I straddled his pitiful form as he cowered on the ground, attempting to protect his face. “Oh, I’m taking her. After I beat the shit out of you. Then kill you.”
The tsunami hit with full-blown rage as the image of Rayne dangling from her neck, eyes wide with horror, lips trembling.
“Kilter. End it. We need out. Now!” Quill ran at me, grabbed my arm and pulled me off the wheezing husband. “We have two minutes before this place blows.”
I yanked my arm from his grip, bent, and threw another punch so hard my knuckles cracked as they hit his skull.
“Stop. He’ll be dead soon enough.” Quill shoved me in the chest. I shoved him back then took a step toward her husband again.
“I want to see this bastard die.”
I heard the choked sob behind me and looked over my shoulder. The girl’s eyes were wide and horrified as she stared at her husband. His face was unrecognizable, eyes swollen shut, nose off to the side, teeth missing and blood everywhere.
I glared at her. “Don’t tell me you give a shit about him?”
Her gaze darted from her husband to me. Then she stepped back, head shaking side to side. It took me four strides to reach her.
“Kilter,” Quill warned.
I ignored him, grabbed her hand, yanked a knife from the sheath attached to my thigh, and slapped the hilt into her palm. “Finish him.”
Her breath hitched as her eyes darted to her husband then back to me. “I… I can’t.”
I grunted. “He deserves to die.”
“Yes,” she whispered.
“And you should be the one to do it for whatever the fuck he’s done to you.”
She swallowed, eyes shifting to her husband who was currently moaning while he rolled around on the ground.
She didn’t move.
Fuck it. Fine. She didn’t have the stomach for killing, I did.
I snatched the knife from her hand and strode over to her husband, straddling him. Then in one fluid motion, stabbed the dagger into his stomach.
A gurgled sound escaped his throat and blood dripped from the corner of his mouth. “You won’t die for a few minutes yet. But you will die. It’s a fatal wound.” I lowered my voice and leaned closer. “Enjoy the pain.”
“Let’s get out of here, man,” Quill said.
I wiped the blood from my dagger on my khaki cargo pants then put it back in the sheath before I stalked to the girl, grabbed her hand, and then hauled ass to the wall.
JEDRIK FLIPPED OUT THE moment I walked through the door into the Toronto Talde house. Actually, flipped out was too mild of a description. More like he seriously freaked and was one pissed off Scar.
By the time I left Liam’s, it had been sunrise, and instead of going home to Danni’s gallery where I currently lived, I came to the Talde house to use the state-of-the-art gym in the basement. Even though Jedrik lived here, along with the other Toronto Scars, I’d expected him to be either in bed sleeping or in the bed of his flavor of the week.
He wasn’t.
He was up raiding the fridge.
“This is flippin’ bullshit, Delar. Are you shittin’ me? Liam? I can smell the bastard all over you. Goddamn stupidest thing you’ve ever done. Okay, it compares to hooking up with hothead Edan—fuck, what are you doing? Liam? A goddamn vampire?”
“Okay, you’ve said that,” I muttered as I leaned up against the wall in the foyer.
Jedrik paced the Persian runner, head low, blond curls bouncing with each furious step. “A vampire? A bloody vampire?” Jedrik repeated himself when he was angry. Maybe because it was so unusual he ever lost it that he needed to double up on the rare occasions he did. “Waleron hears of—”
“He won’t,” I interrupted.
Tac, aka Waleron, finding out I was sleeping with a vampire would be the kicker to my already screwed-up extracurricular activities. That controlled cool he exuded might just crack. Or he’d have to pop a few more of those fucking pills. Either way, it wouldn’t be pretty.
Maybe in some masochistic way, I wanted Jedrik to find out. I needed him to yell and scream and tell me how stupid I was being.
“He found out about Edan. What the hell is with you lately? You take off for two years, no email, no text, no nothing, and then reappear as a Wraith’s sex toy. And now you switch gears and you’re a vampire’s sex toy.”
I stiffened. “This doesn’t concern you, Arrow.”
“Yeah, it does concern me because you’re my best friend.” Jedrik shook his head, hands clenched at his sides. “Liam. Fuck.” He snorted. “It’s Waleron. This has something to do with him. Right? Of course, I’m right. It always has to do with him.” He didn’t give me a chance to answer as he continued. “You’re using these guys like he does Trinity for her visions. Except with you, it’s more than that, isn’t it?” I tensed at how close he was to the truth. “Is it working for you? Well, I sure as fuck hope it has worked its way out of your ass, because I’m not going to stand by and lose you again. Liam finds out you’re using him, he’ll kill you and screw the truce.”
Maybe, but I doubted it.
I was, however, pushing it this time. Hooking up with a Wraith was taboo, frowned upon, yeah, even against the rules, but the Scars and Wraiths were on the same side. Liam might have a truce with the Scars, but he was still the enemy, even if I was doing this to attain info.
“I’ll cool it,” I said, avoiding his eyes as he stepped in front of me.