shook free of his stupor and shot forth a stream of magic. It slashed across Austin, opening a gash and spilling blood down his dewy white coat. He didn’t even flinch. He roared again as he rushed forward, grabbing the mage and chomping down on his head before ripping to the side.
Something inside of me roared in response. It scrabbled to get out. To feed on his power. To bask in his strength. To merge with him, giving him some of my own power and strength. He was showing me his beast, and mine was answering in kind. Magic shed from my body, colorful light drifting into the room.
Chambers put up his hands, but not to throw a spell. He was shielding his face from what Austin was doing to the other mage. Crimson splattered across his palms.
One of the mages in the back shook into action, hands shaking so badly that the spell he churned out withered and died on the vine. Austin wasted no time, shoving furniture out of the way, knocking over anything that hindered his movement. He grabbed up that mage and ended his efforts. The last ran out of the door. Austin turned toward him, but the basajaun’s roar said he’d get there first. The mountain shook under my feet again.
“Don’t bring the mountain down on us,” I hollered, a backseat driver if ever there was one.
Austin lowered down to all fours, his predator’s gaze on Chambers as he stalked around him in a circle, putting his body between me and danger.
“I c-can save you,” Chambers said, his palms still up, his hands shaking. “I can k-keep Momar away from your brother. From y-your people.”
“As if,” Edgar said, unintentionally (I was pretty sure) sounding like a character out of a nineties movie.
Light and heat flashed in the room. Austin stood there in the flesh. “I would like to kill you for what you’ve done, but my mate is safe. I must defer to the one whose life you took.”
The huge silverback gorilla filled the doorway, his arms and legs thick with muscle, his chest robust.
“No,” the mage said, backing up, tripping over a chair and falling. “No! It wasn’t me. It was my people. I didn’t do anything!”
Austin turned, his eyes twin cobalt flames. He grabbed the rope attached to the bindings on my back. The other end was tied to a hook in the wall, and he ripped it out in one crisp gesture. “Send everyone back to the rooms,” he barked.
“Yes, sir, colonel…ah…alpha.” Edgar puffed into his insect form and zipped from the space.
“Edgar got in by knocking,” I said, heat pooling in my middle. Power still pounded in my chest, filled the air, sizzled through my blood and bones.
Mate.
I wanted to give him his due. I was ready to merge our beasts.
Mate.
I didn’t know what any of that meant, but the need was there, pulsing within me, insistent.
“I was giving orders,” Austin said, and I could barely focus on the words. “He ignored them. His first inclination was to get to your side. He’s nuts, but he’s got his heart in the right place. I won’t fault him for it.”
And then he unwrapped me, blood trickling down his cut chest, and all I could do was stand there, buzzing. Aching. Desperate for him. Wanting his arms around me, his body inside mine, his heart beating in my chest.
Click.
It felt like a giant’s hand punched through my chest, grabbed my very center—my life’s essence—and squeezed.
Suddenly I couldn’t breathe. I clutched my chest, and his heart gave one hard throb before settling into mine, our link deeper than my connection to Ivy House. Stronger than the roots of a mighty oak. Permanent.
MATE!
The world shifted, but it didn’t go anywhere. Everything changed, but nothing did.
His eyes moved over me for a beat, and then suddenly I was in his arms and he was hurriedly walking through the halls. The basajaun froze when we neared him, a head in each of his huge hands, doing some sort of end-zone dance.
Cyra looked up from a pile of char, and I did not want to know what that had been. This crew was getting out of hand.
I’d deal with them later.
“What’s happening?” But I didn’t need to ask. I already knew.
Twenty-Two
Mate. Mate. Mate. Mate. Mate.
It was a pulse within me. It was an assurance. My beast had finally accepted Austin. And so had I.
“I lo—”
“No,” he growled, reaching the end of the tunnel and cutting across the foyer.