Direction. Any kind of direction about how to move forward… for him. As a team. His friends. Me… whatever I am to him. “Meet me in my office in an hour. If anyone asks, I’m going through the data about the collapse,” he tells Toby, who takes the command as the dismissal it is, and within the space of two thundering heartbeats, we’re alone. “I wasn’t going to let you die,” I say, closing my arms around my middle, preparing for a fight. “I couldn’t. Not when I have the ability to… be anywhere, at any time. I found you.”“I knew you’d come. I could feel you there, just like when I was a kid, and you found me in my dreams.”I suc
AvivaI barely have time to pull my dress over my body before Ryan is running again, hastily pulling on his shirt. I leave my sandals behind and sprint toward him, my bare feet slipping over rock that turns to gravel as we reach the village. My heart is thundering when I finall
SarahI pull the crank that opens the ceiling in the tower, watching as the night sky comes into startling clarity. The stars are faint overhead, shielded by a layer of thin mist that moves across the sky like wisps of smoke. The moon, however, is full and painted a pale blue.
AvivaRyan looks conflicted, and I immediately change my mind. At first, I’d been more than willing to lie down on this rickety bed and let him have me just to know what it would feel like to lie with my mate. The legends painted this as something so incredibly life-alter
AvivaThe air in my old home is humid. The sucking, sticky kind that makes me feel dirty and uncomfortable. Summer swept through the Deadlands last night after what felt like weeks of rain, and now, what’s left of the moisture hangs in the heated air, weighing me down, ma







