25. Patten

Iwait until a door snicks shut on the floor above, and then I barge past Shep so I can punch Dominik in the face.

“Don’t do it,” Shep grips my arm and hauls me back.

“What part of try to apologize to Jade did you miss on your way to making her look like she wanted to cry?” Shep growls as he prowls toward Dominik.

If Shep wants to do the punching, I’ll leave him to it. “I’ll check on Jade.”

Shep stalks toward Dominik. “Give her a minute to work herself out, Patten.” He keeps going until he’s nose to nose with Dominik. “You keep hurting her and it is getting increasingly difficult not to kill you.”

Isaiah closes the back door and looks from Shep to me. He tips his head as if to ask, ‘should we be worried?’

Maybe we should.

Shep is steady. The calm one. The mediator.

He isn’t calm now.

So yes. We should be worried.

Gold fur sweeps over his arms and the backs of his hands. I’m not sure he’s even aware of the fact he’s making growling rumbling sounds.

“I wasn’t trying to make her cry,” Dominik snaps.

“Then what the fuck were you trying to do?” Shep snarls.

If he wants to kill Dominik, that’s fine with me. But Dominik doesn’t strike me as someone who will go down without a fight. I move closer to watch Shep’s back.

“I don’t know,” Dominik snarls back. “I don’t know how to talk to her.”

Shep doesn’t say a word. Isaiah’s eyes are bouncing between Shep and Dominik. Mine are doing the same.

“It wasn’t malicious.” Shep sounds considerably calmer than before.

Dominik shakes his head, frustrated. “I say the wrong thing. Every time I open my mouth, I say the wrong damn thing.”

If I didn’t hate the guy, I would probably feel sorry for him.

But I don’t.

“Have you tried maybe not saying anything at all?” I suggest, raising my eyebrow.

Dominik’s green eyes flare flame yellow.

“Yes,” I say dryly. “Set me on fire. Jade isn’t quite upset enough. Shep, she needs one of us.”

“She’s okay,” Isaiah says.

I look at him. “You sound pretty sure about that.”

“I am.” Isaiah’s smile is faint. “She’s standing up for herself. Considering the first time she met us she bit me and crawled between your legs, I’d say that was a big deal. Let her figure out the next step on her own.”

“What do you mean, she bit you?” Dominik’s lips flatten.

“None of your damn business. You weren’t lying, were you?” I cross over to the kitchen, wishing there was a beer in the refrigerator. “You do say the wrong thing.”

Isaiah is right.

Back in Chicago, Jade wouldn’t have stood her ground like that, and I’m proud of her. It took me far too long to stand up to my da. And in the end, I never really did. I packed up a bag, and I left London for the States.

Dominik messed up, and Jade is not letting him off the hook for it.

Jade is upstairs and we’re all downstairs, which has opened up an opportunity for us to talk. Given what I know of my da, it’s only a matter of time before he makes his move, and I know exactly what he intends to do.

“My da is going to grab Jade,” I say.

Shep observes me for a beat, thinking. The gold fur disappears from his arms as he steps away from Dominik, his anger burned out. “I thought the same. It’s the only reason he’s held off on telling Atticus where we are.”

“And the reason we can’t find him and tear his head from his body?” Dominik asks.

“He’s good at dodging the consequences of his actions,” I say. “Trouble finds him and it slips right by him.”

By silent agreement, we migrate to the kitchen island. We stand around it, facing each other. Me and Shep on one side, Dominik and Isaiah on the other.

“He could be with Atticus?” Isaiah suggests.

I shake my head. “Doubt it. Da will have arranged some kind of deal with Atticus. He’ll have promised to grab Jade for him. Before handing her over, he’ll feed on her. Jade isn’t powerless now, her blue ribbon friend as shown him what she’s capable of, so he has to be even more manipulative.”

“Since Atticus is doing such a good job of hiding himself in this town, and your father is working with him, we could track him right to Atticus,” Dominik says.

“But that would involve handing him Jade.” I glare.

“It might involve letting him think he had Jade,” Dominik quietly corrects me. “Jade will never be safe unless they’re dead. The sooner we do that, the better.”

So occasionally he knows how to say the right thing.

Keeping Jade safe is the important thing here.

“Have you thought of going after Atticus yourself?” I ask Dominik. “You know, taking one for the team?”

“Patten…” Shep rumbles warningly.

“What? It was worth a shot.” That’s another thing. Jade wants nothing to do with Dominik, but he’s still sticking around, showing no signs of going anywhere.

Will he eventually win her over or will he get frustrated enough that he kidnaps her again?

Dominik observes me for a beat. “I considered it.”

“And?” I prompt, hiding my surprise.

“I underestimated Atticus before. I don’t intend to do it again,” Dominik says.

“So we use your father to get to him?” Isaiah asks me.

My brain works through how we can use my da’s greed against him, and he is greedy.

How to do it in a way that doesn’t put Jade at risk?

“It sounds like she’d be playing bait.” Shep’s brows knit together. “I’m not sure I agree with that.”

“So we make Almeth think he’s won,” Isaiah says.

We all look at him.

“And how do we do that?” I ask.

Isaiah smiles. “I’m sure an opportunity will present itself.”

“If one doesn’t?” Dominik asks.

“Then we create one,” is Isaiah’s vague response.

I study him. “You have an idea.”

He lifts one shoulder in a half-shrug. “Not yet.”

My focus shifts to Shep. “Leaving might give us more options. Unless we have to worry about Atticus ramming our car off the road.”

He did it before, which is how he’d gotten Jade in the first place. There’s no reason to think he won’t try it again.

“You have a dead witch’s soul clinging to you,” Shep says.

I stare at him. “What now?”

“You have a?—”

“Yeah, I heard you,” I say. “I just didn’t understand why you would say something so crazy.”

“It’s not crazy. Meliah saw it. It’s why the female cop from the highway ran away from you and she showed no reaction to us.”

I walk over to the mirror hanging beside the front door and make myself cross-eyed staring at my reflection.

“What are you doing?” Shep calls out.

“Looking for it.”

“It’s not something you can see.” Shep sighs. “Trust me, I’ve tried it.”

I ignore him in favor of staring at my reflection.

Same dark blue eyes, maybe a little red from not enough sleep these last couple of days. Same dark hair that is looking like I’ve been doing nothing but raking my hand through it. Didn’t think to pack a brush before we left Chicago to come after Jade.

I take in my stubbled chin. And I could do with a shave. Again, a razor wasn’t high on my priorities when packing.

But there’s no dead witch soul clinging to me, no matter which direction I angle my head.

“Meliah says she can do a purification spell to?—”

I swing away from the mirror, stalking back to the kitchen island. “No. Fucking. Way. Is a witch coming at me with a spell. No fucking chance.”

Shep studies me, his expression serious. “It’s dangerous, Patten. She said the longer we don’t do something about it, the more damage it can do to you. Staying means getting her to fix you up. I don’t know if she’s willing to come to Chicago, and I don’t know that we can find another witch who can do the spell when we’re back there.”

“Just witchy mumbo jumbo. She was probably talking out of her ass. The focus is on Jade, and it’s keeping her alive. Not me.”

“What’s wrong with you?” Jade asks.

She’s halfway down the stairs, no longer looking close to tears, and I didn’t hear a fucking thing.

I aim a grin at her. “Nothing is wrong with me.”