Total pages in book: 8
Estimated words: 7510 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 38(@200wpm)___ 30(@250wpm)___ 25(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 7510 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 38(@200wpm)___ 30(@250wpm)___ 25(@300wpm)
The man who loved my wife enough to kill thousands for her.
CHAPTER TWO
Marcus
Werewolves don’t like heights.
Exactly why I transport Ivy to the top of the Republican Tower, the tallest building in Denver, at fifty-six stories high. The fact that a werewolf attacked the top floor of the Ritz means one thing and one thing only: magic was involved. Black magic…and nothing good ever came from that dark practice.
Ivy gasps as she glances around and realizes she isn’t where she was moments before, her thin, torn gown fluttering in the wind. I’d use my magic to change her attire, but that wolf had hold of her, and confirmation that she is not bitten or scratched is mandatory.
“Where are we?” she demands. “And how did we get here?”
“You know how we got here. I’ve been talking about my world—this world—with you all your life.”
“Magic,” she whispers.
“Yes, magic.”
A look of utter confusion mixed with fear slides over her lovely face. “Eli,” she says. “The wolf. Please tell me he’s okay.”
“Now that he’s not worried about you,” I say, “he’ll be fine. If I thought otherwise, I’d have handled the wolf for him.”
“Why wouldn’t you just use your magic to kill the wolf?”
“If it were that easy, I’d think all the rebels would be dead. That’s black magic, and there is always a price for using it to take a life. A life for a life.”
She hugs herself. “Is that how the wolf got to the penthouse? Black magic?”
“Or he simply climbed from the lower level.”
“And jumped in the window from mid-air?”
The years of training her and preparing her for the here and now have clearly worked. She understands what a normal human would not. Nothing is as it seems in this world. “We’ll determine how the wolf traveled after he’s dead.”
“How will we know when he’s dead? How will Eli know where we are?”
It’s in that moment that Eli begins shouting for me, using our mental connection to cut through the distance.
I ignore him, shutting off the communication, and focusing on Ivy and her well-being, which is ultimately what Eli wants as well. He is not like the other humans I’ve given life to, only to turn them into Wardens. He won’t live for his duty and survive on the high of knowing he makes the world a better, safer place. He has always clung to the wife he loved and lost. Always clung to the guilt over a card game, when it was nothing but that—a card game. It was the vampire who killed over a mere game that was the problem, not him. But nothing has ever made him believe this truth.
Nothing and no one can ever make him whole again, but this woman.
“Look at me, Ivy,” I compel.
Her gaze lifts to mine and she says, “Do I have an option?”
No, I think, but my answer is simply to transfix her. A wolf bite will be closed in hours, but the outcome will not change. Under any number of scenarios, she becomes a wolf.
I walk around her and eye her back. My jaw clenches at the sight of the deep cut on her shoulder blade and I eye the full moon. Normally a human infected with the wolf virus will change by the next full moon, unless the master wolf is killed. Eli killed the wolf. I can feel it, but I can also feel that something is not right. I press my hand to Ivy’s shoulder and magic radiates from my palm.
Every muscle in my body tenses.
We have a problem and not a small one.
I walk around her and face her again, allowing her to return to the present.
“You didn’t answer me,” she says. “Do I have a choice?”
“You always have a choice with me,” I say. “I could make you forget what is happening to you. I could put you on the other side of the world, and you’d never remember Eli unless I wanted you to, but we both know I won’t do any of those things. Because you know me. Because you trust me.”
“Why are telling me this?”
“Because you’re going to need to trust me.”
“Take me to Eli. Then I’ll trust you.”
“You already trust me, but I’ll bring Eli to you.” I snap my fingers and he appears in front of Ivy.
The minute he sees her, he pulls her into his arms, kissing her. I walk far away to the edge of the wall, put one foot up on the concrete edge, and look out over the city, dark clouds hovering low in the sky. A rumble of loud, angry thunder promises a downpour, but it’s not mother nature I’m worried about. It’s the mother of the magic used to empower the wolf who infected Ivy.
Eli steps to my side. “You know already.” His voice is a sharp whip.