9
KENDRA
Igrab Kojo’s arm on instinct, my fingers closing around his bicep where there’s nothing between his skin and mine. The heat radiating from him is so intense it should scald me, but instead it anchors me in the darkness. The room has gone pitch black, the building dead around us, and all I can see is the low amber glow of his eyes, just bright enough to catch the bridge of his nose, the curve of his jaw, the planes of his face hovering above mine. That supernatural warmth and those inhuman eyes are the only things keeping me from complete panic.
“Aiden.” Kojo’s voice cuts through the darkness.
I hear Aiden moving near the table. The scrape of his chair against carpet, the shuffle of his shoes, then the rustle of fabric. A zipper pulls with a metallic whine. Something soft brushes against my arm and I flinch before Aiden’s voice comes from beside me, steady and calm despite the tension I can hear beneath it.
“Here. Your boots and coat.”
Kojo’s arm disappears from under my grip so suddenly I nearly stumble. He snatches the boots and coat from Aiden withsuch speed I hear the fabric pop in protest. Aiden makes a sound between a grunt and a curse, clearly caught off guard.
“Would you chill the fuck out, man? I’m trying to help her.”
Kojo doesn’t answer. Instead, he drops to one knee. His fingers find my left ankle in the darkness, his fingers burning through my skin as he guides my foot into the boot. He laces it tight, tugging each cross careful before moving to my right. I stand there in the dark letting him dress me like a child, and I don’t say a word because I don’t know what I’d say. There’s something simultaneously intimate and impersonal about how he handles me, like I’m precious cargo that must be protected.
He ties the second boot and rises to his full height, and the heat of him ascends with him until I feel it washing over my chest and face in waves.
He holds the coat open behind me. I reach for it, wanting to handle this one thing myself, but he pulls it back just enough to keep the collar out of my fingers. I try again, grabbing for the sleeve, and he shifts it away from my hand a second time. He angles the opening toward my shoulder instead, waiting for me to slide my arms through rather than just take it from him. The message is clear: he wants to put it on me himself, to complete this service.
“Will you put on the fucking coat so we can get out of here?” Kade’s voice snaps from somewhere near the window.
Kojo growls in response. The sound rolls through the room, low and guttural, vibrating against the walls and rattling the thin motel windows in their frames. Kade goes quiet immediately, and in the faint glow cast by his eyes I catch her wincing, jaw clenching as she bites down on whatever she was about to say next.
I can’t help the smirk at my lips as I slide my arms into the coat. He smooths the fabric across my shoulders, adjusting the collar so it sits perfectly against my neck, his fingers brushingthe skin beneath my cheek. Then his fingers move to the zipper at my waist, pinching the tab between two fingers, ready to pull it up.
My hand rests on his forearm before he can complete the gesture, not pushing him away, just resting there.
“You will get cold,” he says, concern threading through his voice.
“No I won’t.” I look up at him, and his eyes hover mere inches above mine, throwing enough light that I can make out the worry lines etched across his forehead. “Not with your furnace.”
The worry lines smooth away and he goes quiet, a smile spreading across his features, wide and genuine. He steps back, and the warmth stays against my skin like an imprint even after he pulls away, like he’s branded me with his heat.
Then his head snaps toward the door and the smile dies on his face. His back goes rigid, and I hear it first, this grinding sound that runs all the way up his back. Through the slit in his shirt, the fur along his ridge thickens and hardens into something else entirely. The spikes line his back from the bottom of his ribs to the nape of his neck, and every single one of them looks sharp enough to go through bone without resistance.
I want to touch them. There’s this pull in my fingers, this urge to trace the line of them from bottom to top and feel where the fur stops and the bone begins. I’ve never seen anything like it up close, and I can’t tell if my fascination is simple curiosity or something deeper, something tied to whatever connection he claims exists between us.
A hand closes around my upper arm and yanks me backward before I can act on the impulse. I yelp, stumbling, and Aiden pulls me behind him, positioning his body between me and whatever Kojo is sensing. His grip is firm but careful, protective without being painful.
“Stay close,” he says.
Kojo presses his face close to the door, nostrils flaring wide. He inhales once, slow and deep, holds it for a moment, then exhales through his nose. His ridge vibrates, producing a low hum.
“Six.” He holds up his hand, fingers spread with his thumb tucked against his palm. “Six men.”
He inhales again and his entire body goes rigid. The hum from his ridge stops abruptly and everything about him stills.
“Two of them.” His voice drops to something flat and dangerous, stripped of every trace of the softness he showed me moments ago. “I know their scent. They were there the night my Matriarch was murdered.”
He turns his head and looks at Kade. Even in the near-dark, I can see the silent exchange pass between them. She gives a single nod, understanding without words.
“They never forget a scent,” she says to no one in particular.
She vanishes. The black smoke swirls where she stood. I barely have time to process the wrongness of watching someone disappear before the door clicks. It opens from the outside and she’s standing in the hallway, scanning both directions. The corridor beyond is darker than the room. No emergency lighting, no exit signs, nothing. Whatever cut the power took everything with it.
Kojo steps out first. Aiden follows, his hand still locked around my arm, pulling me with him. I cross the threshold into the hallway and the temperature drops, the motel’s heating system as dead as the lights. My breath fogs in front of me in wispy clouds. Kojo’s doesn’t. Instead, steam rises from his shoulders in curling tendrils that dissipate into the blackness.