24
Dante
Seven slams the door to my wrecked sports car shut so hard that the windows that managed to survive the crash shatter.
“Shit. Where the hell is he?” Seven roars, kicking a tire as he walks back to the road. “What was he thinking?”
I sigh, looking around the trees.
“I don’t know,” I answer without really thinking, lifting my nose to the air. “He’s long gone though. My best guess is he’s gone back to the city.”
Seven storms over to his motorcycle parked by the side of the road, wiping the back of a hand over his face and inadvertently smearing more soot across his face.
“You coming or what?” he growls.
“Yes, just a moment.”
I lean in through the broken passenger window and grab my keys off the floor ignition before slipping them in my pocket. Turning back toward Seven, I settle on the back of the motorcycle.
He revs the engine and we pull onto the road, only to see Luci’s SUV flipped over on the side of the road a few seconds later.
“Pull over.” I hop off the motorcycle and run over to the driver’s side. “Bloody hell.”
That doesn’t even begin to describe how the inside of the car looks, coated in Evi’s dried blood.
“The door’s been ripped off too,” Seven comments, and I notice it for the first time. “What do you think happened?”
“I don’t know. Look for the door,” I say, leaning into the car to look for any possible clues.
Seven stomps off without arguing which is a pleasant change of pace, but I suppose he knows this is partially his fault.
I’d been furious when he came back for me, and I’d learned that he’d sent Evi off on her. Of course, I doubt I would have made it out of the fire in one piece without him after the tunnel out collapsed, but still, he should have obeyed orders.
There’s too much blood all over everything, I can’t scent anything else in all this mess … and if Luci took her, his scent is long gone too.
“Found the door!”
I straighten and follow Seven’s voice deeper into the woods where the door is lodged in a tree.
There are hand marks imprinted in the frame. So, it was torn and thrown.
“At least we know a vampire did it,” I sigh.
“Do you think Luci’s the one who found her?”
“If he did, why didn’t he bring her back to us?”
“Maybe he thought we weren’t going to make it out after she escaped without us?”
“Hmm.”
I mull this over in my mind as I scan the forest, not entirely convinced that Luci didn’t just drag her off into it and drain her of what little blood she had left.
“Where are you going?” Seven asks as I turn back toward the road.
“We need to get back to the city, now.”
“You think that’s where he went?”