Page 133 of Shadowface

“Three days,” I tell him.

He rests his head back on the plush chair. “I fucking knew it.”

I arch my brows at him and jerk my head toward the dark hallway where Bianca disappeared into. “I can kill her for you, if you want, since you can’t seem to do it.”

He crosses his arms and looks at me with an amused face. “Is that fucking so?”

I shrug as Lucy brings me a full glass of whiskey. “Here you go, Mikael.” She runs her hand over the back of my head, her touch lingering on my shoulder.

I was always her favorite.

“Thanks, Lucy.” I grab my drink, clinking the ice on the expensive crystal, and continue as Lucy disappears back into the walls of the house. Xander’s eyes follow her as she leaves the two of us alone.

Lucy stopped me from killing Xander when we were kids, only because she gently placed her hands on my back—the same way she did just now.

“Please, Mikael. This isn’t our way; we only kill other people, not each other.”

Please. One simple word of kindness brought me back from the edge of darkness. Darkness I eventually slipped into, anyway. But it did save Xander’s life.

I hope he understands that.

As I soon discovered my taste for blood, there was no way back. Only death, destruction, and darkness lay in my path.

I take a sip and continue, “Bianca won’t help you transcend. Let’s not pretend you’re not waiting for someone else. Is that why she acts like a fucking dog?”

His eyes are dark. He knows I’m right. The Codex is clear.

He leans forward and takes a contemplative sip of his drink. “I don’t know what the fuck goes on in that girl’s mind.”

I’m sure she’s just as crazy as the rest of us. No rational girl would ever date a member of the ancestry, knowing they will likely become a sacrifice. Even if she is technically one of us.

The ritual is brutal, savage and bloody.

“Does my grandmother know you’re back?” he asks.

“We had a visit.”

He arches his dark brows. “I’m sure she was thrilled.”

“I think she suspected it when I marked Summer Landry. Lincoln was trying to stop it, so I took control and made it happen, anyway.”

He grins at me. “The way you and Lincoln can lie to the world is mind-blowing, but do not fucking lie to me, Mike. You owe me that much. Do you have something to do with that missing girl found in the woods?”

I knew he’d put two and two together, eventually.

I adjust my collar and shrug. “I’ll admit it. Taking her was a mistake, but we fixed it. She’s all better and still breathing. No harm done.”

We worked together when we said goodbye to Cali. Lincoln has the ability to make logical decisions, rather than being driven by emotions. He found a solution that didn’t involve death. Combining Lincoln’s logical thinking with my primal psychotic impulses turned out to be successful.

He stares at me with a grim expression. “Is he gone, then?”

A tingle hints under my skin. Lincoln is still skimming the surface of my reality. I’m accepting my thoughts as my own as I accept his, but not fully fused.

Two entities where there should only be one. Three, if you count that split dying to come out.

I sense the thrum of it—it tickles all my senses.

“Not completely,” I tell him. “He’ll never be gone…not in the way you think.”