I hated relying on other people. I wanted to fight. I wanted to do something, anything. But if I had to rely on the witches, I would. I would do anything. Almost anything.
Maybe I would regret not giving Cosette to Helen so that I could get Tessa back, but I couldn’t do it.
“Helen did this, and she didn’t do it alone. If I picked up on that, Van did, too,” Michael said. “He must’ve gone back to looking for answers inside the courts. Once he knows, that will help, too. A lot.”
It wasn’t enough. I wanted to be thankful for his help, but I wasn’t doing anything. “And if the witches can’t remove the magic from my bond? If Van can’t find who took her? What then?” I hated that I was dealing in ifs, but I needed to know what we’d do. How we’d keep going if we kept coming up against dead ends.
“You can’t give up yet,” Meredith said. “You’re acting like Tessa isn’t strong. Like she hasn’t done impossible things. Things that no one should’ve been capable of. Tessa saved me. She fought for me. When she was new to magic and new to being a werewolf and didn’t even know what the hell she was doing. She fought, and she won. And now, she’s so much stronger than she was. She’s so much better. And I know she’s out there, staying strong so that we can fight for her now. It’s our turn to save her, and we won’t let her down.”
I stared off into the distance again. I knew that. I did. But I was a man who’d always been asked to take action, to step up, to lead. Now I was supposed to wait? To take care of Axel? To hope someone would give me information? That…that wasn’t enough.
“We’ll find her,” Meredith said. “It’s only a matter of time. Don’t lose faith yet. It’s only been five days and—”
“Five?” It’d only been four when we went to court. We’d lost time.
Fils de pute.
We’d lost time we didn’t have.
“Five days.” Meredith waved us forward. “Come back to the castle. Eat. We’ll call Claudia and figure out who to go to first. We’ll keep doing all the things we can think of. We won’t stop until we find her. Okay?”
I dropped my chin to my chest and closed my eyes, trying to feel for a bond that wasn’t there.
All I found was emptiness.
A ghost where my mate should’ve been.
Searing pain where her soul had been severed from mine.
I was trying not to lose faith, but it’d been nearly a week, and we had nothing.
I was trying to stay strong, but if I didn’t find something—some clue of where she might be—I wasn’t sure how much longer I’d last.
Chapter Seven
DASTIEN
Thirteen Days, Fourteen Hours Missing
* * *
There was a little hope, but a lot of fear as I walked up the rickety steps to Samantha’s apartment with Michael just behind me. We’d picked up Axel from Chris and Cosette’s sanctuary when we got back from Ireland. We took him with us as we started looking for a witch to help us, but ended up leaving him with Lucas and Claudia last week. His control wasn’t good enough to be around so many humans. The travel was wearing him out, and we couldn’t focus on what we needed to do if we were constantly focusing on his control, his hunger, and his reactions to every dead end we hit. I felt a little guilty leaving him behind, but I was having enough trouble maintaining my own control to deal with his.
It’d been two weeks since Tessa had been taken. Two weeks of dead ends and no answers and failing at every fucking turn until I wasn’t sure what hope I had left to cling to. There was so little of it left. This was my last shot, and I was terrified of what would happen if Samantha couldn’t help me.
Over the last eight days, we’d traveled from coven to coven, meeting with all kinds of witches. Those who specialized in voodoo. Others in brujaria. Gypsies. Psychics. A couple mediums, because why the hell not? And one palmist who told me I’d find her, but that I would have to prove my love to get her back.
Okay. Fine. Tell me who I needed to prove it to, and I’d do it. I’d make them believe I loved Tessa with every atom in my body, every ounce of my soul, every beat of my heart.
But nothing we did was working. And with every dead end we hit, the hope that I’d see her again faded just a little bit more.
Our fey friends were still searching for who took her, but they hadn’t gotten anywhere either. The more time that passed, the weaker the trail would get until I wasn’t sure we’d find her. Maybe not ever.
And what would I do then?
How would I keep going?
I couldn’t even listen to music anymore. I would hear something that I knew she loved, and then it would hit me that she wasn’t there. She might never hear it again. Ever.