“He knew that you were the halfling,” he repeated. “He had to die.”

Maybe it was the shock of everything—Ren unexpectedly returning and being okay with what I was and then snapping Henry’s neck like it was a twig—because I suddenly wanted to laugh, but nothing was funny about any of this.

“How?” I croaked out. “How did he know?”

“I don’t know,” he answered.

My brows furrowed. “Then how do you know he knew? And if he knew, then that means Kyle knows. And if they know, then how am I still standing here? They’ve had ample opportunity to come after me.” I scrubbed my hands down my face. “They don’t seem like the type to wait around.”

“They will if they believe you will lead them back to the prince,” Ren replied, kneeling at the side of Henry’s body. He reached into the pocket of the man’s tactical pants and pulled out a cell phone. “After all, they wouldn’t want to just take out the halfling.”

But taking me out would be an end to one of the major problems we faced. At least temporarily, until the prince located another female halfling. But with me out of the picture, they’d have more time to figure out how to kill the prince. Having a special stake was only going to get them so far.

Ren shoved Henry’s phone into his pocket and rose. “I’m sorry that this bothered you, but it had to be done.”

I inhaled sharply. Did it? If Henry knew what I was, he was a danger to me. So was Kyle. I got that. I also got that Ren was protecting me, but he’d just killed a man and it hadn’t even fazed him.

“I need to take care of the body,” he said, stepping over said body. Then he was in front of me. I jerked when he curved his hand around the nape of my neck. “I should do this alone.”

I was at a loss for words, my heart beating so fast I felt sick.

“It’ll be okay. I promise.” He lowered his head, kissing me, but I didn’t feel it. My entire being was numb. “I’ll catch up with you later,” he said.

I found myself nodding and then I slipped free. I gathered up my weapons and started to pass Ren, but he caught my arm. My gaze flicked to his. “You know I had to do this, right?” he asked.

I nodded, even though I wasn’t sure of why I was nodding. All I knew was that leaving his apartment was a good idea, because I needed to get out of there and think.

“I’ll catch up with you later,” he repeated. “You meet me back here?”

“Okay,” I managed to force out as I lowered my gaze, staring at his throat.

Ren let go and I beat feet across the room. At the door, I stopped and looked back at Henry’s body. All I kept thinking was that this man, this human being, was dead by Ren’s hands. Literally. Sometimes humans get caught in the crosshairs when it comes to fighting the fae, and they get killed. Other times a human gets fed on too much, they get out of control, and have to be . . . put down. I hated that—hated that part of my job more than anything, but it happened. This though . . . A shudder rolled through me. This was different. No matter how I wanted to spin it. Whether Henry knew I was the halfling or not, this was in cold blood.

And I never, not even once since the moment I met Ren, had thought he could so efficiently, coldly, end another human’s life. No way. I thought about the day in the Quarter when the guy was killed in the street and Ren had been unable to save his life. That had gutted Ren. I’d seen it in his eyes. Ren was like me in that way—pained when a human life was lost, unlike some of the other Order members.

But he hadn’t even batted an eyelash at this.

~

Once I was out of the warehouse district and standing near Palace Café on Canal, I snapped out of what felt like a bizarre trance. That’s how I’d felt since I was at Ren’s place. Like I was under some kind of spell and was only capable of walking out of his apartment and getting into a car. My head had been strangely empty, but now as I started walking toward Royal, the numbness vanished. Reality was the chilly wind whipping down the street.

I took deep, even breaths. Okay. What went down back there had seriously happened. Ren had killed Henry and right now he was most likely disposing of Henry’s body. My hands opened and closed at my sides. Part of me wanted to vomit a little, but that wasn’t going to solve much. I didn’t even know what would solve this.

Turning onto Royal, I wasn’t even sure where I was walking. I just needed to keep my legs moving so I could make this right in my head, because right now everything was the furthest thing from right.

I needed to get the facts straight. Henry was a danger to me. Ren rectified that threat. That was all that had happened. It wasn’t like Ren had . . . had murdered someone.

But hadn’t he?

I stopped walking and moved until my back was pressed against the cool stone of a building. I squeezed my eyes shut and cursed under my breath. I couldn’t make this right in my head. My stomach roiled.

I loved Ren. I was in over my head, under water and drowning in love with him, but what he’d just done didn’t sit right with me. I opened my eyes. It didn’t match what I knew about him. It would’ve been one thing if Henry had done something in that moment to prove that he was an immediate danger, but he hadn’t.

“Okay,” I whispered to myself. “Time to focus.”

I might not know how to feel about what Ren had done, but I knew I wasn’t okay with it. We needed to talk about it, even though deep down I knew talking wasn’t going to magically fix anything or bring Henry back to life. I didn’t know what else to do though.