CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
ZADE
My eyes snap open at the sharp, intrusive ring of a phone.
Across the room, Nate answers it, his posture instantly rigid as a sudden, sharp panic bleeds into his voice.
"Where are you? Mio, is Ellie conscious?!"
Hearing those words, I am already moving, my feet hitting the floor before my brain can even process the threat.
"What happened, Nate?" I demand.
He looks up at me, his eyes wide and wild with fear.
"Ellie fainted on their way here, Zade. Mio says they're inside a café nearby. I need to go."
He doesn't wait for a response, bolting out of the suite without a second thought.
I follow close behind his frantic strides, navigating the crowded corridors until we reach the pavement outside.
As we charge toward the café entrance, a sudden, dark movement catches the corner of my eye.
Someone is moving fast—too fast—slipping away into the periphery.
I whip my head around, scanning the crowd, but the street is a blur of unfamiliar faces.
No one is there.
But I know what I saw. Someone was watching this place.
"Nate! Over here!"
Mio's frantic shout violently snaps our attention to a corner booth inside the café.
Ellie is slumped heavily in the chair, her face devoid of color, while Mio hovers over her, completely out of her depth.
But the Witch... well, she's nowhere to be seen.
"Ellie! Ellie... sweetheart, open your eyes, please..." Nate's voice cracks, a terrifying vulnerability breaking through his deep tone as he drops to his knees beside the booth.
"Let's take her to a hospital for God's sake, Nate," I snap, the urgency driving a harsh edge into my words.
Nate nods frantically, carefully sliding his arms beneath Ellie's limp form and lifting her up against his chest.
"Wait, let Alice come back first!" Mio pleads, looking around the café frantically.
"We don't wait for anyone," I hiss, a toxic cocktail of adrenaline and irrational fury boiling over in my chest.
If Alice was supposed to be Ellie's friend, how could she just vanish when things got bad?
"If she cared so much, she wouldn't have left her in the first place."
"But... she left to—" Mio tries to explain, but the noise in my head is too loud, too destructive.
"I DON'T GIVE A FLYING FUCK WHY SHE LEAVE OR WHAT THE REASON IS!" I roar.
The deafening shout echoes violently against the café walls.
The entire establishment goes dead silent, every single customer staring at us in stunned horror.
But it's Mio's reaction that delivers a physical blow to my chest.
She flinches so hard her shoulders cave in, both of her hands flying up to cover herself as if... as if I am about to strike her.
The sight squeezes my heart into a tight, agonizing knot.
The reality of my own brutal temper stares back at me in her terrified eyes.
"Mio, I... I am—" The apology dies in my throat.
Through the glass windows, I see the shadow again.
This time, I know I am not being paranoid.
A figure cloaked in dark fabric is moving down the street with an unnatural, calculated urgency.
"I'm taking her to the car," Nate barks, completely oblivious to the tension as he pushes past the tables.
I nod mechanically, my eyes still tracking the street as I follow him toward the exit, Mio trailing quietly behind us.
But as I reach out to push the heavy glass door open, my entire body freezes solid.
Alice is standing right on the threshold.
She's holding a cold bottle of sparkling water tightly against her chest, her fingers shaking so violently that the plastic is crinkling under her grip.
She isn't looking at Nate, or Ellie, or Mio.
She's looking directly at me.
And her blue-grey eyes are shining with a thick, devastating layer of unshed tears.