Furious Fire: Grimm's Circle, Book 8 by Shiloh Walker

of her hair. I close my eyes and I see her in front of me. How many years am I going to live like this, Greta?”
    She was silent. In that moment, he could hear the families all around them. The family across the street was sitting down to their meager dinner, while a man berated his wife a few more houses down. A baby wailed somewhere close by and a mother, her voice fretful, tried to calm the infant.
    Finally, Greta spoke, her voice gentle. “Maybe it’s time you let her go. You’re alone, always alone. But you don’t have to be.”
    Like he chose to feel this way. But even as that thought rolled through his head, he pushed it aside. In a way, he realized he did. Even if he could find a way to let Becky go, he wouldn’t. The very thought of it felt like betrayal. It wasn’t just guilt. In his mind, she was still there. How could he ever let her go when she still felt so real to him? So very much alive? He half-expected to turn and see her.
    “Yes,” he murmured. “I do.”
    Perhaps it was his penance. Regardless, there was no way he could let his woman go. She was still too alive inside him.
    So alive, that even looking at another woman made him feel as though he’d broken the most sacred of trusts.
    “I spoke with one of the day nurses,” Greta said, settling with him not even an hour later. He passed her some jerky left from a deer he’d shot and killed a week earlier.
    She eyed it with disdain before taking a bite and washing it down with the beer she’d carried over from the bar.
    “A soldier was brought in—collapsed. Has pneumonia. Stable and he’s not going to die. Has all his parts in working order.”
    Finn lifted a brow.
    She tapped a finger against the table, eyeing him. “An able-bodied, relatively healthy young man with a condition that will likely pass. That is what our killer is looking for. We need to watch the infirmary tonight.”
    Finn set his jaw.
    Then he nodded.
    They didn’t get to pick and choose how they did their job. If they were lucky, this mystery would be easily solved and he could go back to ignoring the pretty blonde with pale eyes and freckled skin.
    They finished up in short order and made their way to the infirmary under cover of night.
    Most of the small village was already tucked away for the day, worn thin and ready for their rest. More than a few soldiers walked the streets and both Finn and Greta turned a blind eye when they came across one who had a woman pressed up against the wall. They were well out of sight and although they were making a great deal of noise, the woman was clearly enjoying herself.
    Everybody should have a break away from this, after all…if they could find it.
    Finn couldn’t find it.
    It was too soon that he found himself looking through the window in the back, while Greta settled herself on the roof. He was always left on the ground, but it made sense. He could do plenty of damage from a distance with his pistols and he had a close-up view of the nurse sitting at her station, her pretty blonde hair tucked up neat.
    Looking at Ada, and all those pretty freckles on her neck—
    Stop it.
    He could punch himself in the head for every thought he had about her and it wouldn’t be enough to assuage the guilt.
    Becky’s face swam through his mind and that cooled the need to go to the young nurse, kiss that freckled neck. Setting his jaw, he ground his teeth together and started to scan the interior. He could get inside quietly, but if she turned—
    Her head lifted.
    He pulled back just as she glanced over her shoulder, her gaze unerringly seeking out the spot where he’d just been.
    As though she’d sensed him.
    She pushed the chair back and his skin pricked in warning as she started toward the back door. He started to pull back into the shadows, but then he stopped.
    A whisper of evil slid down his spine.
    Damnation.
    Demon. Coming in fast.
    He had to get in there and get her out. He took off at a run.
    Ada spun around and he gaped as she