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Her peripheral vision caught movement. Two chupacabras had managed to evade the Black Saints and were attempting to flee. Larkin angled her body toward them and flapped her wings hard, emitting a harsh gust of air that flattened them to the ground. She blasted them with balls of hellfire, keeping them pinned in place.
Viper and his brothers were soon on the little shits. After giving her a nod of thanks, they . . . uh, well, they gripped the chupacabras hind legs and dragged them back to where they’d been playing with them. Clearly, they were still in no rush to end their prey.
Deciding she’d leave them to it, she turned her attention back to—
A loud yelp made her glance at the hounds. Four were circling a canine, protecting it from the others of the opposing side. It wasn’t dead, but its chest was very weakly rising and falling. Her stomach rolled. She sure hoped it wasn’t from Teague’s pack.
Refocusing on the hellhorses, she saw that Ronin’s beast and those flanking it had backpedaled even more. They weren’t simply tired, they were beginning to panic. They knew they were being overpowered, and they had no way to escape the situation they’d put themselves in. Well, ha.
She sent another hail of hell-ice at the bastards. She did it again. And again. And again. Hurting them. Distracting them. Coming at them from the rear so they had no way of evading attack.
A hellhorse on Ronin’s side went down, and its opponent immediately pounced—stomping on it, setting it alight with hellfire, delivering savage kicks to its head.
Another of Ronin’s friends went down, followed quickly by another. One by one, the others in their group joined them on the ground . . . until only Ronin’s steed was left standing.
Though Teague’s clan had killed their opponents, they didn’t leap on the surviving foe to aid Teague’s hellhorse. No, they stepped away. In a haze of smoke and ash, they shifted shape as the last two battling hellhorses went at it.
Observing the duel closely, Larkin quickly realized that the reason Ronin’s steed hadn’t yet been defeated wasn’t that it was some tough motherfucker. No, it was still on its feet—well, hooves—because Teague’s demon was choosing to drag the duel out. It wanted to have its fun and make its foe suffer.
Considering that Ronin had plenty to pay for, it wasn’t a surprise.
She didn’t aid Teague’s steed, knowing it would want to finish this itself. Instead, she lowered herself to the ground near his clan, who were tugging on jeans even as they watched the duel.
As she and the six males circled the fighting demons, five bloodhounds gathered close. All were battered and bruised, and some were limping. The other hounds were either dead or dying, as were five ravens. The live birds had congregated on nearby branches, looking worse for wear but not fatally wounded or—
Ronin’s hellhorse went down.
Her pulse leaped. Her demon clapped its hands with morbid glee.
The steed dragged itself upright, clearly in pain. She expected Teague’s beast to lunge and deliver the killing blow. It didn’t. Oh, it gave the fallen stallion a vicious kick all right. It simply made no attempt to kill it. Her hellhorse apparently wasn’t done yet.
Pulling her wings tight to her body, she let them ‘go’ and kept a close eye on Teague’s demon. She sure hoped he’d hurry this along, because her demon really wanted to join him, and Larkin just knew it would act like a weirdo if it did.
Time drifted from Teague’s steed as it got lost in its private battle. Attacking. Punishing. Terrorizing. Prolonging the agony. Not in any rush whatsoever to stop.
The taste of blood sat on its tongue. The thrill of battle pumped through its veins. The craving of pain and triumph came from deep in its soul.
Every counterattack from Ronin’s stallion was as weak as it was desperate. The demon was losing and knew it. Was dying and knew it.
Teague began pushing for supremacy. The demon ignored him, caught up in the duel. But Teague kept on pushing and pushing and pushing. Snarling at the persistence, the steed took its annoyance out on its opponent, bombarding it with more savage kicks.
Ronin’s bucking demon went back to all fours in an awkward move that made a rear leg buckle. It struggled to get to its feet. Failed. Struggled again. Failed once more.
Satisfied, Teague’s hellhorse snarled down at its prey and shot it a scathing look. It was during that one unguarded moment that Teague surged to the surface, forcing the demon to subside.
His teeth gritted, Teague breathed through the pain as his demon’s injuries became his own. Fire raced over several parts of his body. Aches seemed to have settled in his bones. Sweat trickled down his face, making the cuts there sting.
