“No,” said Helen, a little too quickly. “Go to my house instead. It’s closer.” She was a lot better equipped to handle these men than Miss Mabel was, even if that didn’t mean much. At least Miss Mabel’s home of thirty years would be safe. Maybe Helen would ask to move in with her after all of this was over.

“Fine. Which way?” asked Thomas.

Helen gave him directions, praying she wasn’t making the biggest mistake of her life.

Drake couldn’t stop touching Helen. He wasn’t sure if it was because he was afraid that the pain would return if he did, or if it was because her skin was so incredibly soft everywhere he touched. Either way, he was useless in a fight unless he found a way to detach himself from her. And fighting was definitely on tonight’s agenda. It wasn’t going to be easy making the break, but he had no choice. They had to get that sword back, and if they didn’t do it by sunrise, the whole demon nest would relocate and there was no telling when they’d find another lead to its location.

Kevin had been a fierce, proud warrior. He’d died with honor and Drake owed it to him to recover the sword and hang it in the Hall of the Fallen. To do that, he was going to need both hands.

He kept a careful hold on Helen’s wrist, unwilling to break contact until absolutely necessary. Maybe Logan would know what to do to fix this mess. All the Sanguinar, including Logan, had freaky-strong abilities when it came to healing. They knew how to fix damn near anything that went wrong with the bodies of humans and Sentinels alike. If anyone knew what to do to separate him from Helen without pain, it would be Logan or one of the other Sanguinar.

They pulled into Helen’s driveway and piled out of the van. It was a nice neighborhood. Older, but well maintained, and although he was sure that most of the trees had been chopped down when this development was built, the new trees had time to grow back up, serving to shade the houses from the blazing Kansas sun during the day. In the growing dark, those same trees left deep pockets of shadow along the sidewalk and between the homes.

Zach had been bleeding, thanks to Lexi. Not a lot, but enough to bring every Synestryn within a mile radius right to Helen’s front door. Until Logan patched him up, Zach was a walking bull’s-eye, making everyone near him a target.

Including Helen.

He glanced at her as they made their way up the concrete steps to her front door. The curve of her cheek glowed pink in the fading sunlight and he could just make out a cluster of freckles on her left shoulder. Her arms were smooth and feminine—pretty, but not nearly strong enough to fight off the demons headed this way. She was too soft to face down the Synestryn, and if her reaction to that fire was any clue, she was too fragile as well. Part of him wished he’d never even seen her, but the rest of him was doing a ridiculous happy dance, reveling in his pain-free state. He didn’t know what he was going to do with her any more than he knew what she was doing to him.

Thomas carried Miss Mabel up to the front door of Helen’s raised ranch, rather than make her go up the stairs with the walker. She’d griped about it, swatting ineffectively at his muscular arms, but Thomas just ignored her.

Zach was keeping watch over the group, guarding their backs, scanning the shadows for demons or any of the other Synestryn nasties that wanted a piece of them.

Helen stood under the yellow glow of her front porch light, rummaged through her purse one-handed, because Drake was not going to let her wrist go. His stubbornness earned him a disgruntled frown from her, but he was man enough to take it.

“It’s not going to kill you to give me ten seconds to find my keys,” she told him.

“It might. You want to take that chance?”

She actually paused a moment as if considering it as an option. A brief flash of grief dulled her hazel eyes for a split second, then was gone, leaving behind bleak acceptance in its wake. “Fine,” she said, and shoved her purse against his ribs. “You can at least hold it while I dig.”

Drake stared at the top of her bent head. Her brown hair was glossy in the glow of the porch light, and although her twin braids were getting a bit fuzzy from wear, they still drove him crazy, taunting him.

Handles. That’s all he could think when he saw them. The woman had braided handles into her hair, just begging a man to grab them and guide her head where he wanted it to go. Surely she had to realize that. Surely she had to know that between those braids and her soft, full mouth, there was only one place his mind could go. A wonderful, bad, bad place where she was naked and begging him to do all kinds of wicked, delightful things. And he’d do every one of them before he let her go. Twice. But right now all he really wanted to do was grab hold of those handles, tilt her head back, and kiss her until he forgot all about his dead friend and the lost sword and Zach’s bloody arm, which was calling in every nearby demon to come have a bite from the Theronai buffet.

“Found them,” she said, jangling her keys.

Thank God. At least now they’d have a door to put between them and the demons. It wouldn’t last long if an attack came, but it was better than standing out here in the open.

Helen unlocked the door and they all spilled inside with Zach bringing up the rear. Thomas carried Miss Mabel up the half flight of stairs leading to the living room and set her down. He held her steady until she’d taken a solid grip on her walker, which made him a braver man than Drake. That walker was a dangerous weapon in her hands—for which the throbbing lump on the back of his head spoke eloquently—and Thomas was still close enough to be a giant target.

Helen flipped on the lights, revealing a neat, sparse living room. It was done in neutral shades—lots of tan, beige, and gray. The walls were bare and a few sealed moving boxes were stacked in one corner. Helen had either just moved in or was getting ready to move out. He couldn’t tell which.

A couple of library books sat on the glass coffee table. Both of them dealing with spontaneous human combustion. Hell of a topic, and one he would definitely have to ask her about as soon as they got a spare moment. A pair of running shoes stood in the middle of the floor as if they’d been taken off right there. Multiple fire extinguishers stood in bizarre readiness, three in the living room alone—two sitting on the hearth of a fireplace that had been completely filled with bricks. Another extinguisher sat by the front door and he could see a fifth one on the kitchen counter.

Apparently, Helen really didn’t like fire.

“Thank you for seeing us home,” she said. “I don’t want to keep you.” A polite dismissal. One she made staring pointedly at the fingers he had clutched around her wrist.

“Nice try,” said Drake, and just to be contrary, he slid his thumb along the silky inside of her wrist. She was so soft, so warm. Drake wasn’t much for female attachments, but Helen was one he was getting used to, fast.

He looked at Thomas, who was still hovering like a mother hen over Miss Mabel, watching her as though he was afraid she’d fall over any minute. The way she was swaying, maybe that wasn’t such a stupid move after all.

“We need Logan,” said Drake. Without him, this night was going straight to hell with two humans along for the ride. They couldn’t let that happen. As one of the Sentinel races, the Theronai’s sole purpose in life—their entire reason for being—was to protect humans and to guard the gateway into the Solarc’s kingdom, keeping the Synestryn away from both. They needed to get out of here and away from Helen and Miss Mabel before the demons showed up. And there was no question about that part. They would show up.

Thomas pulled out his cell phone. “Logan. We need you to meet us at 17804 East Sunflower Lane.” His bright blue eyes zeroed in on Drake, right to where he was stroking Helen’s wrist, and his expression turned grim. “Yeah, we got a problem. And Zach is bleeding, so make it fast.”

Uh-oh. That demanding tone wasn’t going to go over so well with Logan. He was not a man to push around. None of the Sanguinar were. There was currently peace between the Theronai and the Sanguinar because they each had something the other needed, but that peace was tenuous at best and Thomas knew better than to be anything less than diplomatic. Kevin’s death must have gotten to him more than Drake thought.

Thomas had been closer to Kevin than any of them. All that anger made Thomas one hell of a deadly asset in a fight. Since taking on this mission, the man had been a killing machine. The four of them had blasted through three Synestryn nests in the past week, which had to be some kind of record, and Thomas had been leading the charge every time.

But when it came to getting something from one of the Sanguinar, finesse was the only way to go.

Thomas was apparently hearing all about his insolence, if the tight bunching of his jaw was any sign. “No, of course I didn’t mean it like that, Logan.” His knuckles turned white as his grip tightened on the phone. “Please, make it fast,” he grated out, barely audible.

Zach peered out of the window between two slats in the miniblinds. His hand was pressed tight over his bleeding arm. “How close is he?” he asked Thomas.

Thomas slid the phone back into his pocket and shifted the hilt of his sword so it was clear of his clothing. All of the men carried swords, but thanks to a little hocus-pocus, they were hard to see as long as they were sheathed.

“Five minutes,” said Thomas.

Zach shook his head. “Too long. I’m going to take off, draw them away from here.”

“That’s not a good idea,” argued Drake. “We’re going to need you.”

“Not if all the beasties are following me. It will give Logan some time to figure out whatever it is you’ve got going on there.” He waved toward Helen.

Drake did not want Zach going out there alone. He was one badass Theronai, but he wasn’t invincible. “You’re just doing this so you can go after the girl.”

Zach shot him a vibrant green glare. “You wanna throw that particular stone, Drake?”

Shit. Zach was right. If Helen had gotten away, he would have wanted to go after her, too. Assuming he was able to even walk, which he doubted. “Just be careful.”

“Always. Keys, Thomas.”

Thomas tossed the Tahoe’s keys across the room and Zach was out of the driveway in fifteen seconds.

Thomas looked out through the blinds and spat out a caustic word, which made Miss Mabel shoot him a dirty look. “He put the windows down,” said Thomas.

So the demons could smell the blood and follow him. “I don’t like it any more than you do, but there wasn’t much of a choice left. He couldn’t stay here and risk the women.”

“One of whom is standing right here,” said Helen. “Will you at least tell us what the hell is going on? Why did Zach just run off and why does it matter that he had the window down?”

Oh, hell. How was he going to explain all of this to her? There was way too much to cover for her to even begin to understand what they were up against. She was human. Protected. She wasn’t even allowed to know the Sentinels existed. One of them was going to have to scrub her memories and Miss Mabel’s before they could leave. The less they knew, the less there was to erase, and the easier it would be on them. “Don’t worry about it.”