Page 99 of Eternally Bound
“Did he hurt you badly?” he demanded.
“No, I barely felt anything,” she whispered. “Are you all right?”
“There isn’t a mark on me.”
She ran her hand over the front of him. “What is this?”
“It will fade.”
“What…?” Her voice trailed off, and she bit her lip as she glanced at the others who were edging closer to them.
“Purebreds are capable of almost anything when their mate is in trouble,” he told her and looked pointedly at the hunters nearby, making it clear that if they tried anything with her, he would joyfully tear them all apart too.
Keeping his arms around her, he lifted her from the ground when he rose to face the others. The roof of the warehouse gave way with a loud crack; smoke and flames burst high into the air as bricks crumpled and fell.
“We have to get out of here before the humans arrive,” he said and focused on Nathan. “We have much to discuss.”
“We do,” Nathan replied, though he was paler than he had been as he stared at Ronan.
“I know a place if you’ll follow us.”
“We will,” Nathan said.
Kadence buried her face in Ronan’s neck and inhaled his scent. She slid her fingers into his hair when he started walking across the ground with her. Reluctantly, she leaned away to look at him. His eyes still glistened like rubies, but that reddish-black hue was retreating from his face.
“Why did your skin change like that?” she asked as she ran her fingers over his face. Some of the color remained in his cheeks, but his skin felt no different to her.
Her words drew his attention to the color seeping out of his hands. “Because the demon part of me was close to the surface,” he replied. “Closer than it’s ever been before. I’ve witnessed it happening to a purebred before, but I’ve never experienced it. When that part of a purebred is unleashed, there is little they can’t do. They can even enter a house uninvited and break the rules that normally govern our kind.”
“Does it only happen with purebreds?”
“Yes… well, at least it only used to be purebreds. You are a new entity, so who knows what you might be capable of doing.”
Her lips flattened as her fingers played with the hair at his nape. “I would do anything to destroy someone who attacked you,” she replied.
He couldn’t help but smile over the possessive tone of her voice. “I believe you.”
CHAPTER 44
Ronan turned on the lights within the closed hotel as he moved through it. Baldric purchased the property in Falmouth for him last month, not for the hotel part of it, but for the fifteen acres of land that came with it, a rarity on Cape Cod and an investment for Ronan. The hotel had closed for the winter months before he’d purchased it.
Ronan expected to add the property to his collection and forget about it, but they’d been close enough to it today for it to make a good meeting place for now.
The briny scent of the ocean filled the air as the waves crashed on the shore outside of the boarded-over windows. He kept his arm around Kadence as he walked, not to protect her, but because he needed her calming presence right now. He’d regained most of his control, but it wouldn’t take much to push him over the edge again.
Arriving at the restaurant area, he flicked on the lights and strode over to pull a chair from the top of one of the tables. Dust floated up as he set the chair on the ground and settled Kadence onto it.
“Will you be sitting?” he asked Nathan.
“Not unless you are,” he replied.
Ronan smiled at him as he pulled down two more chairs and placed them on the ground. The others spread out around the room, but didn’t bother to remove the chairs from any of the remaining tables. Ronan hadn’t expected them to.
“Your injuries from last week have healed well,” Nathan said. “I would have thought the bolt hole from a crossbow would take longer to close.”
The hunter was brave for digging at him in such a way, or stupid, but he’d come to realize Kadence and her brother were far from stupid. Nathan was trying to learn more about him.
“I heal faster than most,” Ronan replied. “As it seems, you do too. Broken noses don’t often heal within a week.”
