“Yeah,” Theo interjected. He had joined them a moment before, coming up the alley from the direction they’d chased Boyle. “He’s not taking us seriously. That was hide-and-seek, demon style.”

If they only knew how true that was. They were a game to Boyle, nothing more. Isabelle, in particular. Otherwise the demon wouldn’t be following her around, asking her silly questions about her love life.

“What happened?” Thomas touched the hole in her jeans where Boyle’s blood had burned through the cloth. Being choked had made her forget the low, throbbing pain of her leg, but now that it had been pointed out, it started to hurt.

“Boyle’s blood isn’t much fun,” she said, fingering the eaten-away material around the hole.

Micah leaned in for a closer look. “Ow. That’ll leave a scar.”

“It will match the others he’s given me.”

Thomas took her arm and helped her to walk. Micah, Adam, and Jack followed. “Come on. I want you back at the Coven to see the doctor.”

She tried not to lean against him because of his knee, but he pulled her against his body anyway and she stayed there because it felt good. The heat and scent of him calmed her frazzled nerves. Isabelle closed her eyes and melted against him.

Just for this moment she would pretend everything would be okay, because pretty soon these moments would be coming to an end.

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

TWENTY-ONE

ISABELLE STOOD IN THE CONSERVATORY, FACE TIPPED to the glass ceiling above her so she could watch the rain pound down and the lightning flash. Every time thunder boomed, it shook the entire Coven.

It had been a week and there hadn’t been a sign of Boyle anywhere. Had the copper bullet Thomas nailed him with done its job? Was Boyle dead? Or was Boyle still out there somewhere, biding his time before his next kill?

Tension dominated the overall mood of the Coven these days. The house vibrated with it. Micah spent his days monitoring the newspapers and morgues for some sign that Boyle’s body had been found. They continued to patrol at night, but it had been fruitless.

Yet Isabelle knew Boyle was alive.

Being here in the Conservatory, sandwiched between the water in the stream running below her and the water cascading down on the glass above her, calmed her nerves. A chill had entered her bones and she couldn’t shake herself free of it. It had lingered in the center of her for days—death with his hand on her shoulder. Isabelle wrapped her arms over her chest.

Soon Boyle would come for her.

He’d told her to get her affairs in order. Isabelle supposed that wasn’t a bad idea. Just in case. She planned to go down kicking and screaming, but odds were…she was going down.

Someone touched her back and she jolted.