to fight for me.
I could do this. Be brave. I wanted to be, but I dared the strongest people to face certain death without some kind of regret. I bowed my head as tears welled.
“That’s no good. She’s like a fucking martyr,” muttered Helena. She stood beside Orville, her red hair peeking from the hood.
“She won’t be feeling sorry for herself for long. Bring him out,” snapped Darryl.
The crowd shifted, and someone was carried over, the hood over their head covering their face, their limbs bound in chains.
My heart stopped.
I knew even before they dropped him by my feet. I fell to my knees. “Kane?”
The person jerked and yanked their wrists hard enough to snap the chains. The hood came off, and a bruised Kane stared at me.
Number eleven.
“Ah fuck, sweetheart.” Such reassuring words to match his bleak expression.
Boom.
Like a thunderclap, the noise drew attention so that in the quiet that followed I clearly heard Darryl say, “Dearly beloved, and most hated enemies, we are gathered here today to finally put an end to our curse. To regain our magic. Today, the Orgh’kks rise again.”
Combine that speech with the dagger in Darryl’s hand? Today Naomi dies.
30
Knowing the demon-possessed wanted me dead, I expected something gruesome. A horrible, horrible death.
Panic hit me.
“Kane.” For a teeny, tiny second when he held me close, I thought things might turn out all right.
It didn’t last. Kane turned from me and held out his hand.
Darryl slapped the dagger into it. “You know what to do.”
Kane was going to kill me? Every single person watching us was hoping for a soap opera ending.
“Kane?”
He wouldn’t meet my gaze.
“Coward.” I couldn’t help but say it. To feel angry. I held my ground as he moved to stand in front of me. Bruised. Obviously in pain. Some of the injuries fresh.
He stared at me then the dagger, his hand flexing on the hilt.
I had to ask. “Why sleep with me if the plan was always to kill me?”
“Because emotion unlocks deeper magic.”
And what deeper than the betrayal of a lover. A lover who hesitated to murder me.
“Who tortured you?” I asked on impulse because the car crash had happened a month ago. The bruise on his jaw wasn’t that old.
“Do you really have to ask? This moment has been centuries in the making.” He lifted his gaze to the sky, to the planets almost in perfect alignment. “I showed weakness and was reminded of my duty.”
“Weakness how?
“Because I wanted to find another way. A way that didn’t kill you.” He ignored the hiss from those eavesdropping.
“You wanted me alive. Why?” Why was I torturing myself asking these questions? It didn’t matter now.
“Because I fell in love with you,” he said softly.
My knees wobbled.
Full emotional impact achieved.
“Oh. Kane.” I whispered his name just as the star and planets shifted into their rarely seen place. The moon beamed, bathing me with cold. So cold, and yet when I cupped his cheek, heat filled me. “You have a weird way of showing your love.”
“It wasn’t supposed to be me. But then that night…I couldn’t resist you.” His expression turned bleak.
I didn’t need to ask whose spot Kane had taken. Darryl thought he’d be the one to kill me. Now it had to be Kane. Given the choice, I’d rather have my lover do it. Let him bear the guilt.
Seriously. What was wrong with the people who loved me? Did no one want to save me?
Fine.
I’d save myself.
I screamed to the sky, an incoherent rambling that fed the eagerness of the crowd.
“Calm down.” Trish, my former best friend, now wearing a demon spirit with not only pointed ears but fanged teeth, thought she could dispense advice. “Do you want the legends to remember you died a screaming coward?”
“Open the gate.”
“Yeah. Open it.”
The dual yells drew my attention to a sigil on the ground. How had I not noticed it before? It was huge and intricate. A whorl that circled the hole in the ice. A complicated spell waiting to be activated. Waiting for my death.
“Can I have one last request?”
“Hurry it up, the moon is almost in position,” Darryl snapped.
“What?” Kane asked, knowing I spoke to him.
“Kiss me hard so I don’t feel the blade going in.”
He recoiled from my words. He didn’t fake the pain in his eyes. Then he grabbed me close, pressing his mouth to mine.
But I’d lied. I didn’t want a kiss. I whispered, “I wish you’d loved me enough.”
His murmured reply, “Who says I don’t? I won’t kill