Page 93 of Firedrake Betrayal
Shep studies me, his expression serious. “It’s dangerous, Patten. She said the longer we don’t do something about it, the more damage it can do to you. Staying means getting her to fix you up. I don’t know if she’s willing to come to Chicago, and I don’t know that we can find another witch who can do the spell when we’re back there.”
“Just witchy mumbo jumbo. She was probably talking out of her ass. The focus is on Jade, and it’s keeping her alive. Not me.”
“What’s wrong with you?” Jade asks.
She’s halfway down the stairs, no longer looking close to tears, and I didn’t hear a fucking thing.
I aim a grin at her. “Nothing is wrong with me.”
26
JADE
Istand on the staircase, frowning at Patten.
He denied something was wrong, but Shep looked concerned. If I’d come down the stairs two minutes sooner, I’d have heard what they were talking about instead of catching the tail end of their conversation.
I hadn’t expected to find them all standing at the kitchen island, talking. I don’t know what I’d expected to find, but it hadn’t been that.
When Patten continues to peer up at me, I sigh and make my way down the stairs. “I think we should leave.”
“Not dealing with Atticus and my da here and now means they can ambush us whenever they want,” Patten says.
I know that.
It was my biggest reason for staying, alongside wanting to be with Dad. But that was before people started shooting at Isaiah and Patten. Their lives are at stake, and that is too high a price for me to want to pay.
It’s time to go back to Chicago.
“But we haven’t been doing that,” I say, looking at them one by one. Not Dominik. Every time I look at him, I want to kickhim. “You want to keep me safe, so no one wants to do the thing we should do, like venture into those mountains.”
Silence.
I knew it. I’d assumed it before, but I know it for sure now.
A car squeals to a stop outside the house.
Shep waves me back. “Stay behind me, Jade.”
He doesn’t sound surprised or even startled.
Shep and Patten are standing in front of me. Dominik is somewhere behind, and Isaiah beside me, when the door bursts open.
Almeth skids to a stop. “You have to leave. He’s right behind me,” he gasps.
No one moves.
“Who is behind you?” Shep’s voice never changes from calm and composed.
“Atticus and his men.” Almeth’s eyes slide to mine over Shep’s shoulder. He keeps his distance, which I guess is a direct result of the size of the dent in the wall beside him. “He knows about her. Knows she’s pregnant.”
Panic skitters down my spine, and I automatically lift a hand to my belly as I retreat.
He couldn’t have known. None of us told Almeth. We didn’t even mention the p word while he was here.
How the hell could he have known?
“You told him.” Dominik’s voice is a blast of frigid air.
