Serena’s fever burned hotter, her skin clammy as she lay on her bed, the weight of her illness pressing down like a stone. Gary stood in the doorway of her small room in the Sloan mansion, his dark eyes wide with concern. The mate bond pulsed between them, a faint warmth battling the chill of her condition. Mia’s insistence that she confide in Gary and Jack echoed in her mind, but Hart’s ultimatum—reject them or face exposure as a fire witch—loomed larger, a blade at her throat. The cloaked figure’s shadow and her worsening symptoms only tightened the noose.
“Serena, you look awful,” Gary said, stepping inside and closing the door. He knelt beside her bed, his hand hovering as if unsure whether to touch her. “Why didn’t you tell us you were sick?”
She swallowed, her throat raw. “It came
