Chapter 10

TEN

COLLINS

“You were taking too long, per usual, so she sent me. Again.” The pink-haired woman put her hands on her hips. “Let’s go.”

I didn’t like this at all. This woman had single-handedly blown up the casino. In the moment, I’d been convinced there was a logical explanation, but I no longer felt that way. This was otherworldly. This was foreign. There was no other way to explain what I saw. Randy would never have stripped naked in public.

Or I had officially lost my damn mind.

And now she was here, outside the police station, and talking to him. They knew each other, and that sent my thoughts spiraling. The guy stomped away from us with his hands balled into fists. His pale-blue hair swayed in the breeze. Tallulah gripped my wrist and tugged. I peeked up and met her wild gaze. She nodded her head to the left and arched both eyebrows pointedly.

I frowned and leaned back to look around her—my eyes widened. A single police car was idling at the curb with a window open. Tallulah nodded. My stomach turned. She wanted to steal a police car. That was beyond illegal. The repercussions of that were bad, and it wouldn’t help us look innocent of Lilian’s schemes.

Mr. Moonstone was half-turned toward us. His pale eyes were wild. The energy rolling off him was like a thunderstorm.

I looked back to Tallulah and nodded. My gut told me to get out of there fast. At the same time, we took a step to the left and then paused. Then we took another and another. We paused for a split second on each step, but we weren’t moving fast enough.

The woman with pink hair cackled. Her cheeks flushed the same color as her hair, and those eyes were menacing. “What, cat got your tongue?”

He snarled and the air around him crackled and popped.

I turned to Tallulah. “Run.”

We sprinted as fast as we could toward the getaway car. We were close enough to smell the fumes from the exhaust pipe and hear the CB radio inside. I dug my heels in and pushed my legs to move faster, farther. The little kitten stilettos sent sharp pain shooting up my legs with each step. My pulse jackhammered. My chest was tight from lack of oxygen, but we had to get to that car.

There was a flash of pink and then she appeared out of nowhere right in front of us.

NO!

Tallulah and I gripped each other and slid to a stop a few feet in front of her. She put her hands on her hips and arched one pink eyebrow. Her nostrils flared. Pale-pink wings popped out from her back and flapped in the breeze. I gasped and my heart stopped.

“ WINGS, ” Tallulah hissed.

“ Bastien. ” She tossed her pink hair over her shoulder and snarled. “Lose the spare.”

Bastien? What’s bastien? I looked over my shoulder just as Mr. Moonstone flicked his wrist in our direction. I braced myself for—I didn’t know what—but nothing happened.

And then Tallulah screamed, and my blood turned cold.

She was right next to me, yet her eyes were wild and panicked. “I can’t see! I can’t see! Collins?! Collins! ”

“I’m here, I’m here,” I shouted, shaking her, but she didn’t seem to feel it. “Tally! What’d you do to her? Let her go!”

“No.”

The woman grabbed me by my elbows and lifted me into the air with her as the world exploded beneath us. The ground screeched and broke apart like an earthquake, creating massive cliffs and ledges. Dirt, stone, and cement burst to rubble and dust. Each and every palm tree in sight snapped in half and toppled over.

All of the oxygen was sucked right out of my lungs. I tried to scream, but nothing came out. Cold air rushed by my face. Pink hair whipped around and tangled with my long brown strands. Her pale-pink wings fluttered as we shot straight up. I looked down and the ground was getting farther away by the second.

Down below, Tallulah spun in circles, still screaming my name. She tripped and crashed to the rubble. NO! NO, no, no! Tally! A roar like a lion’s ripped up my throat. I couldn’t leave her. I had to get to her. I screamed and swatted at the woman. Her pink hair coiled around my fingers. She had my arms pinned down to my elbows. Panic bubbled up my throat. I had to try something. Anything.

I reached up and shoved my hands into her chest with every ounce of strength I had. “STOP!”

The woman froze instantly. She gasped. Her eyes widened.

“LET ME GO!”

Her fingers released their grip on me, and I dropped into a freefall. Cold air rushed up from under me as I plummeted to the ground. I looked down and my heart stopped. The ground was like a hundred feet below. I flailed my arms, but it did nothing, I was only gaining speed. I screamed.

A wave of spicy vanilla scent wrapped around me and then two big arms plucked me right out of the sky. It was him. Mr. Moonstone caught me and held me steady. Pale-blue hair smacked me in the face, but I was so relieved I dove for his chest. I suddenly wanted him to hold me, to hang on to me and never let go. I wanted to bury my face in his chest and stay there. My fingers trembled as I grabbed his shirt and dragged myself into him. Over his shoulder, the pink-haired woman dove for us with a nasty gleam in her pink eyes.

My fingertips grazed the edges of his crystal necklaces and those warm and fuzzy feelings vanished. A wild burst of wind erupted out from between me and him, then slammed into the pink-haired woman and sent her flying backwards. The pulsing energy of the stones brought my panic back tenfold.

Mr. Moonstone looked down and our eyes met. He frowned and cocked his head to the side. The space between his eyebrows creased and it sent my pulse into a tailspin. His face was so angular. I hadn’t noticed the slope of his jaw and cheekbones before or just how sharp the corners of his eyes were. A few hours ago, I might’ve enjoyed being this close to him, but not when I was hovering a hundred feet in the air and being kidnapped. Nope, nope, nope. This is bad.

“Let me go! ” I shoved my hands into his chest, and everything went black. I gasped.

His grip on me tightened so hard I was definitely going to have bruises.

And then it hit me. He was doing that darkness thing. I couldn’t see a damn thing, one second I could see the next I was blind. But I wasn’t about to lie down and let them take me.

“Put. Me. DOWN!”

Thin, cold fingers wrapped around my bicep. “She’s touching your stone! Get her off of you!”the woman snarled.

Touching his stone? I yanked my hands off him and my vision came back with a flash. These two gorgeous, terrifying creatures had me in their grips and were pulling on me like I was the rope in tug-o-war. He snarled and growled at her.

She pulled on my arm, and it seemed to take her entire body to move me. “You had your chance, Bastien. Too slow.”

He barely moved his wrists, and I flew back into his chest. I bounced back and forth between them. I felt like that dangling bag of chips stuck in a vending machine someone was trying to shake free. My vision wobbled. My arms burned and my head throbbed.

I threw my hands out and screamed, “STOP!”

They both gasped and froze. The muscles in their arms tensed. Their fingers uncurled from around my arms, and I plummeted in a nosedive. I screamed. Cold wind rushed up my body, sending my hair straight up over my head. I looked down. My heart stopped. The earth was broken into uneven, ragged cliffs. Tallulah was on all fours, clinging to the ground.

This was it. This was how I died.

Unless . . .

I threw my arms up. “CATCH ME!”

These people were my enemy. They were trying to kidnap me. I didn’t want that to happen, but I couldn’t let myself die right here and now. Desperate times, desperate measures. Mr. Moonstone, or Bastien as the woman called him, shook himself and blinked—then growled. He dove for me, his long arms covering the distance between us faster than he should’ve been capable of moving. Please, hurry! I arched my back and strained, stretching my fingers up to him. The woman was right behind him. Both of their pale-colored wings tucked behind them as they dove like giant birds.

Our fingers touched and then a massive, dark object dropped out of the black sky right above us. I choked on a scream. It was a giant eagle with wings that spanned like twenty-five feet wide. Its feathers were the same color as the night sky, blending seamlessly with the darkness until it was too late. Its head and claws were a bright, golden-yellow. It screeched, and shivers went down my spine.

Bastien and the woman frowned at my expression, then glanced above them to follow my stare—and did a double take. Bastien’s already pale face turned snow-white. The woman cursed violently and pulled a dagger from inside Bastien’s boot. But she was too slow. The eagle swooped down and gripped each of them in one of its big, golden claws, its talons coiling tight around their bodies. It flapped its massive midnight-colored wings and shot straight up with them, leaving me in a freefall.

“NO! HELP M?—”

A flash of white erupted from off to the left. It shot like a comet, moving straight for me with blinding speed. Everything was happening so fast. One second I was plummeting to my death, the next a gold wing half the size of the eagle’s spread wide. All these wings flapping sent new gusts of wind at me and made my hair fly into my face. I couldn’t see exactly what was coming at me. But then two thin, warm arms wrapped around my waist. Those gold wings tucked in, closing us in a cocoon of gold feathers. I was flipped over and upside down, then spinning in tight spirals.

All of a sudden, the wind stopped, and my feet gently touched solid ground. The gold wings opened wide and the pressure on my waist vanished. I wobbled and stumbled a few feet, my vision spinning. I groaned and was trying to catch myself when warm, soft hands caught mine.

I know those hands.

I’d know those anywhere.

I gasped and looked up, peeling my hair out of my face in a rush only to find exactly the right person I wanted to see in this moment. Tears burned my eyes. “ MOM? ”

“Don’t move.” She winked and then shot back into the sky with her gold wings.

“COLLINS!” Tallulah screamed behind me. “I can hear you! I can’t see!”

Mom told me not to move but over my damn body was I leaving Tallulah stranded in the dark for one second longer. I cursed and sprinted to her, then sank to my knees. When my hands touched her shoulders, she flinched.

“It’s me, it’s me!”

She sighed and leaned into me. “Don’t let go of me.”

I wrapped my arms around her shoulders. “I’m not moving.”

“What’s happening?”

I opened my mouth, then shut it. What IS happening? I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My mother, the woman who’d adopted me as an infant when she was barely more than a child herself, now flew above the ground with gold angel-like wings. The eagle screeched and released Bastien and the woman, and I saw his talons were bloodied and raw. They dropped a few feet before their wings caught the wind and then they dove back for the eagle with daggers drawn.

Mom tackled the woman like a linebacker. She flipped the woman over her shoulder and threw her like a Hail Mary touchdown pass. The woman screamed and charged back for her just as the eagle swatted Bastien with its wing. He grunted and then slammed right into the woman. Her pink hair billowed around them.

Mom flew up next to the eagle and stopped with a sword in each hand. She chuckled deep in her throat. “Your tricks won’t work on us. Leave.”

The woman snarled, then grabbed Bastien by the shirt—and vanished.

Just like that, they both were gone.

Tallulah gasped and swatted at herself. “Oh God. It’s back. I can see. I can see — WHAT THE F ?—”

“Breathe, girls.” Mom landed effortlessly right in front of us. She was dressed in silver body armor that glistened in the moonlight. She rolled her shoulders and her gold wings flapped. I noticed the tip of each feather was turquoise. She smiled warmly and held both hands up. “Just breathe.”

That massive eagle that had to be fifteen feet tall landed with a thud behind Mom. It shook itself and flapped its dark-gray feathers. Soft green light flashed around him. When it faded, the eagle was gone . . . leaving a red-haired man with emerald-green eyes and matching red freckles.

“ PHILIP? ” Tallulah and I screamed in unison.

He nodded and looked us up and down. “You two okay?”

“OKAY?!” I shrieked and threw my arms around me. “IN WHAT WORLD WOULD I BE OKAY RIGHT NOW? PHILIP? MOTHER?”

“Was my brother just an eagle?” Tallulah groaned and bent over. “I’m gonna be sick.”

My mother sighed and looked at her watch. “We have to get to the portal now or we’ll never make it. I’ll take the girls. Vic’s there already. You handle the cops and meet us.”