Chapter Eighteen

Leaving my home was harder than I expected. It felt more permanent than it should have. I found myself looking around the place to commit things to memory. It was ridiculous. I'd be back. I had to come back. Even if, by some miracle, I decided to move in with the Hounds for good, I'd have to come back for my stuff. And to water the plants.

I packed several bags, including Binx's food, dishes, bed, and toys, but most of my belongings were staying behind. This was my home. I had poured love into it. I'd be back. And yet, I felt tears well in my eyes as I locked the front door.

Binx cried in his carrier.

“It's only temporary,” I said to him. To both of us.

His eyes called me a liar.

I turned to look toward the Host house, wondering if Silas and Michael were still there. Maybe they had their minions lurking around the edges of my property just in case my ward faltered. I was certain Silas had pulled his baptismal routine on all of them by then. Which meant there was no saving them. I don't know why I cared. They wanted to kill me. But I knew it was because of Silas and Michael. They'd been tricked, and they would pay for it. In this world and the next.

There was a silver SUV parked in front of my house. I wasn't surprised when Darius got in the driver's seat. Leave it to him to buy a car that matched his eyes. I shook my head and went to one of the back doors. Dominic opened it for me, and his chivalry cost him. Declan slid into the back seat from the opposite side as I put Binx's carrier on the bench seat.

“Declan,” Dominic growled. “I was going to sit next to her.”

“What are you, five?” Darius snapped. “Put her bags in the back and get in. Come on, we need to get out of here.”

“My ward will hold,” I said.

Dominic took my bags to the back, muttering to himself.

“Sure. Against normal people and even spirits,” Darius said as he looked over his shoulder at me. “But a god changes everything. He might be able to wear away at your magic and eventually get through.”

“Might,” I said. “Eventually.”

“Are you seriously willing to risk that?” He looked pointedly at Binx.

I pulled the door shut in answer.

Binx started crying.

“It's okay, Binxy. We're not going to the vet. I promise.”

Again, Binx accused me of lying. At least this time, I knew I wasn't.

Dominic got in the front passenger seat, and Darius started the car. He turned it around and drove down my drive, all very normal. Just three shapeshifters, a witch, and a cat driving from one safe house to another. At the end of the driveway, Darius stopped, and all of us turned to look toward the Host house. The road was empty, no sign of minions. But that didn't mean anything.

“Ready?” Darius asked.

Declan and Dominic pulled out handguns and laid them on their laps. “Go,” they said together.

As Darius peeled out of my drive, turning away from the Host and toward town, I held onto Binx's carrier, and he yowled. No one told me to shut him up. We were all feeling anxious. The cat was simply giving voice to everyone's emotions.

We were ten feet out of the drive when five trucks pulled out of the Host house's driveway and came speeding after us.

“Incoming,” Declan said as he rolled down his window and leaned out.

“Angel, get down,” Dominic said as he pulled the same maneuver.

I bent over Binx as guns thundered on either side of me. My poor cat yowled louder and cringed into a ball. I cooed to him, covering him as best I could. A boom came—the sound of a tire blowing out. Not one of ours, thankfully. Then a crash came. Yup, definitely not ours. More gunfire threatened my eardrums, and then something hit us. Not another car. I think it was a bullet. Another one pinged off a window. I glanced up and back to see a red pickup right behind us, a man standing in the bed, leaning over the roof to fire a rifle at us. A bullet hit the back window and made that pinging sound again.

Bulletproof glass. Thank God. I bent over Binx again just in case. Even bulletproof glass couldn't hold out forever.

“One of you take that fucker down!” Darius snarled.

“Dibs,” Dominic called.

I looked up again, shocked. Hadn't they said they couldn't kill anyone? But Dominic hit the man in his shoulder, sending him tumbling back, his arm useless, but he was still alive. Right. They'd been doing this a long time. They probably knew all the ways of defending themselves without killing.

“Damn it, Amélie, stay down!” Darius shouted.

I bent over Binx again.

Another crash came, but then Declan cursed. “Coming up beside us.”

I looked over to see him pull back and roll up the window. Just in time too. Another truck, this one bigger than the last, came abreast of us. Several people crouched in the bed, all of them with guns. And all of them fired at us. Declan turned and covered me with his body.

As pings went off and the glass held, Darius jerked the wheel, slamming us into the truck. Metal crunched, people shouted, and we jerked in the other direction.

“Fuck!” Darius growled.

“We're almost to town,” Dominic said. “Encountering traffic. But that's good. They're pulling back.”

Declan straightened and looked behind us. “We'll have to change license plates in case that other driver clocked us.”

“And ditch the SUV for now,” Dominic added.

I sat up in time to see Darius grimace. “The plate switch should be enough.”

“Don't be a baby,” Dominic said. “This isn't even your favorite car. You prefer the Rolls.”

“Yeah, but this is best for defense.”

“My Land Rover is better than this,” Declan said.

“Are you guys seriously arguing over vehicles right now?” I shrieked over the sound of Binx's yowls. “Shh, Binx. We're okay now. It's all right, baby.” I opened the top lid of the carrier so I could pet him.

Binx was trembling but started to relax under my strokes.

The guys had all gone quiet.

Finally, Declan said, “They've backed off, but they're still following us.”

“I figured,” Darius said. He turned right suddenly, taking a road into a middle-class neighborhood. Before the Host could turn down after us, he parked in the first driveway we came to and said, “Amélie, do it now.”

Back at my house, before I'd packed, Darius had asked me to cast a spell on his car, one that could be activated in a moment. Not a ward, but an invisibility spell. It was dangerous to activate a spell like that on a moving car. The driver wouldn't be able to see the vehicle to navigate it. And other drivers wouldn't be able to see it to avoid it. But it was perfectly safe to turn a parked car invisible.

“Now you don't,” I said, activating the spell.

The car shimmered, and that shimmer spread out over us. It was a startling sensation to be sitting there as if I were floating—no car around me or even a body to hold me. I felt like a ghost.

Binx didn't like it either. He started yowling again.

“Shh, baby,” I said, my hand still on him. I could feel him to pet him even though I couldn't see him.

It didn't matter, though. Two trucks drove past us—all that remained of the Host hunting party—and none of their passengers even glanced at us. We waited several minutes for them to go down the road and out of sight.

“All right, you can drop it now,” Darius said.

“Now you see me,” I said.

The SUV returned first, then the magic drew inward and uncovered the rest of us. Binx hissed.

“I know, Binxy. You've had enough of this shit. It's okay. You're okay,” I said.

“That poor cat is going to have PTSD,” Dominic said with a grim look at Binx.

“He's stronger than that,” I said.

“Let's hope so.” Darius sped out of the driveway and back onto the main road. “The last thing we need is a crazy cat loose in a den of hounds.”