Dammit all to hell. They’re shooting to kill, not to capture.
Brianna.
I don’t know how far the witch’s cloaking spell travels—if it’s confined to just this room or Brianna’s entire apartment, but I need to get to my mate.
“He’s gonna make a run for it, Phoenix!” The woman shoots again, but I jump clear to the ceiling to avoid it.
The beast howls inside me, demanding that I let him loose, but if I do, he’ll kill both SF members.
Three days ago, I wouldn’t have hesitated. I would have shifted and torn both of their throats out, but now I have my mate to think about.
She wouldn’t want them to die.
“Watch it, Priscilla!” The male SF member waves one hand, and a blue ball forms in the air.
So not a werewolf but a sorcerer.
I dodge left just as his hex flies. It smashes into the wall, leaving a crater, but the singeing ring it leaves around it has me side-stepping just as the ball reforms and flies toward me again.
A fucking tracking hex. Shit. Shit. Shit.
The blue ball forms over and over as I dodge out of the way. It explodes into everywhere I was standing just as I jump clear of it. And couple that with the SF witch and sorcerer continually shooting at me—it takes only seconds before Brianna’s living room and kitchen are completely destroyed.
Sweat rolls past my ear as I dive toward the hallway again. The witch’s blast comes within millimeters of me and singes the hair off my calf.
My attention drifts for a nanosecond to my mate. Since Brianna hasn’t made a terrified appearance in the living room, I know that means the witch’s cloaking spell is only protecting the immediate area. In other words, Brianna has no idea what’s happening fifteen feet away from her, but time is running out.
The damn tracking hex is growing bigger, and it’s getting faster. That’s how they’re designed. They learn their opponent’s moves and sooner or later, they take you out.
Even I can’t beat a tracking hex. Killing the sorcerer who created it, or making him call it off, are the only ways to stop it, which means I’m only left with one option.
Chapter 16 – Collin
I leap across the room and catapult over the sorcerer. If I hadn’t already spent months on the run, honing my skills and growing stronger every day because of the beast, I wouldn’t have been able to pull off the move.
But I do, and before the duo even knows what’s hit them, I’m behind the man with my arm locked around his throat.
“Call the hex off now, or I’ll snap your neck.” My words come out gravelly since I’ve let the beast out more. I know my eyes are glowing like headlights, and given the witch’s terrified expression, I know she believes I’ll do it.
The blue ball hovers in the air in front of me and the sorcerer. It feints right, then left, looking for a way to burn me while protecting its maker, but each time it moves, I move, too, and I use the sorcerer’s body to shield me.
“Take him out, Priscilla!” the sorcerer manages through my chokehold. He’s wheezing, and the woman’s eyes grow even wider.
“Phoenix.”
I know he’s going to call off the spell when I hear her pleading tone. Whoever these two are, they care about each other, and I’m going to use that weakness against them.
“Call it off now, or you die,” I say into his ear. I tighten my hold more, until he makes a gurgling sound.
“Phoenix!” the woman yells. “Do it!”
He mutters a counter-spell under his breath, and the blue ball vanishes. Before he’s finished uttering the last syllable, I head-butt him, effectively knocking him out. He hasn’t even crumpled to the floor before I’m on the woman.
She tries to raise her gun, but I’m too fast. I slam my fist into her head, and she falls unconscious beside her partner. The shimmering cloaking spell in the air disappears, leaving in its wake a room resembling a war zone.
“Fuck!”
I jump over the fallen SF members and am in Brianna’s room before I can blink.
“Brianna? My love?” I pull the sheets off her and haul her into my arms. I’m already striding out of the room, grabbing her clothes and whatever belongings I can snatch along the way.
“Collin?” she murmurs sleepily.
I throw what I’ve grabbed into the pack before calling upon the beast’s strength and speed and flying from the room. In the hallway, I