Briana tilts her head.“Did he say what happens if I no longer want to be a pet?”
The vampire’s smile falters.I move when she does, not before, but with her.
She slashes the first across the hand, triggering gold fire, and I take the second by the throat and slam him into the wall hard enough to crack plaster but not skull.
The first lunges at her, and Briana speaks the spell-word.The collar flares, and his hand burns before it reaches her throat.I hit him once, and he drops.
Briana stares at both bodies, breathing hard.I want to touch her face, but she turns and presses her forehead briefly to my chest.
A choice.
I cup the back of her head for one second, careful not to hold her there.“You okay?”I ask.
“No.”
“Can you move?”
“Yes.”
“Then we move.”
The black door opens before I touch it, and A woman stumbles out.Human and barefoot.With two puncture wounds on her wrist.Briana catches her, and the bond floods with grief so sharply it nearly brings me to my knees.
“Hey,” Briana says, voice steady even though I feel what it costs her.“I’ve got you.We’re getting you out.”
Inside the room are three more humans, a young male witch with iron cuffs, and a fox shifter girl curled in the corner.
My vision darkens.
Children.
They fucking took children.
The fail-safe charm burns cold beneath my shirt as my beast rises.
Briana looks back at me.Only looks, and that’s enough.
I breathe.“Cruz,” I say into the charm.“First holding room.They need extraction.”
“On my way,” he answers.
A speaker crackles above us, and Lucius’s voice fills the room.“Did you think I would keep my best treasures near the door?”
The rescued woman begins to sob, and Briana goes still.I feel the fear before it morphs into fury.
Lucius continues, his voice silk over rot.“Come deeper, little key.Bring your bull if you must.I wonder which of you will break first.”
The speaker goes dead, and Briana looks at me.“He wants you wild,” she says.
“Yes.”
“He wants me scared.”I nod, knowing she is right.She steps closer.Her hand rises to my chest, directly over the charm.Over my heart.“Then we disappoint him.”
The bond pulses, and I cover her hand with mine.“Yes.”
Cruz arrives with Moira and two of Aldron’s vampires.The banshee takes one look at the room and goes pale.
“So much death waiting,” she whispers.
