“Why are you making excuses for him? He. Fucking. Drugged. Her.” I was going to lose my shit any second.
“Innocent until proven guilty, right? We can’t immediately assume the worst. He’s her mate. He’s hardwired to protect her. Besides, if the situation was reversed, I’d at least hope one of you would try to understand my side. We’re a family. We owe it to him.”
I snarled at him. “You keep using the word family to explain away what’s right in front of you. Have you already forgotten that your devotion to yourfamilyis the reason she left in the first place? Here. Let me make it easier for you.” Without another word, I sprinted back the way I’d come, grabbed the syringe, and returned. I shoved the glass and steel in his face. “Explain this. Ignore this, you naive fucking prince.”
His nostrils flared as he scented everything I’d already discovered. It was a lot harder to ignore the truth when it was in your damn nose.
“Would you drug her to get her to do what you wanted?” Alek asked Thorne.
He shut down, not answering, and then I realized the truth.
“Oh, my God. You would.”
“If it meant saving her, yes. If I had to, I’d lock her away until she was out of danger.”
“What medieval bullshit logic is this? You don’t bully someone into doing what you want,” I shouted.
“Don’t you?” he asked coldly. “Isn’t that exactly what you spent the last seven years trying to do?”
“Tell me when I fucking drugged her, motherfucker.”
“Okay, stop,” Alek said, moving between us. “We don’t know what happened. The only one who can tell us is Caleb. So let’s ask him before jumping to any more conclusions. Who has his number?”
We looked at each other blankly, each of us shrugging. I sighed heavily. “Are you fucking kidding me? No one knows how to contact the priest?” We were a regular bunch of Boy Scouts. Always prepared, except when it counted. “We need to start a goddamned phone tree.”
Moira moved out of the shadows, her eyes solemn but lips tilted up in amusement. “You really are a useless bunch of swinging man meat, aren’t you?” She sighed dramatically. “Leave it to the witch to have to come to your rescue.Again.”
“Youhave his number?” Thorne asked, eyebrows raised incredulously.
“Pfft. I don’t have anything to confess. Why would I have his number? ”
Alek crossed his arms. “So how do you propose to help us?”
It was her turn to look annoyed. “It must be hard having so little blood flowing to your brain all the time. Are you prone to fainting spells? Do you keep smelling salts in your purse?” Before he could answer, she gave a little huff. “If I can manage to find your ass across a different realm, I think I can do a basic locator spell. Easy peasy.”
“Well, what the bloody hell are you waiting for? An invitation? Why are you just mentioning this now?”
Her gaze narrowed on Thorne’s. “Jesus, do I have to do everything? I didn’t think she’d have gotten that far on foot, and we didn’t know the priest up and left until a couple minutes ago.” She pulled a rosary out of her pocket. “Give a witch some credit.”
“You stole his rosary?” Thorne’s voice was filled with a strange sort of pride.
“He left it behind. I guess now that he’s gone heathen, it doesn’t really help.”
“He went heathen a long time ago. Trust me. I saw it.” I shuddered at the memory of the look in his eyes when he found me taking my mate during her heat. That was the first time I’d seen him stripped of the thin veneer of control and civility he hid behind. We just hadn’t realized the truth yet. The priest was the biggest monster of us all.
Moira plopped herself right in the middle of the empty space, her eyes closing as she held the jet beads, the heavy silver crucifix swaying a little as she began murmuring. Then she frowned, her lips forming a pout I would’ve called cute if she wasn’t holding Sunday’s fate in her hands.
“I can’t find him.”
“What do you mean? He’s not fucking dead. Find him, witch.” I all but growled the words.
“He... oh, fuck.” She blinked wide eyes at me, then looked at each of the others. “He’s got to be with her.”
“Tell me something I don’t already know.”
She bit her lip, giving me an apologetic glance. “The spell. It’s cloaking him too.”
“Well then, undo it.”