Page 87 of Kidnapping Their Third

There would be no retreating from this conflict.

“I told you I’d pay your rent,” Cora reminded her, blindly tapping her phone with her thumb, hoping she hit the right spot. “But no one in the family is giving you cash anymore.”

Lucy bared her teeth at Cora and made an inhuman sound. “Just because you’re fucking my brother doesn’t give you control over me!”

“I’m in love with your brother,” Cora said as she looked around for a good weapon. “And the two of us are part of Kimble’s flock. You know that’s a deep connection.”

“Kimble is the most useless vampire to ever exist,” Lucy declared, dramatically throwing up her arms in frustration. “The one thing you can count on with vampires is that they’re rich as hell. Pike should’ve had more money after Kimble claimed him, not less. Every month he was poorer and poorer. That’s not how it’s supposed to work. Being with Kimble should’ve meant I got everything I wanted.”

She sounded like a child having a tantrum. How was Pike so blind to his sister's true nature?

Really, she shouldn’t judge. How long had she put up with her family?

Welp, all of that changed now!

Spotting something that would work as an excellent weapon, Cora edged toward it while bringing both hands up, palm out. The move made her accidentally drop her phone but that was fine, she needed her hands free anyway. “I don’t carry cash and hurting me isn’t going to get you anything.”

“You have a bank account, right?” Lucy said, advancing a step. “Send me money with your phone. Send me a lot, or I’ll fuck you up.”

Cora pretended to shy back against a set of metal shop shelves, the bottles and cans clinking with her impact. “I won’t, and your brother won’t be happy if you hurt me.”

Lucy's expression was nothing but absolute confidence. “He won’t believe you.”

She reached out to grab Cora’s arm at the same time Cora raised the spray can and covered Lucy’s face in flat white.

Lucy screeched with surprise and frantically wiped her face. “What the—”

Cora thought that would give her time to skirt around Lucy and away, but the bear blindly lunged, her massive body leavingno room for Cora to duck away. The impact drove Cora into the shelves and knocked the air out of her.

“You stupid, useless human!” Lucy screamed as she grabbed hold of Cora. One hand balled up in her shirt and the other wrapped around her bicep. The grip on her bicep was painfully tight, making clawing at Lucy’s hand ineffective. The necklace under her work shirt felt hot and tingles radiated from it. Suddenly, Lucy’s grip didn’t hurt as much, but she was still working on pulling air into her lungs.

“I could squeeze your throat,” Lucy hissed. “I could put my fingers around your tiny, scrawny throat and keep you from breathing. Then we’d both get to die!”

They’d both get to die? That didn’t make any sense! “I’ll get you the money,” Cora wheezed out. “I need my phone.”

Lucy was blinking rapidly, but her watery eyes couldn’t focus as she looked around. “Where is it?”

“At my feet,” Cora said, pointing.

“Get it!” Lucy let go of her shirt and arm, then shoved her roughly. “Send me everything you have. I need everything!”

Dropping to her knees, Cora swept up a length of lead pipe that had fallen over during their struggles. Using both hands, she drove it up with all the power in her small, muscled body. She might be human, but that didn’t make her weak!

The impact made Lucy gasp and double over. Even a bear shifter couldn’t withstand a solid blow to the solar plexus. Cora was able to scramble out of the way before Lucy dropped to her knees and started heaving.

“You do not get to come into my house and threaten me,” Cora growled, feeling strangely strong and energized. The pipe felt light in her grip, and she could sense both Pike and Kimble in the back of her mind, worried and scared.

She pushed assurance at them as she backed away from the bear shifter. She didn’t know how long it took for them to recover, so she kept moving until she was all the way out of the garage with plenty of exit points and in full view of her neighbors and any passing cars.

“I won’t be bullied, harassed, or threatened ever again,” she declared. Memories of Seb floated through her head. All the things she let him get away with because no one believed her. Now she had people who wouldn’t question what happened. Even Pike,who’d let Lucy walk all over him, would draw the line at Lucy’s actions today.

She watched Lucy painfully get back to her feet. Her face was scrunched in pain, and her skin flushed. “You’re dead, human.”

She opened her mouth to speak but two things happened at once. The necklace got super-hot and a heavy hand landed on her shoulder and swung her around. She looked up and up to find a guy almost as tall as Pike glaring down at her.

“What’s going on, Luc?” the stranger asked. “Is this the human with the money?”

“Damn it!” Lucy wailed. “Look what you’ve done! Why couldn’t you have just given it to me?”

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