Caged Kitten (All the Queen's Men #2) - Rhea Watson Page 0,43

I couldn’t defend him like he did me, just a witch nobody saw as a serious physical threat, but I could pay his actions forward. I could step in for someone else.

I could make waves, just like my dragon.

“Stop!” My shout fell on deaf ears, and I waved furiously at the guards, pointing to the dogpile, incredulous—but not surprised—that they were just letting it happen. “What are you doing? Stop this!”

The pair chuckled and nudged each other in a look at this hysterical woman kind of way, and the moment quickly spiraled into just another incident where I felt helpless and lost and so very small.

“Keep your panties on, Fox,” Cooper ordered, his tone harsh—like I was the one out of line.

“A little hazing never hurt nobody,” the second warlock told me, his wolfish smile making my stomach turn. Ugh. I shoved down the desire to flip them both off and marched toward the writhing pile of fists and fury and feet, the fight in full swing.

Fight. As if this was a fight. It was a mob attack and nothing more.

I stuttered to a halt just on the cusp of it, fire in my belly that sparked and hissed like it never had before. Only for all the fight brewing in me, I had no idea where to put it—what to do, when to dive in, who to set my hands on first. I’d never been in a fight before. It never even crossed my mind. Not on a rare drunken night out at the club when someone cut in front of me for the bathroom or spilled their drink down my back on the dance floor. Not when customers at the café belittled my staff right in front of me. Not when some neighborhood kids threw rocks at Tully for kicks. Using my fists or my wand to settle things had never been my style.

And I’d like to think it wasn’t because I lacked courage, but because I could solve problems with words instead…

Words didn’t matter in here.

I lunged for Helen, smallest and meekest of the bunch, the little sparrow shifter loitering on the outskirts and smacking at the fae’s legs whenever she had the chance. However, before I could latch onto her arm, Deimos’s head snapped in my direction, his eyes completely black. He snarled and flashed a set of perfectly white, unnervingly sharp teeth—a predator guarding its kill.

Screw him.

I refused to be bullied by this tattooed freak a second longer. Trembling, I swallowed hard, braced myself, and—

Elijah beat me to it. Just as Deimos started to extract himself from the dogpile, black gaze glued to me, a huge body shoved between us, this massive wall of man blocking my view. The fire in my gut exploded, coursing through my every cell, fueled by Elijah’s proximity. It melted the fear, made me stop shaking. In his shadow, I found strength: I was ready to fight.

He was just much better at it. Swift as a striking viper, Elijah dug into the gang and ripped the two shifters in identical blue jumpsuits out. He tossed Helen and Faustus away from their usual table, and when the bird shifters righted themselves, they both appeared to try to get back in—only to lose themselves in Elijah’s gaze. I knew the feeling well, but rather than eliciting desire, the dragon’s unflinching stare seemed to scare the absolute shit out of them. Both shifters folded, eyes plummeting to the ground and shoulders rounded as they scampered back.

Gods, alpha energy was so stupidly hot.

“Stay out of it, Greystone,” Deimos ordered, his voice gruff and foul, nowhere near his usual seductive purr. Elijah squared off with him as the assault slowed on the table, the demon’s lackeys stilling and glaring us down, fae blood on their knuckles and splattered across their cheeks.

“Stop being a twat, Deimos,” Elijah fired back. “This—” He dipped his head toward the fight, to the fae on his back with his head lolled to the side, his gorgeous mouth stretched wide with soundless laughter. “—is petty, and you know it.”

Deimos rose from his place in the middle of the table, one foot on either side of the fae, lording over his carnage like a lion guarding a fallen gazelle.

Which made us the circling hyenas?

Right. That was just laughable.

“Whipped by a female, eh?” the demon snarled, wiping the blood from his mouth, his black jumpsuit splotchy with dark wet spots.

“Just sick of your shit, honestly.” I flinched when Rafe materialized at my side