My mind was still reeling as I made my way back to our room. Well, at least that was the intention. Getting back was going to be a feat once the realization hit me that Aries left me alone. What the hell? She knew I didn’t know where I was. But surprisingly, I made it back to the common area where vampires soon laid their eyes on me.Seeing a familiar face, I scurried off in his direction. There was always time to tease.“Hey, Niko.” He frowned at me looking around at the other faces. Was he nervous or something?“Yeah. Hey. Where is Acelin?”“Not sure. I’m looking for him, actually. I just finished training.” He nodded knowingly, maintaining that stoic demeanor. Were all the vampires around here just stone-faced? Was showing any emotions forbidden? If Claudis expected me to stay here that was going to change. Images of turning this place into party central ran through my mind making me grin. “Seen any pretty humans around here lately?” I asked, wriggling my eyes at him. His widened in

“I’ve come to collect. So where is it?”Onyx barged through my door without even waiting for a response after almost knocking it off its hinges catching me off guard. “Huh? Where’s what?” Between the two women, I wasn’t exactly sure whose attitude was worse.She crossed her arms in annoyance as her eyes traveled to Azrael with curiosity.“And who is this?”“Uh. This is my… friend, Azrael.” Good job, Ray. That long pause wasn’t obvious or anything. I rolled my eyes internally at myself.She stepped toward Azrael in an intimidating manner, towering above her. The little witch was a few inches shorter than me, so Onyx looked like one of those long-legged runway models compared to her. Except she was far from a model and more of a fierce, assassin-type, vampire killing machine.Acelin had stepped out to handle some business or whatever leaving me and Azrael on our own to get more acquainted and familiarized with each other once we had been given the go ahead that she was welcome

“Claudis is on a bit of a rampage. Apparently, the witches that were killed, he had no idea about any of it and he’s not happy. Also, the one who was working for him fell off his radar, he’s very upset about that. As you can imagine, he’s not one that deals well with being caught off guard. He’s very calculated and put in place. So, the fact that one of his own, someone in his employ, has possibly deceived him has him a bit off-kilter, to say the least.He doesn’t want anyone to know about any of this. He assigned Niko to look into the matter personally. But he’s not just mad, he’s upset. What’s not very obvious and what I was even surprised to hear, was that he held the coven leader in high regard despite their differences.”My eyes widened at the sudden influx of information. What a good little source Elizabeth had turned out to be. I absolutely loved the fact I had eyes and ears that Claudis didn’t know about. But like she said, the information surprised me. Maybe the re

Days had passed since the forming of our little crew of abnormals. Witches, vampires, wolves, and a human attendant… I wasn’t sure what else to call us.After the day Oceanus spontaneously combusted right in front of me, I’d been working on my magic with Aziria, Azrael and Aries. Those three, serious and in the training ring, were something else. They’d pushed me further than I thought imaginable, far beyond my limits.Somehow, I’d found time to create those suits for Onyx that she’d basically threatened me about before. I didn’t even want to know what plans she had for them. And as far as her returned favor to me, she’d promised to keep her father on a need-to-know basis. It seemed odd to me that she chose that as her favor. She tried to make it seem like that was the only reason, but the reality was she’d pretty much done that already.If pretending to dislike me made her feel better, whatever. But I knew her truth. Onyx had finally warmed up to me. I’d go even as far to sa

After a much-needed rest, I awoke alone. Adrian left me a cute little note letting me know he and Trinity would be busy looking into things, which meant the Guild/Zariah situation not to mention he had a whole pack to run.Yeah, we had cell phones, and he could have just as easily texted that to me, but the pretty pink rose that sat on top of the handwritten note was a gesture I greatly appreciated. It really was the simple things that brought a huge smile to one’s lips. As a side not, for a man, his handwriting was pretty nice.That was a bit sexist. Men can totally have nice handwriting.I needed to prioritize. There was so much to do. Elizabeth was still sourcing info through Niko from Claudis. She’d learned that he had grown more and more concerned about the Zariah situation and had sent some of his vampires to look for her. As a group we decided we couldn’t let him in on what we knew about her because it would open up a can of worms. We couldn’t divulge the fact she wasn’t just a