Page 70 of Shark 2

“She must feel fine if she’s saying all that,” Jong-min mumbled.

“Stop talking,” Jong-hyun ordered. “You’re injured and we’re trying to heal you.”

“Where were you?”

“Our younger brother teleported us away,” Jong-min said and growled. He also muttered something under his breath that sounded like it was a bad word.

“We’re sorry that we weren’t here to help,” Jong-hyun whispered and stroked his thumb across the back of my hand.

“What happened after the tentacle snatched me?” I asked and started trying to open my eyes again.

“Whip, not tentacle,” Jong-min said. “Stop talking.”

“Why don’t I hear fighting?” I asked. “What happened?”

“He tried to use you as a hostage, but then threw you at Theo. While you were flying through the air, he used a spell at the same time as Theo.”

My eyes finally opened and I saw Theo standing next to a bloody puddle. The two hunters stood nearby, phones to their ears.

“She obliterated him,” Jong-min whispered, “using an illegal spell.”

“An illegal spell?” I asked.

“It was the only way to save you. If she hadn’t used it, you were going to be destroyed by Roman’s spell, also an illegal one,” Jong-min explained.

Tristan and Damien ran out of the restaurant and over to Theo, checking her over for injuries and hugging her.

She cried as she hugged them.

Pushing at Jong-min’s hands, I tried to get to my feet, but they resisted.

“I need to get up. I need to talk to Antoine.”

“Who is Antoine?” Jong-hyun asked with a bit of a snarl as he helped me to my feet.

“The hunter,” I explained. My legs wobbled. Looking up at Jong-hyun I asked, “Uppies?”, raised my arms up, and wiggled my fingers.

Jong-min scooped me up in a bridal carry and walked me over to Antoine. “My mate wants to speak to you,” he snapped.

Antoine hung up his phone and asked, “How are you feeling?”

“I’ve been better. Now’s not the time for that. Are you going to report Theo?”

He scowled. “I have to.”

“No you don’t,” I said quickly. “You could say you didn’t see what happened in the smoke. You could let her live out her life instead of going to prison.”

“She used an illegal spell?—”

“To save us all,” I snapped and hopped out of Jong-min’s arms. “You know Roman was about to use an illegal spell as well. One that likely would have destroyed all of us.”

His lips thinned.

“We are obligated to report what we see,” Phil said as he came to join us.

“You’re going to send her to jail because you guys were too incompetent to find Roman before he attacked us?” I asked and folded my arms across my chest.

Phil and Antoine flinched.