Page 60 of Dating the Dealing Demon

Too late.

She teleports away, leaving us stunned and Gilly open to more attacks outside the wards of Shadowvale.

That’s it. I had zero patience at the start of this conversation, and I’m so far out of fucks right now that I don’t care who I rile up. I jab my finger at Theo’s mom, not giving a damn if she decides to magic me into some wormhole. “Fix this,” I tell her. “Whatever you did, make it right.”

“I can’t.” Her snarl doesn’t have me backing down.

Oh no. She wants to spit verbal fire? I’m more than locked and loaded. I’m a freakin’ powerhouse of pissed off. “Undo. It.”

Bright magic flares from my hand, spiraling toward Theo’s mom. She flies backward, taking out a table of pixie poker. Chips tumble to the floor with a musicalping, ping, ping, and sparkling dust flies. Enchanted cards dance from scattered stacks to sweep around the falling queen.

Theo’s wings flare to shield me as Monty chatters and switches to his dragon form, launching into the air above us.Both are ready to defend me before I can shake away the light blasting from my skin.

Oh shit. What have I done?

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

Theo

Ishove a stunned Val behind my wings, blocking her from my mother’s soon-to-come wrath. “Any idea what that was?”

“A f-freak supernova?” My mate sounds as shocked as I feel right now.

Understandably as whatever magic burst from her fingertips wasn’t the pretty alchemy or literal flower power she has manifested since we completed the mating bond. No, it rushed forth like the weapon my mother accused her of being.

Spells from the pixie poker table flutter and zip through the air, setting off sparkling hearts and pink champagne bubbles. I ignore the itch of pixie powder flooding my nose, concentrating on the bigger threat.

As if my thoughts summon her, my mother rises to her feet, her lightning magic climbing along with her in currents wrapping around her dress like some lethal version of her beloved bling. “You little…” She throws a slim bolt in an arc toward Val.

Brimstone fire erupts from me, a living wall to block my mother’s magic and shield my mate. From above, Montejanus lets loose fire to strengthen the barrier and add a definite demon-threatening boundary, but I don’t need it.

The mating power bump has brought so much control over my fire magic that I could breathe and extinguish it as easily as the little soul guardian does naturally. It helps my mate has become virtually fireproof, a new ability I wish she wouldn’t test so frequently in her lab. Smoke carrying the possible poison that might harm Val doesn’t even dare rise from my curling violet flames.

Nic rushes into the fight. “No, neither of you wants to hurt the other.” Her peacemaker talent is on full display, vines of thorns rushing to draw a line between my mother and me. “Let’s talk about this.”

Dupree peeks out from behind the magical slot machines. Coward. How did I ever suspect he could’ve been brave enough to negotiate with leaders of other realms to open forbidden portals and overthrow the kingdom? His greed stops at risking his own skin.

My mother snuffs out her power. “You would wield brimstone flames against me?” Rage and something deeper—hurt maybe?—shakes her voice. “I’m your mother.”

“Val’s my mate.” The admission rushes from me. “I don’t want to endanger those I’ve grown up trying to protect. Not you, my sisters, or Father. But she’s mymate. You of all people should understand the bond.”

She lowers her hands, but not before I notice the trembling. “Your father isn’t well. Not since the portals began opening at random. Each draws on the magic that ties him to the kingdom’s strength.”

The fight rushes out of me. “We’ve all seen it.” The slips in his memory. Unexplained flares of his notorious temper.

“No one outside of us can know.” In a quick lift of her chin and straightening of her spine, Mother is suddenly the Queen of Hell again. “It would ruin us all.”

“Agreed.” I dip a wing and look over my shoulder, checking my mate for any injuries. “You okay?”

“I didn’t mean it,” Val rushes to say. “Well, yeah, what I said—I meant that. But the magic. I had no idea I could, and I wouldn’t have hurt your mom.”

The tightness that had locked my chest since my mother’s arrival unwinds. “I know, Vicious.”

“Family’s everything. No matter what they do.” She aims a glare my mother’s way. “Like cursing me in some fucked up contract.”

Nic hurries between us, winding her deadly vines in with the same ease humans would curl up a charger cord. “I’m sure Mom didn’t mean to curse you personally.”

With the dagger-sharp glowers flying between my mother and my mate, I’m not so certain my baby sister is right in her eternal optimism. Before Val might magic anactualdagger from Shadowvale, I seize control of the conversation. “Dupree, you have five seconds to run before I let every woman in this room take a shot at your craven ass.” My cousin scrambles from behind chiming slot machines below a small stage where fist-sized trolls usually perform a victory dance for winners. Those trolls have far more courage than my spineless cousin.

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