Chapter 61

61

MINA

I felt like I'd taken the world's longest sneeze—and I was still in the hallway—only the light coming in through the windows outside said it was dawn.

"What...the fuck," I said, coming back into myself and looking around.

"You're up!" a woman squealed—it was the same blonde girl I'd met the night before, she was sitting on a desk and clapping her hands.

"Sylas?" I asked, whipping my head back and forth. "Where's Sylas?"

"Your mate had to leave you," said a different voice, this time mechanical, from the room's ceiling, where the Arachnaea was tucked into a corner. "Royce explained what happened to us, after he left. Your mate froze time for you. He needed to complete a task."

"Which was?" I asked—but I was afraid I already knew. I ripped up the sleeve of my shirt, and sure enough, the sand inside my hourglass mark had stopped moving. Our fates were no longer intertwined. "Where did he go?" I demanded, storming up to the girl .

She was fearless though, and she held up her hands and shrugged. "We were frozen too. He only talked to my dad."

I looked around. "Where is he?"

She leaned back and hit a button on the phone behind her. "She's up now!" she crowed into the intercom.

"I'm coming!" her father announced.

"Here's your purse," Sirena said, offering it over to me. "Nice gun."

The elevator door opened shortly thereafter. "We'll be starting a twenty-four-seven security detail on you at once," Royce began the second after spotting me, while gesturing for me to follow him back into the reception room—which was the last place I'd seen Sylas.

What had happened right before I'd been frozen?

I'd had a sense of déjà vu, I'd called him on it, and then?—

"I don't think she's listening to you, Daddy," Sirena said.

"He didn't want to kill me," I said out loud.

"And that is surprisingly admirable of him," Royce said, giving me a tense, all-business smile.

"No—it means he went off and did something stupid. By himself."

"He's practically an elemental being. He only does what he wants. So wherever he is now is where he wants to be," Royce said calmly, trying to pat down my rising emotions.

I put my head in my hands. I never should've brought anything up at the restaurant. I would've talked about dying a thousand times over, if it hadn't meant that he'd leave me a second earlier than he had to...to go...where?

To try to make a deal for my life, with the only other people who might know how to help him stop himself.

The remnants of the Rho Rho Phi.

"Fuck!" I shouted, loud enough for it to echo.