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“Your and your mate’s safety are critical to all our survival, Alpha,” Mikel told him.
What had Justice been thinking? Fighting could get dirty, and without Justice’s pack there to make sure the challenge stayed clean, he’d left himself and his mate exposed. Had he wanted Erman away from his mate that badly that he was willing to fight and leave his mate unprotected? That was irresponsible and unbefitting an alpha.
“Stop. You know I can protect myself.” Wick dug deeper into Justice’s scruff. “Keep your mind on combat, nothing else.”
Erman was back on his feet, flipping his rapidly healing hand back and forth, testing its ability.
“Last chance. Leave now,” Wick spoke Justice’s words for him “My Justice is reasonable and merciful, you should take advantage of his last act of kindness while you still can. He’s being compassionate… I will not.”
Erman squatted down next to a small leather case beside his other belongings and flicked open the lid. He turned to Justice, looking superior, as if he had an extraordinary weapon that he knew would take him out. Justice barked and growled, urging the vampire to bring it on. Erman jumped from his kneeling position and crouched into a unique fighting stance, wielding a titanium pair of claws of death. Justice would’ve laughed if his wolf was capable of it. Did he really think a pair of fake metal claws was enough to defeat him?
“No weapons in a challenge!” Ramon scolded angrily, looking at Wick to immediately disqualify the captain and order him beheaded.
“I’ll allow it,” Wick said easily, repeating Justice’s words.
Wick sent him a visual of Justice ripping open Erman’s throat with the vampire’s own damn weapon. It did have a sadistic irony.
The first thing Justice’s father taught him about fighting was that the greatest defense was a greater offense. As much as he wanted to tear through the vampire, he let him leap first and come to him.
It wasn’t easy to watch another lunge and try to kill his Beloved while he stood idly by, but he knew the rules of a challenge and what it meant to break them. Wick couldn’t legally intervene, otherwise he’d have already severed the former captain’s head… without having to shift to his beast.
Wick stood in awe of Justice’s fighting abilities. He wasn’t engaging Erman at all, instead letting him swipe repeatedly at him. Justice easily spun out of reach each time until Erman got exceptionally close to Justice’s face and Justice gave him a hard head-butt to his ribs, sending his body flying across the cobblestone driveway. Wick’s heart pounded in his chest, he wanted this to be over.
Justice leapt into the air – no longer on defense – covering the distance easily and landing on top of Erman. The vampire’s body jerked like he’d been hit with a defibrillator. Justice clamped his huge mouth over the vampire’s throat and shook him roughly, dragging his body across the coarse stones. The action was vicious but not lethal. Justice was giving him another chance to submit, but Erman steadily tried to buck Justice off, clawing at his sides with those ridiculous metal weapons.
Wick was careful to keep his feelings shielded so he wasn’t a distraction to his mate. But his frustration at being forced to stand by had to be evident, no matter how he tried to hide it.
If Justice sensed anything in Wick, he didn’t acknowledge it and instead stayed in the battle. The apprehension and frustration was clear in his mate’s body language. Justice didn’t want to kill.
A blood-curdling scream rent the atmosphere when Justice clamped down harder on Erman’s throat. Wick heard Alek’s wolf growl next to him, maybe giving his big brother some encouragement. He couldn’t tell what, if anything, Alek was saying to Justice, but he could feel Alek’s presence in his mate’s head. An unbreakable sibling bond. Wick was thankful he was there.
As if he felt Wick’s appreciation, Alek’s big animal eased in closer to him, just shy of touching him. It was a display of Alek’s full support of his brother’s mating. So much that he’d protect his brother’s mate with his own life.
Dark red blood ran down the sides of Erman’s throat where Justice’s canines dug in just deep enough to inflict unbearable pain but not enough to kill. The vampire’s body went completely limp, his fake claws laying out to the sides. Justice had sustained a few scratches and pokes while he forced Erman’s submission, but they’d healed too rapidly to ever allow Erman to gain the upper hand.
Justice’s big wolf stood over Erman and howled his victory high into the mountains. He snarled and barked close to the vampire’s bloody throat before he finally backed away, never taking his eyes off his enemy. Blood flowed from Erman’s neck while he lay there defeated. Wick stepped forward and addressed the nearby vampires.
