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The forest grew quieter and quieter, until all I could hear were the sounds of my feet crunching the leaves.
There wasn’t even any damned wind.
I pushed myself harder, ignoring the pain and stress and fear—and then skidded to a stop when one of the massive bastards from earlier stepped out from behind a tree in front of me.
Three
“What the fuck?”I snarled at the man, my heart pounding wildly as every ounce of terror I’d ignored for the past few hours surged to the surface. “Don’t fucking touch me.”
The man studied me, his gaze sort of… thoughtful.
It wasn’t the tatted, blond guy with the scary grin, luckily. Or the buzzed-head bicep-tat guy, who had given me that intense stare.
The guy in front of me was the one with black hair and light skin, and the muscle tee and pants.
At least it wasn’t one of the half-naked ones.
“What do you want?” I demanded, when he didn’t say a damned word. “Iwon’tbe your mate.”
He kept studying me.
It was way worse than if he’d just said something slimy.
When he finally spoke, he said, “You’ve almost made it. If you hadn’t picked up that scale, you would’ve.”
“Almost made itwhere?” I ripped the red thing out of my pocket and eyed it for a moment.
Scale.
Dragonscale.
Fucking hell.
I chucked the damn thing into the forest, earning a hint of a smirk from the black-haired man. Fae. Fae-man. Thing.
Whatever the hell he was.
“The Stronghold. When a woman isn’t claimed during the hunt, she goes there.” He nodded his head in the direction I’d been running. There was nothing visiblythere, but it was in the direction of a mountain range that had seemed like the easiest target to run toward. “Your beast’s instincts have been taking you there, I’m sure.”
Mywhat?
Fuck this conversation.
“What will it take for you to leave me here, without touching me, so I can go to the fucking Stronghold by myself?” I practically growled at the man. “A kiss? A blowjob? A punch to the fucking nuts?”
The question earned me an amused chuckle. “Who said I was going to ask for something in exchange?”
His response caught me off guard for a moment, but I scowled at him anyway. “You’re a man. Men are predictable.”
His amusement died, and then his eyes darkened. I hadn’t realized they were light until he took two steps and somehow closed the gap between us with just those motions.
Our bodies were only an inch apart.
My head tipped back and his tilted down as he said in a deadly voice, “I’m adragon, female. You may know men, but you know nothing of me.”
His fingers brushed the side of my throat, and an electric pulse rushed through me. I inhaled sharply, taking an instant step backward. “Don’t fucking touch me,” I snarled at him, my voice a hell of a lot shakier than I wanted to admit.
“The Stronghold is this way.” He tilted his head in the direction of the mountains. “If you’d like to avoid being claimed, we’ll need to hurry.”
