“Good thing I did, yeah? You sly cat, you told me Ouachita was only a clan of Nine.”
Gash scowled. “I like to keep you on your toes.”
“Ah, you do, don’t you? Always have.”
He jerked his shoulders back twice, like he was shaking something from his back. A conscience maybe? Adira could only hope.
“Is this your mate, Gash?” he asked, gesturing to Bailey. Crudely, he tilted his head to the side, letting his gaze roll the length of her body, measuring her up before giving her a chin shrug. “Not bad, brother. Not bad at all. A little more than a man like you needs in the hips. Don’t need all that padding unless you really intend to lay into her…”
Gash rumbled out a warning growl.
“…but I definitely didn’t expect you to manage a female so pretty.” Felix’s face turned cruel. “Not with that mark on your face.”
Gash snarled a furious sound, pressing Bailey back behind him.
Felix smirked. “But hey, some women like a man that never offers a challenge. They’ll curl up with those ugly ones because they don’t have to fight other females for ‘em. It all works out, I guess.”
A hiss blistered through the clearing, and then a high pitched roar. Bailey. She hadn’t turned but her eyes flickered dangerously.
“Or… I don’t know… maybe we could share her. Like we did our toys when we were little. That way she knows what it’s like to have a real man behind her instead of a weak piece of shit like you.”
“Don’t you dare talk about my mate like that!” She stepped around Gash, stomping forward as if she intended to claw Felix’s eyes from his skull.
“Bailey!” Gash warned, reaching for her but missing.
She marched forward, and he ran after her, but it was too late. Even with Magic’s panther bounding forward and snarling for her to stop, she reached Felix before Gash could catch her. A resounding smack across the other shifter’s face echoed through the circle, and when Bailey drew her hand back, blood oozed from three claw marks.
“There,” she said, huffing with anger. “Now you have a mark to match. But it doesn’t matter because what makes you ugly is what’s inside. And my mate is gold inside. Gold. Even with everything you’ve put him through.”
Felix stared at her, calmly wiping his cheek and sucking the blood from his finger before giving her an empty smile. “I know,” he said low. “That’s why this is going to hurt him so much, and feel so damn good to me.”
Bailey’s face scrunched in a frown as Gash reached to pull her away. But with no further warning, Felix moved like lightning, yanking her to his chest. One hand tangled in her hair to jerk her head up and the other wrapped around her throat, his claws digging in to hold her still.
Gash, panicked, reached for her, but stopped when he noticed his brother’s claws drawing blood. His hands went to his head, eyes wide and desperate.
Adira felt hers go wet.
“No,” Mirena whispered, glancing desperately to the sky. “Come on… come on…”
If they could just catch one free light to pull from, it might not be enough, but they’d try. They’d try so hard.
Cats hissed and snarled from every direction. The tension was blistering. One thing to set them off is all it would take, and then this would be a blood bath.
“Felix,” Gash breathed, his hands in front of him in surrender. “Please,” he ground out. “Please don’t hurt her. I’ll go with you. You can take it out of my skin. Whatever you want from me, you can have it. Just please… please don’t hurt her.”
Felix’s expression lost all sense of formality, twisting into a thing of rage. “Oh, I can make it quick. She wouldn’t feel a thing. I could slice through her jugular with one flick of my wrist. But there’s nothing fun about that, and you certainly wouldn’t learn your lesson. And when it all boils down, that’s what needs to happen here.”
Gash shook his head, eyes pinned to a furious Bailey while he tried to negotiate with Felix. “A lesson? Okay, alright. I get it. I can’t escape you. I’ve learned it. Please. Let her go.”
“Not good enough,” Felix whispered, his eyes going glassy. Some far away memory made him pause before he continued. “Pops told me to teach you your lessons. That you needed to learn, the way I did. But you never learn, brother. You never fucking learn.” His voice had risen to a screech, and he seemed to catch himself, his next words sounding oh so quiet in comparison. “So I’ll have to make it hurt real bad. Worse than ever before. This is the way you will finally learn.”