Total pages in book: 138
Estimated words: 131708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 659(@200wpm)___ 527(@250wpm)___ 439(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 131708 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 659(@200wpm)___ 527(@250wpm)___ 439(@300wpm)
“I don’t know where the smell of acid is coming from, but it’s making my nose tingle.” Ella wasn’t crazy about the scents of sulphur and brimstone either.
“I think it’s coming from whatever the Black Saints are conjuring.”
Noticing that three strix were hightailing it across the field, Ella narrowed her eyes. Apparently, some had decided they were fighting a lost cause. Good decision. That didn’t mean she’d let them leave alive.
But before she had the chance to cut their run short, they bounced off something she couldn’t see. A containment forcefield, maybe? She wasn’t sure. Whatever it was, the strix battered at it with fists.
Chanting, Ella slammed them with heavy gusts of magick that punched their backs hard enough to knock them down. Before they could fully rise, she hurled a loop of magick that curled around each of their necks and contracted tightly, cutting off their air supply.
Another tried running. She did the same to it.
Another made the same attempt, and it met the same fate.
A strix sped toward her car with an enraged hiss, its eyes boring into hers. She launched a blast of magick square in its face, causing its head to wrench back. Before she could act again, an ultraviolet blast sliced through it.
She whipped her gaze to her far left. Viper was looking at her, his breaths coming a little heavy … and she saw that the battle was over. No strix remained, no others were attempting to flee. All the fallen angels appeared fine and were slipping their jackets back on.
“You okay, Mia?”
A relieved sigh. “Yeah. Just wondering something, though.”
“What?”
“Well, the strix somehow sent Ghost tumbling over your car and onto the road, didn’t they? How did they manage to see him when they call him Ghost for a reason.”
Considering he’d once claimed to Ella that people only saw him if he wanted them to see him … “I really have no idea.”
Ghost tipped his chin toward a stretch of grassland. “They were waiting out there to swarm me, V. My cloak dropped for just a few seconds, and then they were on me. For them to wait here, they know my routine. They’ve been watching me—probably all of us.”
Just as Viper had suspected. “There are two things I don’t get. How they could know your routine when your presence is cloaked, and how the hell they could make that cloak drop.”
Ghost shrugged. “Beats me. I’d like to know the answers as well.”
Viper crossed to Ella’s car just as she and her sister hopped out of it. Pulling his woman close, he searched her from head to toe. “Were you bitten?”
“No, the strix never got that close to me. I’m okay, just a few minor wounds.”
“I’ll never consider any injury you suffer ‘minor’.” Viper pressed his palm to hers and then pushed healing energy into her.
Her eyes widened. “Oh. You kept that nifty ability quiet.” She looked at Mia, who was receiving the same aid from Dice.
Satisfied she was fully healed, Viper caught Ella by her nape. “I know it’s not who you are, but I can still wish you’d stayed in the damn car.”
“Technically, I did.”
He felt his nostrils flare. “Not with every possible entry and exit closed.”
“As you said, that’s not who I am.”
“It should be totaled,” said Rivet, eyeing the vehicle.
Ella shrugged. “A little magickal protection goes a long way.”
“Was it my imagination, or did your car actually zap a strix?” asked Blackjack.
“I’d set the trap for my note-writer, but the strix suffered for it.” Her attention drifted to the two dead bodyguards, and her eyes dulled. “They were killed so fast I didn’t have a chance to do anything to stop it.”
Picking up on the guilt lacing her voice, Viper gave her a pointed look. “The strix are to blame, not you.”
“My words, your mouth,” Mia said to him before then turning to Ghost. “I’m guessing the strix barreled into you out of nowhere, since you went hurtling through the air.”
He stiffly inclined his head. “They did.”
“I never see you,” said Ella. “I catch glimpses of your brothers in the distance sometimes, but never you. How did they?”
“I can cloak my presence, which is why I can stick close to you without being seen,” Ghost replied. “For just a few seconds, the cloak dropped.”
Ella frowned. “But … how could they have made it drop when they couldn’t see you?”
“They must have guessed I was here when they saw your car. They somehow know I watch over you and that you use this route. They were prepared for an ambush.” Ghost absently rubbed at dried blood on his jaw. “Don’t know how they lowered my cloak, though.”
“Maybe they didn’t,” said Dice. “Maybe a celestial is working with them. They hate hell-born demons, yeah, but the Uppers are desperate to take Viper down. They could have decided to make an exception.”