~

 

“You can get off me now. You’ve made your point,” Fallon said with a small sigh of resentment for his good looks, his, sort-of charm, and his ability to pin her on her back when the mood took him, and a body that was as hard as it was sexy…

She hated that. All of it, but especially the last one.

It didn’t seem right that fate would leave you with only one real out to mating, and that was to kill your mate.

Of course, you could always leave him behind, but that amounted to the same thing, because a male who lost his mate was nine out of ten times likely to go rogue…

You would have to be one frosty female to walk out on your mate and leave him for dead…

“I could, but you’re so cushiony soft,” Jamie teased back, and he had no choice but to grit his teeth when the sting of her magic ripped across his body…

She could, of course, reconsider her frosty side at any damn time that she chose…

“A woman doesn’t like to hear that she’s fat,” Fallon bit out, and she meant it…

“Not fat … curvy … and in all the right places,” Jamie managed to bit out the words from between his clenched teeth. The witch definitely had a sting to her magic.

The instant relief of her magic being turned off made every inch of him relax at once, almost every inch, because lying against her like that meant that he wasn’t going to get any instant relief from the ache at his groin.

He allowed his muscles to relax and almost forgot to hold his weight off of her body … he snapped back to attention because he knew that a squished mate would be a bad thing…

“That’s different.”

“Glad to hear it. Maybe you should ask questions first and zap later,” Jamie berated her.

“Where’s the fun in that?” She offered him a smug grin and her eyes shone with bright mischief of a witch that was enjoying flexing her magical muscles.

“Fun – for who?” he tossed back, trying to pull his mind out of being bedazzled by her.

It was a rhetorical question, and she knew it, but that didn’t stop a smirk from growing on her lips, or a twinkle of mischief to reside in her eyes – eyes that he knew he could get lost in given half the chance.

Mine…

His beast knew it too. It knew his moods and he was in the mood to love her.

Zapped or not – that didn’t stop every inch of his body from wanting to be pressed naked against every inch of hers.

It certainly didn’t stop his hard length twitching against her thigh.

And it definitely didn’t stop the fever that was growing within his blood to taste her on his tongue…

“Don’t you want to make your mate happy?” She turned her head slightly and offered him a sideways glance and a cheeky grin that was full of mischief and mirth.

“Sure,” he said on a slow nod. “I just don’t want to give up a pound of flesh to do it.”

“How about a little fur? Smoking or non-smoking?”

Jamie opened his mouth to speak, but his beast made a sound like Scooby Doo, questioning their mate’s words, and the man couldn’t help but smile.

“I think you just scared my wolf,” Jamie offered on a teasing smile.

“Ok, but going after a poor dumb creature is wrong…” she shrugged, and the beast grumbled…

“My beast is glad to hear it,” Jamie smiled.

“I was talking about you – your wolf is safe with me.” That mischievous smile was spellbinding, and he was once again lost in it.

Jamie couldn’t resist the urge that shot through him to kiss her, and he brought his lips down on hers before she saw it coming.

Her eyelids slammed shut, her heart lurched, and her body flooded with a massive jolt of pure pleasure that hit her womb and made her gasp at the sheer intensity of it.

Fallon didn’t have a chance to second guess what her body did as she melted beneath him.

Fire met ice and turned it to steam.

 

~

~

~

 

“Don’t you have anything more productive to do?” Sarah admonished her aunt.

“Yes, I could be feasting on a witch, care to join me out on the porch?” Chloe snarked back.

Chloe wasn’t in the mood to be nice and chatty – or maybe that should have been nice or chatty. She wanted to play in the big sandbox and her mate had made her promise to stay out of it.

How was she going to learn to kill the big, bad vampires if she wasn’t allowed to kill the big, bad vampires?

She got that Monty was one big ball of nervous hypersensitivity when it came to her, a newbie, going out in the world alone, and possibly dying at the hands of someone – anyone – but she would never hone her fighting skills if she didn’t practice them.

After all, she’d been practicing her magic from a very early age and by the time that she’d died, some eight decades and change later, she still didn’t know everything…

I was a wickedly badass witch back in the day though…

Now I need to be a wicked badass vampire in my new life…

How am I going to do that if Monty keeps benching me?

Simple …

I go around Monty…

“I hate to say bite me, because that really must grate of your last damn nerve … oh wait, bite me!” Sarah tossed back, and Chloe rolled her eyes and allowed her fangs to elongate…

If I can’t have fun with the witches…

Bring on the vampire.

Chloe had one last thing on her to-do list before she joined the hunt – she stepped out in front of the large picture window and waited for Sarah to snap her eyes towards her – then she flipped her the bird.

Actions speak louder than words – I think I spoke quite eloquently.

 

~

~

~

 

Nathan caught the scent of the unwelcome vampire in the air and he scanned the woods looking for anything out of place.

He knew that Monty had gone high to his going low, and the vampire was up in the trees somewhere. He couldn’t see him or hear him, and he’d pay a pound to a penny that Jaxon was just as damn stealthy.

He regretted that he’d traded his beast’s weight and power in order to be able to communicate with Monty when he’d decided not to shift into his wolf.

His fangs were in place and his claws were out, but aside from that – he only had his strength and speed to rely on.

Nathan spun on his heels at the sound that came from behind him. The air around him was displaced by the speed of the vampire as he launched his attack.

He got in one good swipe of his claws down the man’s chest, opening up his skin, before he was knocked sideways with so much power that his head spun.

Nathan’s back hit the solid trunk of the tree with enough force to fill every inch of him with screaming pain, and knock the breath right out of his lungs…

He knew that something was broken inside of him – he just didn’t know what.

‘Jamie, I’m down – Monty will be fighting alone…’

‘Damn it, brother, recon – you said recon…’ His brother’s anger made him second guess his own choices.

He may have screwed up. He may have been wrong.

He just hoped that Monty could do the job alone…