Dark Champion (Flirting with Monsters #4) - Eva Chase Page 0,6

gotten past—well, Thorn, anyway.”

“Then he should have realized we have good reason for that devotion.”

The prickling frustration was expanding, rising through my ribs and up to the base of my throat. Sorsha had saved me not once but twice. She’d woken up a whole world inside me I’d had no idea even existed. I had to protect her.

I marched onward, searching for more signs of Omen’s passing, but I was reaching the area where he’d outpaced us. I wasn’t sure exactly which direction he might have veered in from here. We were getting close to the road, where a whiff of a cloying chemical smell lingered from the occasional cars passing this way.

I pushed past another tree—and found myself faced with a portly mortal man who was strolling along the side of that road. He paused, blinking at me, and the prickling sensation dug into me like the rows of splintery teeth that could spring up within my mouth.

Everything I cared about had gone wrong, and someone needed to pay. I could rip his soul to shreds and devour it down—

My body was moving before I’d even finished that thought, propelled by the all-encompassing hunger of my nature. The man’s eyes widened, his round cheeks paling.

“Snap!” Ruse hissed, but I was already yanking myself backward. I clenched my jaw before it could extend any farther and propelled myself away from the mortal and the tempting thrum of his life’s energy.

I was better than that. I was a monster, and I would bring out my fangs if it helped us—but not just to distract from my frustrations. Savaging that man wouldn’t bring Sorsha back.

If only I had a better idea what would.

When the RV came into sight, I stopped with a ragged exhalation. Ruse halted beside me.

“I don’t know what to do,” I said to him. The urge to rend and tear was still clanging through me. Just for an instant, a small part of me was glad Sorsha wasn’t here to see how my control had frayed.

Ruse gave me a crooked smile that looked rather painful. “You’ve already managed more than I’ve been able to contribute. Fat lot of good my charm can do for us or Sorsha right now.” He sighed. “I think I found a few places in the Everymobile that Omen touched—or rather, slashed or smacked. Do you want to come give them a taste?”

If our leader hadn’t been sure of his destination while he’d dashed away out here, I didn’t imagine he’d been clearer on it before he’d even made it out of the vehicle. But confirming that would do us more good than murdering random passers-by.

I raised my chin. “All right. And then we find something else to try. We keep trying, no matter how ridiculous it seems, until Sorsha’s back with us.”

I wouldn’t let myself consider yet what I’d do if she was lost to us forever.

3

Sorsha

If Omen had wanted to keep the location of his hidden bunker a secret from me, he hadn’t done a very good job of it. In with the pre-wrapped chicken sandwich and bottle of orange juice in the bag he’d tossed me, I found a rumpled napkin with the logo for the Grand Canyon Visitor Center.

I’d always wanted to take a gander at the Grand Canyon. Of course, I’d have preferred to be looking at it from the rim rather than this incredibly inside view of the rock it was made of. Omen really didn’t have the tour-guide instinct.

I had to assume he’d picked this cave as a stash spot because it was nowhere near anyplace mortals generally went in the canyon. I wouldn’t be surprised if the door at the other end of the room led out to a nearly sheer several-hundred-foot drop, and the bastard hadn’t brought along my grappling hook. No doubt I was about as far from human civilization as you could get in the entire country.

Maybe he’d wanted me to see that napkin to dissuade me from attempting to slip my bonds.

After I’d wolfed down the sandwich and chugged the juice—because my chances of survival were hardly going to get better if I starved myself—I examined the cuff around my wrist and the chain that attached me to the cot’s frame. I’d melted metal with my fiery powers before. The first time just a pop can, sure, but I’d also wrenched through the bars of cages in one of the Company’s facilities.

Even those bars had been significantly thinner than the links on this