Page 72 of Craved By a Wolf

She sank to her backside on the step and hugged her knees. Maybe if they talked. She huffed. If they talked right now, he would probably say everything wrong, inciting her wrath and forcing her to keep her promise to remove his balls. She needed to do something though. She couldn’t go on like this, not really knowing where she stood or what was happening from one moment to the next. She hated the feeling that she was spinning out of control and in danger of things going badly wrong. By badly, she meant ending up with a mating mark on her neck that she didn’t want.

Hella propped her chin up on her palm and gazed at the foyer of Fenix’s elegant Scottish mansion.

Although… if MacKinnon played his cards right, she might want that mark.

But he had a lot of work to do to make that happen.

Starting with improving his behaviour.

She glanced back up the stairs. Not that his jail time was going to make that happen. When she went back to him—and it waswhennot if and not only because she had left her precious bag in the room—he was going to be angry with her.

She would use their time apart to figure out a way to quickly calm him.

Easier said than done.

Voices drifted along a corridor and she heaved another sigh and pushed to her feet, aware she couldn’t keep Fenix waiting. If she did, he would probably come looking for her and she didn’t want him to find her sitting on his stairs moping over MacKinnon and nursing her aching heart. She would never hear the end of it.

Hella frowned as she approached the door to the library and Fenix’s voice came through it.

“Besides, she isn’t alone. I’m only going to warn you once that there’ll be no flirting, no attempted seductions, not eveninnocentlooks at her.” It was just like Fenix to be protective of her and to lay down the law with his family, making sure she felt safe. A smile curled her lips, but it faltered as he continued, “Break the rules and the wolf with her will probably break every bone in your body.”

She glanced up at the ceiling in the direction of their room, fighting the urge to go back to him, and then sucked down a breath and pushed the door open.

Fenix glanced her way, his green eyes warm with a silent greeting. His tawny hair was wild, as if he had been running his fingers through it. He probably had been. He had confessed once that his family were hard work, constantly in need of subtle and not-so-subtle corrections to their behaviour. Of the four incubi he had taken under his wing, two were good and two were pure evil judging by the things Fenix complained about to her.

Although she always saw love in his eyes even when he was ranting about whatever rule they had broken or the state he had found his home in.

She strolled into the room, aware of all their eyes on her and noticing that Des was missing. Tiny, a sweet young incubus with scruffy sandy hair and blue eyes currently holding flares of gold and cerulean as he gazed at her stockings and blushed, stood beside Fenix, his loose charcoal T-shirt and dark blue jeans a contrast to Fenix’s more formal fitted black shirt and tight black jeans. She doubted Tiny had been the one to earn a warning from Fenix.

Hella glanced at the brunet, Rane, where he stood off to one side like a shadow in his black T-shirt and matching jeans, keeping his distance from everyone. He flicked her a disinterested look and went back to his work. Not him either then.

Which left Mort.

The troublemaker.

The tall blond’s hazel eyes were bright with sparks of gold and cerulean as he stared at the top of the long wooden table that occupied the centre of the room, diligently keeping his eyes off her. Which meant he was the one Fenix had warned. He looked ready to run from the room rather than face her, something she found amusing as she approached him.

Hella stopped beside him, leaned in close, bringing her lips to his ear, and breathed into it. “Oh, he’ll rip you apart like a chew toy, incubus.”

Mort’s throat worked on a hard swallow and he blanched a little, and maybe having an alpha wolf for a man wasn’t such a bad thing. It certainly made her feel safer when she was around incubi. The last time she had come to this house, she had felt as if she was in constant danger. Both Mort and Rane had been more than a little forward with her.

Either they had grown up a lot since then, or the threat of a wolf was enough to keep them on their best behaviour.

“Hella,” Fenix chided and she sighed and sashayed her way along the length of the table on the opposite side to him. She pretended not to notice the questioning look he gave her as he took in her outfit and clung to her confidence, refusing to let him rattle it. His tawny eyebrows knitted hard and he shook his head slightly, and she had the feeling he knew why she was dressed the way she was. His tone brooked no argument as he said, “I have rules for you too. No teasing my family.”

Lightning shook the building, making the lights flicker, and Hella cast him a questioning look.

“Pest problem,” he muttered and she gave him a look that told him she knew what he was doing, using her own words on her to try to make her not poke her nose into who was outside casting powerful thunder magic. He pushed a stack of books towards her. The leather-bound tomes had seen better days and there were papers sticking out from the pages, making them even thicker. “Anything you think might be useful, flag it for us. We can all speak fae and Mort knows his way around runes.”

Hella’s eyebrows shot up as she looked at Mort, surprise sweeping through her.

Mort scrubbed the back of his blond hair and refused to look at her.

Interesting.

Outside of witches and other magic users, it was rare for someone to know runes. Had the incubus been involved with a witch at some point? Or did magic run in his family? Incubi didn’t just appear. They had mothers, although most of them never knew them. It was common for women to give up any baby sired by an incubus. Incubi were still viewed as parasites by most in the immortal realms and there was still a stigma attached to bearing the offspring of one.

Fenix rolled the sleeves of his black shirt up.

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