Adare looked around a fairly busy park. The pool was deep but the water kept moving around a bend toward the city. The Kurjans were gone. Adare partially stood, his legs protesting. Blood poured from several wounds along his arms and legs as well as one in his neck. He sent healing cells immediately to the injuries, stomping across river rocks to the bank.

Ronan slugged along beside him, bleeding from a wound in his cheek.

A woman walking a baby all bundled up in a stroller paused and then screamed.

“Shit.” Ronan held up a hand. “We’re okay. We were working upstream on the electrical grid and fell in. The rocks did a number on us.”

“Electrical grid?” Adare muttered under his breath.

Ronan shrugged. “She stopped screaming.”

They climbed up the decorative rocks to the brick walkway that led to several stores and restaurants. In the late afternoon, the coffee shop to the right was busy, and most of the patrons watched them with wide eyes.

Adare nodded at the crowd and kept on walking. “We need to get out of here.”

Ronan hustled up to his side. “Can you run?”

“Yep.” He might be a little dizzy, but he’d get to the helicopter. They’d hidden it in the forest, far from the meeting place. “We have to go by that Bobbi’s apartment. The Kurjans have obviously gotten to her.” It was probably too late, but for Grace’s peace of mind, he needed to check.

Ronan ducked his head and loped into a jog. “We’ll go by there, but it’s a waste of time.” He was quiet, his speed increasing. “The Kurjans were in the sun.”

“I know,” Adare said, keeping pace and running toward the sun. The sheer magnitude of that fact was too much to comprehend right now. The Kurjans had somehow modified themselves so they could venture out in the day—which altered things considerably. In the Kurjans’ favor.

Everything had just changed. Again.

Ronan’s phone buzzed, and he drew it from his pocket, halting in a parking lot for a movie theatre. Water dripped from the device, but he pressed the button anyway.

Adare stopped and scouted the area for threats.

“Hello.” Ronan put the phone on speaker.

“Ronan? It’s Emma. I just received an email from Faith saying she’s stuck in Adare’s lair and that Grace is gone.”

Everything inside Adare froze and then heated. “Gone?”

* * * *

Her hands were tied, but Grace managed to lever herself up and look into the back of the SUV where Benny lay on his side, blood pouring from a wound in his neck. Half of his hair was burned off, and his jeans still smoldered. He wasn’t moving. “What did you do?” She fell back to her seat, her heart aching and fear making her legs shake.