action. He barely notices me though, the anger coursing through him is more than enough to distract him from me.
It’s kind of hot and I have to remind myself that it has nothing to do with him protecting me and everything to do with his own reputation.
“Just when I thought Gabe couldn’t get any more pathetic, he’s simping after the girl who threw him away. How does that reject pussy taste, Ardern?”
Gabe moves around me so fast that all I see is the blur of his big body moving and then they’re both on the ground. I bump into Sawyer as we both throw ourselves in front of Sage, which is dumb because she’s the badass who could light us all on fire if she wanted to.
There’s shouting over at the main house but I’m too busy backing Sage up against the pool fence, trying to keep her clear of the shifter brawl happening, to notice. I’m oddly proud to see that Gabe is kicking Martinez’s ass, just pounding on his face like he could go at it all damn day.
It feels like karma.
Sawyer groans and then steels himself as he wades into the fray to pull Gabe off of Martinez, narrowly missing a fist to the gut himself. Gabe doesn’t fight him but when they both straighten up, his eyes have a very feline look to them, his irises ringed with fire and still following his prey like he’s imagining tearing flesh from bones and picking his teeth.
It shouldn’t be so hot.
“What the hell is going on here? What have you done to my son?”
I glance around to find a crowd forming around us, muttering and with a whole lot of phones pointed in our direction. I wish I had a towel around myself but that’s the least of our problems now that Martinez’s father is here with a savage look on his face.
He’s shorter than Gabe and dressed in a suit, probably either on the council or works for someone who is. He looks a lot like his son, and he has the same gutless asshole air about him that sets my teeth on edge.
Gabe rolls his shoulders back, his jaw set like he’s planning on just taking whatever this dickhead says to him on the chin, and that doesn’t sit right with me at all.
“You always did have a vicious temper, I’ll have you off of the football team for this—”
I jump in without thought of how it looks or which of North’s rival councilmen surround us. “It was me. Gabe took a swing for me.”
As if called over by my admission, the crowd parts and Gryphon and North appear. North is holding a plate of food, which my brain registers but doesn’t really do much with because both of their faces are twin masks of thunderous, pissed-off Alpha males.
Great.
North’s eyes flick over the entire scene and then he says, “What’s happened, David?”
No one says a word, so I take the moment to butt in, throwing myself under the bus. Gabe took a swing for me and I’m not letting him take the fall for that. Football is his life, I have nothing left to lose.
“Martinez shifted in the maze during TT and hunted me down to use me as bait for the pond… girl. He started mouthing off and Gabe was defending me.”
Gryphon’s eyes shift between us both, Gabe’s knuckles still bleeding from where the line backer’s tooth broke the skin. I hold my breath, ready for him to call us both out and just be done with it, but then he turns back to the other and says, “You can’t fault Gabe for protecting his Bond… even if he took it too far. ”
David’s eyes flick back over to me and when they begin to glow, Gryphon plants himself in front of me, his hands relaxed by his side, but the tension in his shoulders tell me he’s ready to throw down with this Gifted man if he tries anything.
North shoves the plate of food at me and when he steps towards David, the crowd around us suddenly goes quiet, the fear rippling through everyone is so palpable that I almost choke on it.
Whatever he can do, it has them all freaking shaking.
“Take her home, Gabriel. Sage too, get them both out of here.”
No one dares to question him. Gabe doesn’t look fazed by the stern order either, he just grabs a towel and slings it over my shoulders while Sawyer does the same with