Marked by Midnight

Never to be seen or heard from again, of course.

As for Mathias and his team, they were already looking into another unusual string of killings.

It seemed someone had begun quietly targeting London’s banking community. Three high-ranking finance executives had been found dead in their homes in the past handful of days--one victim human, the other two Breed. JUSTIS was under immediate and great pressure to make the murders stop before the public found out and began to panic.

Mathias understood the urgency, but his mind was on another unresolved matter of great concern.

He had to see Nova again.

He had to let her know she was safe.

And that she would always be safe, so long as he had breath in his body and blood ru

He just needed to find her first.

“Nice ink,” Callahan said, strolling into the room to where Mathias sat with a computer tablet, reviewing the intel from the recent murders. The young warrior sat down next to Mathias at the workstation, studying the sword tattoo on his back. “Think your lady will do one for me?”

“I don’t know,” Mathias answered. “What would you want?”

The warrior shrugged. “Something badass, like the one you have.”

“No way,” he said. “That one belongs all to me.”

And so does the woman who created it.

“What about the one you’re drawing on that report, then?”

“Hmm?” Mathias glanced down to where he’d been idly toying with the stylus on the tablet. He didn’t have a fraction of Nova’s talent, but he recognized the symbol immediately.

The rose window from the ruins of Winchester Palace.

One of Nova’s many tattoos.

One that meant something very important to her.

And that was where he would start looking for her as soon as night fell.

~ ~ ~

Nova tucked Eddie into the thin cot in the basement of the cathedral. The poor kid was exhausted. She was too. She sat on the edge of the mattress and smoothed his hair off his drowsy face.

“How long do we have to stay here?” he asked her, his words slurred from the sleep that was already pulling him under.

“I don’t know,” she answered. “For a while. Until I find us someplace better.”

He nodded sleepily. “Okay. Just don’t leave me.”

“Never,” she whispered, realizing only now that she had just stepped into Ozzy’s shoes. They wouldn’t be easy to fill. But she would do her best. She would find a way to give Eddie the same security and support that Oz had given her all those years ago.

God, she missed him already.

Would always miss him.

And she missed Mathias too, although that was a pain she didn’t have to accept.

She could contact him. He’d given her his number. A number she’d tossed in the trash almost the same moment he gave it to her.

Now, she wanted nothing more than to pull that moment back to her. Rewind it. Play it out a different way.

Maybe Ozzy would still be alive.

Maybe she and Mathias would be together.

Maybe she was a fool, losing her heart to someone she’d known only a handful of days.

As Eddie’s soft snores drifted up from his pillow, Nova carefully eased herself up off the bed.

It was early, just past sundown. She was restless, twitchy, even though she hadn’t slept more than a few minutes last night.

She glanced around at the dozens of other similar cots, occupied by men and women and children, a community of all ages and descriptions. She was homeless again. Faced with the decision to either run some more or hide.

She needed space to think. Time to heal after Ozzy’s death and all of the awful things that had surrounded it.

And she needed to feel Mathias’s arms around her, with a desperation she could hardly reconcile.

She’d fallen in love with him.

She didn’t know how, didn’t care why.

She only knew that she needed him.

And right now, all she wanted to do was walk out into the night air and scream Mathias’s name.

Quietly, she left the basement shelter and walked up the stairs to the door leading to the cathedral grounds. She found a wooden bench and sank down onto it. It was a place she’d sat many times before, her private meditation nook in the middle of the bustling city.

Tipping her head back, she looked up, beyond the cathedral towers at the stars and the waning crescent moon. She closed her eyes and remembered the terrified, brutalized little girl who’d come here the first time.

She was back again, scared and hurting, but she was different now. She had a new strength, thanks to Ozzy and the home he had opened to her. Now he was gone, but she was still standing. And he would want her to stand. He wouldn’t want her to run.

She didn’t want to run, not anymore.

Not from anyone, ever again.

Not even from Mathias, and the feelings he had awakened in her.

“Is this seat taken?”

She dropped her chin, her eyes flying open. “You found me.”

“I found you,” Mathias said. He sat down next to her on the bench. “Ozzy’s killer is dead. You’re safe now. I wanted you to know that.”

“You...?” she asked, unsure what she needed to know in that moment. The fact that he was there with her was the only thing that really mattered.

“We got him, Nova. And from what we’ve gathered, it doesn’t appear that anyone else knows you’re in London. Doyle and the others weren’t looking for you. You and Eddie aren’t in any danger now.”

“Thank you,” she murmured. “You came here just to tell me that?”

He nodded. “Are you...all right?”

“I miss Oz,” she admitted. “I’ll always miss Oz.”

“I know. I’m sorry.” He frowned, gave a mild shake of his head. “If there’s anything I can do...”

“I’ll be fine,” she assured him. “Eddie and I will be fine. We’ll figure things out.”

Mathias smiled at that, a smile that seemed heavy with regret. “Have you thought about what you’ll do...whether you’ll go back to Ozzy’s place...?”

“I don’t want to take Eddie back there,” she said, realizing it only now. She hadn’t really thought about alternatives, but she knew she’d land on her feet somewhere. “We’ll figure things out.”

“You already said that,” he murmured. He reached out to her, stroked her cheek with a light caress. “Why don’t you figure it out while you’re staying with me.”

Nova frowned. “Staying with you, where?”

“At my place in the city.”

“You mean, the Order’s headquarters?”

He shrugged. “I’m the commander of the London office. So, technically, the headquarters is my place. You and Eddie would stay with me, in my private quarters in the mansion.”

“Mansion,” she said. She pictured gleaming marble and elegant furniture. Things she’d known as a child and learned to despise. “I don’t know...”

“What don’t you know?” The fingers stroking her cheek now wandered into her hair, his warm, strong palm cupping her nape. “Come back with me. There’s no point in you and Eddie living here, when I have all the room either of you could ever need.”

She shook her head, even as tempted as she was by his offer of comfort and a luxurious place to stay. “It wouldn’t be right. I can’t trade one temporary shelter for another.”

He stared at her, a scowl forming. “No, that wouldn’t be right.”

She exhaled a heavy, pent-up breath. Letting it out seemed to deflate some of her soul along with it. “I’d rather stop this now, Mathias. I’m not afraid to be on my own, but I don’t want to fool myself that accepting your offer won’t make it harder for me to leave later.”

He nodded soberly. “I agree, that would pose a problem. For both of us. That’s why my offer isn’t a temporary one.”

She gaped at him. “What?”

“I want to take you home with me, Nova. You and Eddie both.” He took her face in both hands now, holding her as tenderly as an eggshell. “I want to take you back with me, right now. Where I plan to romance you properly...and thoroughly. You, at any rate. Not the boy.”