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“Survival,” she snaps back, her voice tight with urgency.
My eyes linger on the mark a second longer before I let it go, for now. We’re standing in a powder keg, and trust issues or not, we need to make it out alive.
But damn, does it burn.
“Drop your weapons,” the man leading the Eclipse forces orders, voice cold as the barrel of his gun.
Aisling’s grip on her pistol tightens, her knuckles white. She doesn’t move, doesn’t speak, just stands her ground with a defiance that’s pure fire. Ruby, Joy, and Iris flank her, forming a wall of determination. Each one of them is bristling, ready to tear into the enemy. Luka’s pain-filled moans drift from behind them, a stark reminder of what’s at stake.
I don’t know this man giving orders, but I can read the lines of cruelty etched into his face, see the way Aisling’s eyes flicker with something dark and personal. Now that I look closer, they have the same eyes…that bright, indomitable blue, like the core of a flame.
It clicks then—he’s gotta be family.
Her father, maybe.
But there’s no time to ponder the twisted branches of her family tree.
“Back off, or we’ll open fire!” Ruby’s voice is steady, even as it shakes with anger.
The man in charge laughs, a sound devoid of any humor, and it slices through the tension. “You think you can take us all?”
“Fuck off, Jasper,” Joy spits back, her stance unwavering. “She said we’d rather die than live under your rule, and we all meant it.”
It’s the spark that lights the fuse. The air shivers with the promise of violence.
Then I’m moving without thinking, because Aisling launches herself at Jasper like she’s more bullet than woman.
Chaos erupts.
Gunshots ring out, echoing against the walls of the temple. I shoulder my way through the brawl, Vance right with me, exchanging blows with any Eclipse soldier dumb enough to get in our path.
“Cover Aisling!” I yell over the cacophony, my voice raw with desperation.
“Got it!” Vance grunts, dropping an Eclipse thug with a swift, brutal punch.
We fight in tandem, a dance we’ve perfected on blood-soaked grounds. This temple might have been sacred once, now it’s just another battlefield. I knock an Eclipse soldier off balance, send him crashing to the floor with a well-aimed kick to the knee. Vance is a whirlwind beside me, taking down anyone who threatens to swarm us.
“Where’s Aisling?” I bark, scanning the room between throwing punches.
“Center of the storm, where else?” Vance replies, nodding toward a tangle of bodies where Aisling is a blur of motion.
I push harder, driven by the need to reach her, to back her play. Jasper’s got to answer for the mark on her neck, for daring to threaten what’s mine.
Her father…that sick fuck.
“Keep close!” Vance warns.
But I’m not fucking listening.
We’re almost there, almost to Aisling, when another wave of Eclipse soldiers crashes into us, trying to drag us down. But they don’t know us. They don’t know we’re built from the same ruthless hunger that’s kept us alive this long.
The blood of our fathers runs through our veins…and they were brutal, deadly soldiers.
“Come on!” I roar, shaking off hands like they’re nothing, my eyes locked on Aisling. She’s fighting like hell itself, and I’ll be damned if I don’t fight just as hard to stand by her side.
I burst through the last ring of fighters, my fists and elbows weapons of their own. There’s Aisling, pinned to the ground, her father’s hands wrapped around her throat, squeezing the life out of her. Her legs flail, trying to find leverage, but there’s none. Each kick weakens, gasps for air turning desperate.
“Get off her!” I snarl, pouncing on the old man with a fury that’s been building since I saw the fresh mark on her neck. My hands latch onto his collar, yanking him back with all the force my alpha blood grants me. He stumbles off Aisling, and I’m on him in an instant, throwing punch after punch, each hit a promise for every bruise he ever left on her.
