“He did worse than desert you.” He laughed. “He deserted you for a Council scientist,” he screamed. “For a dirty f**king monster maker instead of killing her as he was hired to do.”
She would never convince him that her uncle hadn’t deserted her, or that he wasn’t hiding with the Council scientist he had been hired to find just before he was killed in that warehouse. And she didn’t care.
“I’ll kick his ass for you if he ever shows himself. How’s that?” she promised.
“Kick his ass and let’s roll, baby,” Lawe murmured. “Dog is friendly and was here to collect intel for Jonas before deserting the Council completely. But the dozen moving in on us are heavily armed and gunning for us. I’d like to be gone before they get much closer.”
She paused, her gaze going to Dog and the cigar he was giving her a toothy grin around. Lifting his arm, he tipped two fingers to his forehead in greeting.
“I should have known.” Loosening her muscles she stepped closer to Malcolm. “You never did inspire loyalty, Malcolm. I should have known you hadn’t done so now.”
“Fifteen minutes,” Lawe reminded her as his head bent to bestow a kiss to her forehead, a loving tribute of confidence, love and his belief in the self-confidence he could sense surging through her.
“Fifteen minutes.” She nodded then turned back to Malcolm.
She rolled her eyes. “Oh look, he’s stripped his shirt,” she stated mockingly. “God love his heart, does he really think it’s going to be that easy?”
He thought the sight of his muscles intimidated. That the flex and ripple beneath his flesh had the power to make mere mortals flinch.
Diane didn’t flinch. She didn’t leer.
She scratched at the back of her head with a sigh. “So, Malcolm darling, are we gonna rumble?”
He flexed his shoulders. “Come on, whore, let me kick your ass.”
Lawe snarled, but Diane was riding a high that held no fear of her mate’s interference, and no fear of his inability to allow her to finish the fight.
Fifteen minutes.
“This will only take ten,” she promised.
“Just make sure you save enough energy to enjoy your punishment for slipping out on me again, mate,” he suggested. “I may understand, but I’ll ensure it will never happen again.”
Pausing, her gaze raked over him, from head, to the proof of his erection beneath the jeans he wore, to the military ankle boots he wore and up again. “Have no fear, mate.” Her smile was cocky, feminine, and assured. “I’ll save plenty of energy for all the punishment you can dish out.”
“This f**king lovey-dovey bullshit is getting on my nerves, bitch,” Malcolm snarled. “Get your ass over here and let me show that unnatural son of a bitch how f**king weak his mate is. Then my friends can collect all your asses and haul you in.”
Diane grinned as they began circling each other. She’d kicked Malcolm’s ass before. It wasn’t easy. He was a dirty gutter fighter, but she knew his weaknesses. She wasn’t certain, though, how Lawe was going to react when Malcolm managed to actually pierce one of her weaknesses.
Straight off.
He jumped for her, his fist colliding with a glancing blow across her cheek and knocking her off her feet.
A violent feline snarl echoed around the clearing.
Diane didn’t bother to come to her feet. Instead, she caught herself on her shoulders, swept her legs out and knocked Malcolm off his.
Fifteen minutes or less. She didn’t have time to play fair. Not that she would have bothered anyway, but she might have drawn it out a bit, just for the humiliation Malcolm would have suffered.
As he went down, she was up. Her steel-toed boot, reinforced to add to her strength buried itself in his side before she jumped back, rounding an openhanded caress to the ground where she swept up a handful of desert sand.
Malcolm came easily to his feet, though blood smeared his side now and he favored it instinctively.
Moving in close enough to direct the sand straight to his eyes, Diane came back, her leg swinging out and up to slam the steel-toed boot straight into his jaw.
She heard it crack as he went down again.
This time when he came up, he caught her short, his fist slamming into the back of her knee and driving her to the ground as she twisted around.