“Now, I’m curious. You want a round?” Blair offered.
Avani sized her up in one glance. Honestly, for a witch, she really was in top form. Every one of her limbs was toned. She moved like a warrior, with confidence and smoothness.
“Sure,” she replied. “As long as you’re allowed to use magic, too.”
She didn’t like unfair fights.
Blair lifted a brow. “You can’t cast any spells. I could block you and punch you. That wouldn’t exactly be fair.”
“Have you ever fought a wolf?” Avani asked.
Blair shook her head. “I’ve seen some going at each other in the yard, though. They don’t mix with the rest of us.”
“There’s a reason for that. You guys might use magic, but we are magic.”
She’d never fought a witch herself so she might be talking out of her ass, but she preferred to lose than to accidentally rip a friend’s head off.
“All right. Let’s start a fight, and I’ll use magic if I need to.”
Avani walked to the plush mat Chloe and Cat had vacated to join Gwen and Greer on the sideline.
“Yield or draw blood to lose.” Chloe self-appointed herself as their referee. “And go.”
Blair started to move from one foot to the next, pacing, getting her footing. Avani remained still.
She cocked back her fist and lunged. Avani saw the blow coming a mile away. Instead of moving to evade it, she let Blair punch her with all her might, and smiled at her and grabbed her fist with one hand, then held her by the throat with the next. Wolves often went for the throat if they could—their animal liked demanding submission that way. If she’d been fighting an enemy, it would have been over. Seeing as she had no intention of breaking her neck or lifting her in the air and watching her draw her last breath, she kicked her back instead.
The damn woman hadn’t listened; she hadn’t used her magic, even to cushion her fall. So Avani ran past her as she was pushed backward and placed herself between Blair and the wall before she cracked her skull on the wooden beam.
Helping her back on her feet, she asked, “You all right?”
Blair stared blankly.
“Did I hurt you?” she repeated.
Blair shook her head. “No, I mean. Just my pride. Fuck. What was that?”
“Speed and strength.”
She returned to the mat. “Again, if you’re ready. With your magic, this time.”
Blair didn’t protest. She erected a translucent blue shield and yellow energy coated her feet, increasing her power.
Avani frowned. “Do you have anything for speed?”
Blair winced. “I can’t maintain all three spells at once.”
“Then don’t. Just cast them and only hold them in place as you need them. The shields when I attack, the power when you hit. But speed is your best bet against sups like shifters.”
Blair complied, letting go of both spells and replacing them with a green aura. Her movement now twice as quick, she moved fast and hard. Her training was clearly a lot more technical than Avani’s; she went for fancy roundhouse kicks and nice, clean punches that she’d probably learned in some martial art lesson. Avani was all brawl. She’d learned to fight in the Elder Pack and it showed. She blocked. She punched. She grabbed and threw back.
Blair’s attacks now twice as powerful as they’d been at first, she definitely packed a mean punch. But she couldn’t bring back her shield fast enough to avoid Avani’s riposte. Avani would have been able to kill her five times if it had been a real fight. In the end, Blair won; she got her in a headlock and Avani good-naturedly yielded.
“Well done.”
Blair snorted. “You could have gone for a killing blow like, ten times.”
She wasn’t wrong. Avani had just enjoyed herself. She was all sweaty, and also happy. Nothing said friendship as much as punching each other every now and then.
Mostly because she was insane.
“That’s true.”
Avani turned to find the scary, eerily white-clad vamp standing right behind Chloe and Cat. The two vamps started like they hadn’t seen Ruby come either.
“You pulled back.”
Avani shrugged. “I was sparring.”
With a fragile-ish witch.
“Yes. Which is why you’ll fight me now. I want to see what you’re capable of.”
Then Ruby smiled.
Shit.
Temptation
Movies weren’t safe at all. For one, Avani had a thing for tucking her legs under her and lowering her head to the arm of the sofa; before the end of the movie, her legs somehow ended up extended, and he naturally put them on his lap.
They felt right there. Looked right, too, in the soft, tight yoga pants she wore most days.
She was starting school on Monday, which meant that she was moving out soon, in a matter of days. He should be delighted about it. He was delighted about it. He’d helped her pack her belongings, going as far as lending her a suitcase.
“I’ll miss this bathroom,” she’d said with a sigh.
“Come back to use it any time.”
That was the natural, polite answer.
Never mind the fact that Alexius Helsing wasn’t a polite person at the best of times.
He paced his house, frustrated and unreasonably angry. Where was she? She made it back by nightfall most days. Had she already left, without saying goodbye? Shit.
He considered walking upstairs to check if her borrowed suitcase was still in his sister’s room when he smelled her.
Her blood.
In a heartbeat, he was at the entrance of the house, looking her over. He inched her black silk top down her chest and up her tummy, lifted her leggings to check her legs.
“What happened?” His voice was deceptively calm.
She had bruises all over, a large one on her breast and another, almost as big, on her shin.
As she said nothing, he looked behind her to Chloe, who was supporting her weight. “What. Happened.”
He repeated it in a tone that held a warning.
“Chill,” Avani finally said.
There was no way he’d chill when she’d come home in this state.
“Was it the wolves?”
If so, they were dead. Every single one of them.
Avani rolled her eyes. “I was just sparring with Ruby. We got a little overexcited, I guess.”
Alexius’s eyes flashed as he lifted his gaze to the nearby row of trees, catching Ruby’s distinctive scent.
“Don’t get your panties in a wad, Dracula,” Chloe said. “She left Ruby in a worse state.”
Alexius’s eyes widened, and he was momentarily distracted by the rage that had started to bubble out of his chest. “You did?”
His tone held wonder now. Shit, he might not have dared sparring with Ruby. The woman was patently insane.
“Sure did. Except she’s probably all healed now. Vampire healing is cheating.”
He shook his head, finally stepping to her side to take Chloe’s place. “I've got her.”
He rushed her to her favorite place on the sofa in the blue and gold drawing room.
“No more moving for you for a bit. What would you like to eat and drink?”
Avani groaned. “I was going to cook, you know. To thank you for your hospitality.”
“No thanks necessary. You relax.”
She didn’t argue, thankfully. Like he’d let her slave in the kitchen when she looked like a punching bag.
“It’s been some time since I’ve treated one of you. Are you in pain? Will you heal fast or should I speed it up?” He was moments away from offering elixir for a few bruises.
“I’m a little sore, but I’ll be fine in an hour or so. The bruising will have faded by tomorrow. No need for anything.”
It added up, from what he remembered of shifter healing.
“Wine, then?”
“Please.”
He served her a glass of a nice Merlot and poured his, adding a drop of blood to spice it up. “I don’t know if I want to praise you for holding your own or ask what possessed you to fight Ruby.”
Avani laughed. “Well, she informed me that I was fighting her. I don’t think I was given much choice in the matter. It was fun. And I won, by the way.”
Jesus. “Really?”
“Well, I had to shift. But I got a good chunk of her leg, yeah. First blood won.”
He frowned. “I smell your blood, though.”
“I just scraped my knees a bit. It’s already healing.”
Not fast enough for his liking. He didn’t question himself; he brought his wrist to his lips and bit down till he drew blood. Alexius handed her his arm. It was only when she looked up at him, her big eyes full of questions, that he realized something.
He drank from his lovers—witches, regular humans, the occasional vampire—though he’d never given his blood before. To anyone.
Their blood did have healing properties, and there was nothing wrong, per se, about giving it to someone else to help them. However, the action was…intimate.
Some vampires got a kick out of being sucked on, and Alexius wasn’t one for criticizing kinks. That said, it was considered pretty taboo. Lewd, even. Sucking his dick would have been less intimate than drinking his blood.
“You don’t want bruises when you start school on Monday, right?”
She frowned, before bringing his arm to her lips. And again, she hesitated.
“I didn’t take you for the cowardly sort.”
Avani rolled her eyes. “I’m not. I’m just thinking—that won’t turn me into one of you, right?”
Ah. A pertinent question. “No. For a mortal to become one of us, it takes a lot more blood. Only born vampires can transition with a few drops. And, well, you’d have to die. Don’t do that if you can help it.”
This time, she did open her mouth, closing it on his wrist. Then she looked down. The wound was already closed.
“Damn. That’s pretty neat.”
He laughed, inching his arm away to bite it again, but her teeth were already sneaking out, sharper than any human's, larger than a vampire’s. A set of wolf’s fangs.