I focused on my goal—to get out of the sterile smelling surroundings where it felt like the walls were closing in and retreat outside. Josh and that other Drake vampire were still hanging about. I’d find them and get a ride… somewhere.
My concentration kept the intrusive thoughts at bay, so I was left in peace as I trotted down the stairs and traced a path through the large building.
I prowled through the front doors—which opened automatically—and didn’t let myself relax until the chilly night air surrounded me.
The sky had faded from inky black to a sort of dirty gray color—lightening at the first hint of sunrise.
When I exhaled, my breath turned into a silvery puff. The street in front of the hospital was quiet—my breathing was the only noise. Streetlights marked a sidewalk that wrapped around the hospital to the parking lot behind it.
I followed the sidewalk—I needed to, as the Drake vampires were kicking up their heels in the parking lot—but my mind was now free to ponder what I’d been avoiding.
What now?
My holiday was quite obviously over and in comparing Killian Drake to his siblings, it was obvious that despite his questionable choice at having a One, he was still of sound mind. （Or sounder than his siblings, anyway.）
Staying around Magiford was just going to invite headaches. However… there was still Jade to think about.
I turned around to glance back at the hospital. Jade’s room overlooked the parking lot, so I wasn’t yet on the right side of the building.
There—I was thinking of Jade, a human, again.
But leaving her in the hospital didn’t sit right with me.
She’s feeling good enough to stab a dragon shifter and has some members of her team with her. She’ll be fine.
On second thought, the presence of her team was not much of a reassurance given they’d been with her when she’d gotten so soundly beaten. But I also knew Killian Drake would soon secure the hospital’s premises if he hadn’t already.
Jade would be safe.
The antsy feeling in my chest that still hadn’t fully dissipated twisted uncomfortably, proof that I didn’t believe my own assurances. I would have said the feeling was the kind of comradery I’d shared with Ambrose, but it wasn’t. It was… different, in ways I couldn’t define and probably shouldn’t try to.
I growled in disgust at myself as I rubbed my forehead.
Is there really any purpose in avoiding the realization when the damage is already done? I can’t dodge it any longer: I care for Jade O’Neil. A human.
Somehow, between her shy smiles, disastrous baking trials, and her fearlessness, she had effortlessly squirmed her way into my heart passing through all my disdain and dislike of emotional attachments to others.
She was important to me.
I’m not on the edge of the danger zone, I’m squarely in it.
Nothing besides Jade’s life hanging in danger would have moved me to reveal myself to Killian. Nothing besides Jade could have gotten me to take full advantage of my powers and status.
I might have amused myself by instigating skinship with her as both Ruin and Connor, but the truth was her warmth and actions had made the interactions downright addicting.
Instead of backing off, I continued down the path—with the excuse of entertainment. In hindsight, my quest for entertainment had worked too well, to the point of backfiring, as it had given Jade the opening she needed to become an important fixture in my life.
It’s even worse than that—I don’t just feel friendship for her.
I’d been enraged that Ambrose had kicked the bucket after his One died, but as close as we had been we still had occasionally gone months and sometimes an odd year or two without seeing each other and that hadn’t bothered me.
Jade, on the other hand…
I laughed and slid my hands into the pockets of my trousers, amused by the irony of the situation. “I’d been concerned Killian was losing his mind and came to Magiford to fix him. Instead, I ended up being the loon who had grown attached to a very mortal—though perhaps not so fragile—human,” I murmured to myself.
I rounded the corner of the hospital, revealing the stretch of the asphalt parking lot, then slowed down and stopped under one of the sidewalk lamps.
I had to give myself some credit—I was not as head-over-heels as Killian Drake was for his One. But, given enough time and exposure to Jade O’Neil, I had no doubt that I would be.
As much as I delighted in Jade’s company, as important as she’d become to me, I wasn’t so far gone as to not recognize the danger of my position.