Holy hell.
She’d killed him.
The delivery girl and Raz had been having an affair, and some argument had broken things. She’d gone into the back, dumping in too much poison into the vial for it to be a small accident. She had no way of knowing how much was lethal, other than by the warning on the ingredient list on the back. She’d gone way overboard, adding so much more than was necessary. Whatever Raz had said to her there, whatever news he’d brought, had pissed her off.
And she’d killed him.
10
Oakley had lived a very long time, and there was one thing that he’d learned about pain—the worst kind of pain was betrayal.
He’d been shot, stabbed, burned, poisoned, and beaten in his time, mostly in his youth, and while it hurt like a motherfucker when it happened, it went away with time. It healed, and he moved on. He’d endured every kind of emotional, physical, and spiritual suffering known to man over the past few centuries, but nothing ever stuck as much as caring about someone and them sticking a knife in your back.
He’d cared about her. It was okay to acknowledge that. It didn’t mean he hadn’t been foolish, but he cared about Poppy. In fact, he loved Poppy. They had a strange bond, a connection that was hard to explain. Not just the physical stuff, but the deeper things, the way that they thought and saw the world and the fact that when they weren’t together, he couldn’t stop thinking about her. That was what hurt the most: he’d let her in, and trusted her, and been amazed by her, and he’d read her so wrong that she’d played him like a fiddle.
He sat on the deck of his house, looking out at the sun peeking up over the horizon. She had to have seen the way that he looked at her and the way that he’d spent so much time and effort scouring the scene to try to save her. And she’d looked him right in the eyes and lied to him every second. How had he been so wrong? How had he been so blinded? Maybe she really had cast a spell on him. He was supposed to be immune, but maybe she’d figured out some way around it.
The worst part wasn’t what she had done. It wasn’t the lies or the trickery or the betrayal or her using him.
It was that he still loved her.
It was that he still couldn’t shake the feeling that she was a good person.
It was that he hadn’t stopped wanting to be around her.
It was that he still wanted her to be happy.
And that, that was what hurt the most. He’d been wrong about people before, and in a lot worse ways sometimes. But when it was over, it was over. He’d cut people out and never think about them again, learning his lesson and moving on. But with her, he couldn’t. She still stayed in his mind, ever on the tip of his tongue. Things seemed wrong without her. He had only known her for weeks, but in those weeks, it felt right in a way that he’d never felt before.
Maybe it was a spell, or maybe it was a real connection. He took a deep breath, held it in his lungs for a few seconds, and exhaled through his nose. What the hell was he supposed to do now? On the one hand, he could accept the possibility that he still wanted to be with her even though she’d betrayed him and played him like a fiddle. On the other hand, he could apply the logic part of his brain and abandon her for good.
Maybe she had reached out. Maybe not. He’d never know because he’d blocked her, which had seemed like the right move at the time, but now he was starting to miss her texts and communication. It was the weird, irritating little things that he missed about her. A smile, the way that she pronounced something, an inside joke. Little things. Things that he’d never missed from someone before.
It was a rare day that he was stumped. Maybe it was experience or maybe it was just his personality, but he was never stuck in one place for long. He made snap decisions and handled things how he wanted to. It wasn’t his habit to go over things for any time. Decide and don’t look back, and if he did look back, it was merely to reflect and consider what he should do better in the future. Not this weird, wishy-washy, stuck in the middle thing.
Easy come, easy go. That was how it normally was. But she wouldn’t leave him, and perhaps he didn’t want her to. Even then, he wanted to drive back to her, to love her, and to hold her. Even then, he’d catch a grenade for her, even after she’d lied to him and tricked him. He squinted into the sun as it went up. He’d known that he was screwed up, but not that screwed up. Why was his instinct still ordering him to go to her? It was never wrong. Even as his logic and his mind ordered him to leave her behind, his gut screamed at him that he was making a mistake.
That had been her in the footage. That, or in an incredible twist of fate, it wasn’t her and was someone who looked virtually identical to her. Possible? Yes, but not likely. A red-haired woman of the same build and size and age, who just happened to be there, and just happened to know how to make potions? And who just happened to know Raz?
Not likely. But, as close to impossible as it was, that thought kept pinging around in his brain. What if he was wrong? What if something really was wrong here and he just wasn’t seeing it? He leaned back and watched the crimson streaks peek out and illuminate the landscape. He’d known from the beginning that this was going to be complicated, but he’d never for a second dreamed it would be like this.
“Okay, so you think you can talk to him?”
Poppy’s life had been chaotic for the past few hours. In the past 48 hours, she’d been abandoned by her mate, Magnolia had shown up, they’d identified the killer, and Magnolia dropped the bombshell that she could get in contact with Oakley.
Normally, Poppy could do it. Normally, it would be an easy matter of throwing together a locator spell. It was easy, basic stuff that she could do with her eyes closed, but since the Immortal Council had her on lockdown and had blocked her powers for the time being, it wasn’t possible. But Magnolia could. And Magnolia could find him. And Magnolia could talk with him.
Magnolia snagged her keys from the little table by the door. “Yeah! I’ll tell him everything.” She smiled. “It’s gonna be okay, Poppy. If he’s your mate, he’ll return. And the light is—”
“Yeah, yeah, the light is never wrong.” Poppy nodded, rolling her eyes. Magnolia had always been a lot more into the idea of the light than Poppy ever was. She pulled Magnolia into a hug, curling her fingers into her back and half entertaining just asking her to stay. She didn’t want to be alone again, but it was just for a little while. And besides, when Magnolia returned, she might have a certain griffin in tow. She pulled back and placed her forehead against her sister’s, looking her in the eyes. “Be safe, okay?”
Magnolia’s bright, happy blue eyes looked right back at her. “I’ll be back before you notice I’m gone.”
Doubt that. Poppy pulled her into another hug. “Call if you need me. Please.”
Magnolia’s hand, holding her phone, rose into view. She wiggled it with a smile. “You got yours?”
Poppy tossed her head over in the direction of the coffee table, where her phone was sitting. “Yeah, I’ll call you if I get super bored. You can come rescue me from the router going out again.”
Magnolia released the hug entirely too soon. “I’ll kick that router’s butt again. You want some, punk?” she called in the general direction of the modem, before snickering and whisking out the door. “Toodle-oo!”