Addict (Hunter #2)(89)

“You might have mentioned I would be welcoming a Hunter into my home.” Winter came to stand next to him. Two incredibly old, powerful demons.

Gray’s father waved off the worry. “She’s a baby. She’s barely a few months into training. She’s nothing to worry about, but I would greatly prefer she not be damaged. She’s promised to my son. Imagine the child between a dark prophet and a Hunter.”

“I am not your son,” Gray growled behind me. “And I swear if anyone lays a hand on her, I’ll find a way to kill you all. I won’t accept this. I won’t allow that drug to work on me. Find yourself another prophet.”

“Think about this.” His father had his hands out as though not having a weapon made him less threatening. “Grayson, the light has always had their prophets. You would be the first Hell prophet. Do you know what power you would have?”

Gray wasn’t having it. “I don’t want it and I wouldn’t use the power for you. You think you can start a war on this plane and placate Lucifer Morningstar by turning my life inside out. I won’t accept it. You’ll have to kill me first.”

I believed him and was damn straight going to make sure it didn’t happen. Gray would die before he gave in to his father. The entire time I’d known him he’d been trying to break his ties to Hell, not become their holy prophet.

“Gray, back up. We’re going to move out toward the front door.” I kept my eyes on the demons.

Jacob stood in the back, watching. Apparently that was what he did. Helping would have been better, but apparently that went against the prophet code. It looked like we were on our own.

I was kind of hoping once we got to the yard, we could make a run for it. In the freezing cold. And the snow.

Yeah, I hadn’t thought this one out very carefully, but I was kind of committed at this point. I couldn’t let them have Gray. I could tell myself all day long that I didn’t want the bad guys to get such a powerful weapon, but it was far more than that. I couldn’t let them have Gray. I couldn’t let him go.

I might never be able to truly let him go.

“Kelsey, get behind me,” Gray ordered in that voice that meant he wasn’t taking no for an answer.

He was going to have to this time. He was still a bit pasty, and it was easy to see he was reeling from being betrayed by his family. I personally thought it should have been one of those self-evident things. When your family rules a special section of the Hell plane, you should probably count on uncomfortable family reunions, but Gray was oddly na?ve. I think he always hoped his father cared about him for reasons other than his unique and apparently well-engineered DNA.

I had to give us some time. Once more, I turned to my old friend, the bullet. They wouldn’t kill the bastards, but a few well-placed ones would buy us a couple of seconds.

The sound roared through the room as I put a slug into both the demon’s foreheads. They slammed back, the force of the bullets making them stumble and fall. I would have taken out Bellamy, but he was a smart human. He was hiding and I didn’t have time to play.

I took Gray’s hand. Those bad boys would be up and on their feet following us in seconds. “Time to go.”

We had to get back to Ether. The king had to know about the plan and we had to get Gray into protective custody and pray he was the only one bred to take on this ability.

Gray followed, keeping up with me. His hand tightened around mine as we made it to the door. No time to figure out where the coatroom was and bundle up. As he opened the door, I swore the next time someone insisted I wear open-toed four-inch heels, I was giving them a smackdown they wouldn’t forget.

Cold wind blasted through me. I had to hold on to Gray’s hand so I didn’t fly back into the house.

“Don’t let go,” Gray shouted, pulling me out. He put a hand up to ward off the crazy wind. He jogged out into the sudden blizzard.

I could barely see. It wasn’t that it was dark. The amount of snow and ice coming at me almost made it too white. The moon was shining down, reflecting off the snow. Where there had been a modest dusting only twenty minutes before, now my feet sank ankle deep into the powder.

So cold. I felt that chill in my bones. This wasn’t a mere snowstorm. This was pure killing winter. This was the element undiluted, and this was part of Abbas Hiberna. He was calling the shots now.

Gray pulled me close as we moved past the frozen fountain. “I don’t know that I can find the car. I think we should make a run for Jamie. We don’t have much time. I don’t suppose I can get you to leave me?”

He’d learned much from our previous encounters. “Not on your life. Can you see enough to tell which way to go?”

The wind was picking up and everything appeared white to me. I tried to orient myself. Panic threatened because I couldn’t see anything. The minute we moved away from the fountain, it disappeared in a blanket of snow. My feet were starting to go numb, but I forced myself to move. We had to find shelter.

Gray held a hand over his eyes as though he could peer through the pelting snow and ice that contained us. But it wouldn’t be eyes that saved us. This was nature at its most primal and nothing so logical as eyesight would win out.

Instinct was the only thing that might save us.

I carry a wolf inside me. The demons had created Gray as the perfect vessel for their sacrilege. They’d spent hundreds of years searching for the perfect bloodlines to pervert.