From the right of Ronan, a wave of Savages rushed forward with a unified cry of bloodlust. A scream lodged in Vicky’s throat as the first of twenty more monsters emerged from the smoke. Before the Savages could collide with Ronan, vampires and hunters poured through the smoke to clash with the Savages. Cries of victory turned to ones of pain as the Savages were brought down.

Joseph turned to flee, but Kadence darted to the side, heading him off, and Nathan ran at him from behind. When Joseph spun to escape in another direction, Vicky moved to intercept him.

The spreading flames heated Vicky’s back and caused her hair to dance in the billowing wind. Smoke burned her throat as the four of them closed in on Joseph while Declan, Lucien, and Saxon advanced from the other side.

Cornered, Joseph turned and charged straight at Vicky with teeth bared. She braced her legs apart, waiting for him to get closer before dropping suddenly.

It was a move she’d perfected during training, one that had thrown Aiden and other trainees off as she hit the ground flat on her back. Not expecting it, Joseph could have run over her, or she could have rolled out from under him. This time, she threw up her right leg, kicking him square in the nuts.

Joseph’s breath exploded out of him. He was lurching downward when Nathan swung an uppercut under his chin that shot his head back and caused blood to explode from his mouth. Ronan snatched Joseph from behind, and his arm snaked around the Savage’s neck. Joseph was taller than Ronan, but Ronan lifted him off the ground until Joseph’s eyes bulged and his feet kicked against Ronan’s shins.

Two Savages raced out of the smoke and crashed into Ronan’s side, knocking his hold on Joseph free. Kadence cried out as Ronan spun to tear one of the Savage’s hearts out, but half a dozen more Savages jumped on him.

Nathan pounced on Joseph’s back and brought him down like a velociraptor on a cow. He drove Joseph’s face into the ground until blood burst free and his features became nothing more than mush. Joseph’s teeth littered the ground, blood oozed from his ears, eyes, and nose, and still, Nathan continued to batter him.

Vicky’s scent filled his nose as she stepped beside him and rested her hand on his shoulder. “Nathan.”

He resisted her for a second, but then he shoved Joseph’s head away and jumped to his feet. His shoulders heaved with every inhalation as he stood over the prone body of the man who had inflicted so much damage on his family and his kind. Lifting his arm, he went to wipe away the blood splattering his face before realizing it saturated every part of him.

He wanted nothing more than to drive a stake through the bastard’s heart, but for now, Joseph was more useful to them alive. He would go into Ronan’s prison where they could question him and learn everything he knew before destroying him. And Nathan would take great pleasure in killing him slowly.

Lifting his head, Nathan’s wrath ebbed as he met Vicky’s troubled gaze. He was reaching for her when Joseph suddenly rolled and jumped to his feet. His face resembled pancake batter, but he was still healthy enough to smash his hand into Nathan’s chest.

Nathan grunted, his body bowed backward as Joseph’s fist shoved through flesh and bone in search of his heart. This invasion of his body didn’t hurt as bad as the Savage’s bite, but pain still flared out from his severed nerve endings and broken bones. Joseph’s finger scraped his heart, and the beat of it altered. It all happened so fast that Nathan didn’t have a chance to react at first.

Through their bond, Vicky’s terror and panic engulfed him as her hands wrapped around Joseph’s wrist. She tried to pull Joseph back, but the Savage was stronger than her.

Nathan couldn’t die here, he wouldn’t allow her to die, and he wouldn’t let this bastard be the one to kill him. Over Vicky’s hands, Nathan seized Joseph’s wrist, restraining the Savage from wrapping his hand around his heart.

“No!” Vicky screamed.

She couldn’t lose Nathan, not after everything they’d been through, not when she’d finally allowed herself to envision a future for them.

“I killed the father. Now I’ll kill the son,” Joseph taunted, his words distorted by his toothless mouth and battered face.

Nathan held Joseph’s ruby eyes as he twisted his wrist to the side. Together, he and Vicky succeeded in pulling his wrist back an inch.

Red and black color swirled through Vicky’s hands as power the likes of which she’d never known suffused her. Her muscles felt like someone had placed her on a rack and stretched for days, but her fingers squeezed down. Joseph hissed out a breath when she felt the give of the bones in his wrist; he didn’t let up as his muscles flexed against her palms and his hand slid a little way into Nathan again.

“No!” she spat. She’d tear Joseph to pieces for this.

“Nathan!” Kadence shouted.

Kadence appeared at Vicky’s side. Her hands encased Vicky’s, and together the three of them finally succeeded in wrenching Joseph’s hand from Nathan’s chest. Joseph swung his other hand up, but Vicky caught it before he could hit Nathan. Kadence lifted a stake over her head and plunged it into Joseph’s chest.

Blood exploded from Joseph’s mouth, but the stake had missed his heart. Joseph spun, tearing his hand from Vicky’s grasp and backhanding Kadence across the face. Kadence cried out as the blow flung her away, and Ronan’s roar reverberated through the air. Joseph twisted back, but before he could smack Vicky, Nathan jumped in front of her.

“Nathan!” she screamed as Joseph’s blow lifted him off his feet and threw him fifty feet away.

Joseph spun toward her, his shoulders hunched up and his nostrils flaring like a bull preparing to charge. Over Joseph’s shoulder, Vicky spotted more Savages coming toward them through the smoke. Having finished off the last of his attackers, Ronan launched to his feet to intercept a Savage bounding toward Kadence.

They’re coming for Joseph, Vicky realized with a sinking sensation. Whether it was to save their leader or destroy him before he could be captured and interrogated, she didn’t know, but the Savages wouldn’t be stopped.

“Killing you will kill him,” Joseph said, his voice sounding like what she imagined a talking snake would.

And then he was coming at her.

Before she could react, a booming explosion rent the air. In what seemed to be slow motion, fire raced over Vicky’s back and seared away her flesh. Bits of flaming debris, chunks of wood, and a kitchen sink flew by her as she was lifted off her feet. She somersaulted through the air, flashes of ground, smoke, and sky filling her vision as flames crackled and screams resounded all around her.

Then, she felt the air falling away as she fell back toward the earth. When she hit the ground, air burst from her lungs and earth plowed up before her as she skidded ten feet on her stomach before coming to a stop near a tree. Dirt clogged her nose as she inhaled shallow breaths, and tremors racked her brutalized body. It took her a minute to realize some of the smoke and snapping flames around her were coming from her charred flesh.

“I’ve got you, don’t move,” Declan commanded.

He pulled off his shirt as he knelt at her side and beat out the flames consuming her flesh. She thought it should hurt, but she couldn’t feel anything. She only knew the fire was being put out by the dwindling noise and smoke coming from her.

“Nathan?” she whispered.

“He’s fine. He was thrown fifty feet in the other direction. You were the closest; you got it the worst.”

She tried to reach out to Nathan through their bond, but she was too weak. “What… what happened?”

“Gas line or propane tank, I’m assuming,” Declan said as he finished putting out the flames.

Vicky’s teeth started to chatter as goose bumps broke out on her non-charred skin. She was burnt to a crisp, yet freezing.

“We have to go,” Saxon said as he arrived at Declan’s side.

“Vicky!” Abby screamed, and then her sister was kneeling beside her.

“I’m fi… fi… ne,” she said through chattering teeth.

“I’ve got her,” Aiden said as he knelt beside Declan and gently slid his arms under her stomach. “Don’t move.”

“Nathan. I… I want… to… to see Nathan.”

Aiden turned her, and when she lifted her head, she spotted Nathan running through the smoke toward her. At his side, Ronan carried Kadence in his arms. Nathan’s eyes were wild when he halted beside her. Blood cleaved his ripped shirt to the torn flesh of his chest, but he seemed not to notice as he clasped her face.

“Vicky,” Nathan whispered, unable to keep the tears from choking his voice or a tremor from his hands. The black and peeling flesh of her back was broken only by raw skin and blisters. I wish it was me, he thought.

I don’t.

He hadn’t realized he’d mentally communicated the thought to her until she responded. She closed her eyes when he tenderly kissed her.

“You’re going to be okay,” he whispered.

“Ye-yes.”

“We have to go,” Ronan said as wailing sirens sounded in the distance.

Nathan eased her from Aiden’s hold. Vicky draped her arms around his neck and wrapped her legs around his waist; she bit back a scream when the motion caused her burnt back to crack. Pain lanced across the nerve endings already putting themselves back together.

Over his shoulder, she watched as hunters and vampires lifted the bodies of the dead and dying Savages and tossed them into the spreading fire. Others carried dead and wounded hunters and vampires while they ran from the stronghold.

“Joseph… is… is… he…?”

“He got away,” Nathan said. “Some of his cronies grabbed him when the house exploded.”

“No,” she moaned.

“We will get him.” Gently, he clasped the back of her head and pressed it into his neck. “Feed,” he commanded as he started running.