Page 105 of Caged Kitten

Lloyd stiffened when I straightened with a newly acquired weapon in hand, but his face read like he knew just how to play me.

“What are you going to do with that, kitten?”

Tipping my head to the side, I popped out the knife portion, hesitated—then slashed at his throat, nicking his skin just enough to unleash a thin dribble of blood. It crept down his neck and plumed over his shirt collar. Lloyd flailed as if to roll me off, but I stabbed his wand to his temple, then pressed the knife back to the open wound with a little more pressure. The skin warped and split beneath the blade, another spurt of blood painting the silver red.

“You move, you look at me like you usually do, you cast anything, and I’ll slit your throat,” I growled, ignoring the incoming storm of boots and paws. When Lloyd just stared at me through murderous grey eyes, all the horrible things he planned to do to me after this if I failed playing across them like a black-and-white film, I pressed hard and zapped him with his own wand. Just a simple jolt, a little hex that first years learned at the academy to shock their friends with, like dragging your feet across carpet and poking someone. He flashed his teeth. I arched an eyebrow. “Do you understand? Answer, you piece of shit.”

Prowling around Lloyd’s head, Tully suddenly stopped and hissed. Ten feet away, a charging guard went down, clutching at his throat and writhing on the gravel like he was choking. It was only then that I noticed how close they were.

“Subsisto,” I murmured, sweeping Lloyd’s wand in a circle around us. Even with a conduit, my magic was more unstable than usual, firing from the tip like a hailstorm of bullets. Each guard it hit not only froze in place, but they were hurled back like rag dolls. Tully, meanwhile, had entered a staring contest with the nearest wolf shifter, the imposing figure dark grey and larger than all the rest—the alpha. Collarless, the wolf bared his teeth, same as Lloyd—and my familiar doubled in size, standing his ground and uttering a low warning growl.

One step toward my familiar and I hit the wolf with another stunning spell. Lloyd’s wand resisted to a degree, shivering in my hand, intentionally throwing my aim. It preferred its owner to a stranger, but my magic was just a shitstorm of power at this point, pent-up and highly aggressive, bullying its way through the conduit whether the wand wanted us or not.

What I wouldn’t give for my wand, which was hopefully still sitting in my desk drawer, untouched by any of my human employees—or some super who came sniffing around the café in my absence.

“Heard, Katja,” Lloyd gritted out with a stiff smile. “I hear you. I respect you—”

“Good.” As if he actually respected me: his hands were still on my ass. Eyes narrowed, I reached back and zapped each, and he shoved his fists into the gravel as if to make a point. A cool breeze decided then was the opportune time to rip across the prison grounds, ruffling my stick-straight hair and whooshing over my exposed thighs, and I resisted the urge to tug down my dress. “Now that I have your attention… Take down the ward.”

Lloyd gawked at me for a beat, then snorted. “You can’t be serious.”

I pursed my lips, then dug his knife into his throat. Lloyd twitched and kicked out beneath me, hissing as I sliced a few inches of flesh open, a stronger gush of blood pouring down his neck and watering the earth. For once, the anxiety churn was gone, replaced by a very welcome focus, anger and intent melding with the adrenaline, steadying my hand and centering my thoughts.

“Katja Fox,” he hissed, twisting his head like that would even do anything, his tone leaning more toward harsh father figure than the gross daddy he had been masquerading as ever since we’d met, “you stop this immediately—”

“You have time to sort out the bleeding,” I mused as I flicked the blade under his chin, opening up a line of red there too. “It’s not deep enough to do any real damage… yet.”

I tapped his cheek with his wand when his hands shot up, then readjusted my thighs so that my knees dug into his arms, pinning them. Then, with Tully circling, guards positioning themselves all around us, half the wolves slinking off and the others sniffing at their stunned alpha, I set his wand tip right over his eye. Xargi had taught me so much about myself, about my capabilities without magic—and I didn’t need to utter a damn thing to maim him. I just needed to jab his wand into his eye and press until something popped.

“Remove the ward,” I repeated. My calm firmness promised that this was the last time I would tell him. The way he flinched, the dance of the bulge in his throat with a not so subtle gulp, suggested the message hit home.

But Lloyd had run a criminal empire before this. Threats probably bounced right off him, especially with his cronies lining up to take the shot.

To put me out of my misery.

Not today, boys.

Lloyd called my bluff; he did nothing but stare, goading me to make a move. So, eyeing the small army of warlocks clustering around us, I removed the blade from his neck, wiped it clean on his stubble, blood smeared up his cheekbones like blush, and then placed it on the other side of his throat. Lips pursed, I poked at a few spots, then looked him dead in the eye.

“I’m sure you know the exact pressure needed to sever the carotid,” I said with a sigh, leaning on the blade while stabbing his wand into his cheek—right between his teeth, just as he’d done to me with his disgusting fingers time and time again, squeezing my jaw and forcing my lips open. “You just let me know if you feel your life slipping away and I’ll—”

“Katja,” he choked, kitten a distant memory as he stared up at me with rounded eyes. I shrugged, breaking the first bit of skin with a cavalier slash.

“I have nothing to lose,” I whispered, then leaned in close enough to brush his ear with every word. “And don’t ever speak my name again.”

This man had killed my parents, my brothers. He planned to make me some sex slave, just another piece of property, a pretty doll to screw whenever the urge struck. He had already taken everything from me, but still came back for more.

And he had threatened my guys.

A part of me wanted to just drive the blade in, consequences be damned, and deal with the ward some other way.

Maybe he saw that, how close I was to the brink, seconds from going nuclear, because Lloyd sucked in a stuttering breath, then flicked his gaze pointedly toward his wand.

“I’ll need that to remove the ward.”

“Good boy,” I sneered, easing it away from his face and flipping it between my fingers, offering him the stupid ivory handle. “If you do anything beyond that, you know what happens.”

Shifting in place, I allowed his right arm out from under me, then gave him only enough leeway to prop himself up on his elbow. As soon as his hand coiled around his wand, I slashed at his throat again, and right on cue, Tully appeared at our sides, glaring the warlock down, unblinking and huge, his magical aura almost suffocating.

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