He gave her three addresses.
“Quick,” he said at the end, his breathing strained and pupils hugely dilated. “You promised quick.”
Zaira let the tip of the blade touch his eyeball. “I lied.” She wanted to torture him until he begged for her to end it. The fact that they were in public didn’t matter. The fact that people would see her as a monster didn’t matter. Icy rage had morphed into a red-hot murderous anger that shoved at her to rip him limb from limb. Smash in his skull as she had her parents’. Erase his face.
Sunlight glinted on the ring on her finger as she went to wrench back her captive’s head with a grip in his hair.
If you didn’t have anger inside you, you’d be inhuman.
I refuse to accept that my Arrows are frozen in amber.
I have faith in your will. Fight for us.
The memory of Aden’s voice, his absolute faith in her, halted her when she would’ve punctured the changeling’s eyeball in the first act of brutalization. The rage monster in her hesitated.
Don’t go. Don’t leave me alone.
I have faith that the girl who chose to stop crying at three years of age has the will to conquer this demon.
I like you. You’re nice.
Aden just needs you.
There is a reason every Arrow in Venice, even the most recalcitrant senior, would die for you.
Blind faith. And love.
Breathe, Zaira. Take a minute and just breathe.
Remembering Ivy’s lesson through her fury, she focused on the ruby on her finger, the ring that Aden had given her because he wanted to keep her, and took a breath. Another.
Aden loved her.
All those other voices were of people who liked her, too, who thought she had value as a person. If she did this, if she surrendered to evil, she’d lose them all. Persephone would die. And if Aden survived, he’d wake to find himself alone because the rage would’ve swallowed Zaira whole: she’d promised him he’d never be alone, that she’d always be with him . . . that she’d be his partner.
You aren’t locked in that cell anymore. You live in the light.
Aden was gone from her mind and it hurt. It hurt. But he’d marked her regardless, and she clung to the echo of him, holding him possessively tight. Don’t you go, she said along the dead telepathic connection she kept trying to force open. Don’t you leave me. I’ll become a monster if you do. It was a threat that held endless need. I can only be human if you’re there to teach me.
No answer, but the rage creature inside her was leashed. Looking down, she found herself facing a gaze full of terror, one eye red with blood that had dripped from his split eyelid. She’d broken him, obtained the data the squad needed. There was no need to kill him. Flipping the blade, she tapped his temple with the back end, putting him under.
Did you get what we need?
Looking up at the sound of Vasic’s telepathic voice, having ignored him during the fight, she gave him an affirmative. “Get him to a hospital and contact the authorities,” she said aloud for the benefit of their audience. “The threat has been neutralized.” I have Persephone’s last known location. We’ll go as soon as you ’port back.
While Vasic took care of the body, she slipped the knife back into place and picked up the scanner she’d dropped. Then she walked deliberately toward the crowd. The onlookers parted in front of her, mingled fear and awe in their expressions. “Where’s the gun?” she asked the human couple.
The man held it out to her, hand trembling. “I picked it up when you made him drop it.”
Zaira knew that, had seen him do it and never forgotten the gun that could be turned against her. “Thank you. You minimized the risk to others.”
A shaky smile. “You’re an extraordinary young woman. Isn’t she, dear?”
“Oh, yes,” his mate replied with a beaming smile. “Why, that horrible man might have hurt us if she hadn’t been there.”
Not sure how to respond to that unexpected statement, Zaira turned to Vasic as the teleporter returned. The valley first. We need more weapons and people.
Chapter 77
THE LOCATION THE shooter had given her for Persephone turned out to be a shipping yard owned by a human magnate. Locked and gated, barbed-wire fence above the chain-link, the premises also had electronic surveillance, guards, and dogs. None of those were enough to stop a team of Arrows determined to get in, especially under cover of the night that had fallen in this part of the world.
While Mica took care of the electronics and Vasic silently stunned the guards into unconsciousness, another member of Zaira’s team made sure the dogs were asleep. The sedative-laced meat they’d brought in after an initial reconnaissance had worked exactly as planned—the animals would be fine when they woke. No need to penalize them for the crimes of their master.