“Here!” A muffled voice called from beyond the door.
Gryphon pressed harder against her mouth with his hand.
“Open it!” another said.
“I can’t. It’s bolted from the inside.”
“Sonofabitch.” That was Nick’s voice. Maybe there was still a chance… “This entrance leads into the tunnels, right?”
“Yeah,” someone else said. “I don’t know where, though.”
“Well, fucking find out,” Nick hollered. “Get me blueprints of this damn castle. Keep working on that door. And someone wake up Theron and Orpheus. I want this sonofabitch caught before he gets outside the colony’s borders.”
Gryphon’s free hand gripped Maelea’s wrist. Without letting loose of her mouth, he pulled her away from the wall and shifted her around so her back was plastered to his front and his big, hard body was pushing her forward.
“Walk,” he said in her ear. Hot breath ran under the collar of her jacket. “I know you’ve been in here before. I’ve seen you when no one else is watching. You know exactly where this tunnel lets out. We’ve got minutes before they figure it out too. If you want to live, you’ll get me the hell out of here. And you’ll do it fast.”
Orpheus jolted from the erotically charged dream involving him, Skyla, and a vat of JELL-O he’d just as soon have continued exploring.
Glancing toward the clock on the nightstand, he caught the time. Just after two a.m. Against his chest, Skyla lay softly snoring, her heat warming him where she’d passed out after they’d made love for the third time.
His chest pinched. Gods, he did not want to leave her in the morning. But there was no way around it. Nick wouldn’t let Gryphon stay—not after what he’d done—and Orpheus wasn’t abandoning his brother to the outside. He ran his fingers through Skyla’s long blond hair and remembered the way she’d stood up for him, even knowing all the dumb shit he’d done in this life and the previous one. If Orpheus could be saved, then there had to be hope for Gryphon.
She wanted to go with them, but no matter what, he wasn’t letting Gryphon anywhere near her. She’d tried to argue about it last night, but he’d successfully distracted her with his mouth and hands and the rest of his body—several times. In the morning she’d likely try again, and she’d be pissed when she found out he wasn’t relenting, but he’d rather have her alive and pissed than dead.
He’d meant it when he said he wasn’t losing her. Not again.
A pounding echoed through the room, and lifting his head from the pillow, he realized that was the sound that had woken him.
As he pushed up on his elbows, Skyla stirred. Grunting once, she lifted sleepy, sexy eyes his way. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t know.” He slid out of bed, pulled on the jeans he’d tossed on the floor earlier, and crossed the room toward the glass door. Embers still burned red in the fireplace, and shards of moonlight shone through the windows on four sides of the hexagonal room in one of the highest towers of the castle. Beyond the glass door, a male figure loomed. A figure Orpheus recognized as one of Nick’s men.
Skata. Please tell me Gryphon didn’t attack someone else.
Orpheus pulled the door open. The guard’s face was flushed from running, and he drew a breath before saying, “He’s gone. Tower guards spotted him crossing the courtyard, heading for the orchard. If he gets to the tunnels—”
“How in the bloody hell did he get out?” Skyla asked from across the room, already standing near the bed, the sheet wrapped around her luscious body, her hair a wild tangle around her worried face.
The guard glanced toward her, then looked quickly away when he realized she was all but naked. “We think he went out the window and scaled the building.”
“Son of a bitch,” Orpheus said. “Where’s Nick?”
“Already searching. He requested you and Theron join him.”
“I’ll be right down.”
The guard nodded. As he left, Orpheus shut the door and searched for his boots. Near the bed, Skyla dropped the sheet and shimmied into her own clothes. “He can’t have gotten far,” she said.
It wasn’t how far Gryphon could get that worried Orpheus. It was what his brother would do to anyone who got in his way that sent fear racing down his spine. And what Nick’s sentries would do if they found him first.
They dressed in record time and made it down to the main hall just as Theron, the leader of the Argonauts, Zander, and Demetrius were stepping off the elevator. With Titus’s injury yesterday, all the Argonauts had gathered in a show of solidarity. All except Gryphon, who’d been locked in his room.
“Where are the others?” Orpheus asked.
“Cerek and Phin already went down to start looking,” Theron said.
“What about the girls?” Skyla asked. She was dressed in black pants, a black long-sleeved top, and her signature goth boots, which Orpheus knew housed her weapon of choice: a bow and arrow that would expand to full size when used, one patterned after the bow she’d carried when she was a Siren. “They might be able to tell us where he’s at.”
“The girls” were the queen of Argolea—Isadora—who was also Demetrius’s new mate, and her two sisters, Callia and Casey. As all three shared the same father, the late king, and were descended from the Horae, the ancient Greek goddesses of balance and order, they had the ability to channel their gifts and see into the present. Maybe even see where Gryphon was right this moment.
“I already sent word to Argolea for Acacia and Isadora to join us,” Theron said. “Callia’s in the clinic seeing to Titus. When they get here, I’ll call her up.”
Acacia, or Casey as everyone but Theron called her, was Theron’s mate, a half-breed, and Callia was Zander’s mate, a healer who tended to the queen and the Argonauts when needed. Since Atalanta was hunting the Horae, it was never smart for them to be in the human realm, but in this instance Skyla was right—they might be the Argonauts’ best chance at finding Gryphon before Nick’s sentries did.
“Zander, D,” Theron said, turning toward the guardians, “head down to the tunnels, see what you can find out. Orpheus, Skyla.” Theron looked their way as Zander and Demetrius both headed back for the elevator that would take them down. “Why don’t you two hit the orchard. Nick’s men have probably already messed with Gryphon’s trail, but maybe you can use some of those super Siren tracking skills Skyla has left and see what you can find. I’ll go try to talk some sense into Nick before one of his men kills Gryphon. He’s pissed about what happened yesterday, and in his mood I don’t think he’d stop them if they tried.”
Orpheus’s gut hitched at that thought, but it warmed at the fact that even with the incident yesterday, the Argonauts weren’t abandoning his brother. There was a bond there, among all of them, one that couldn’t be broken even by the Underworld.
“Okay,” Skyla mumbled, already in Siren mode, heading for the hallway and the stairwell that would lead out to the courtyard.
Before Orpheus took two steps to follow her, Theron grasped his sleeve. “O, wait.”
When Orpheus turned to face the leader of the Argonauts, Theron glanced toward the elevator doors that were closing, then toward the hallway where Skyla had already disappeared. “I didn’t want to say anything to the others, but there’s something else.”
Orpheus’s nerves jumped another notch. “What?”
“Maelea’s missing.”