Page 100 of Love's Ace

And…

My shoulders flexed, and I felt it.

The movement of wings.

Dying hadn’t fixed me.

If anything, it made it worse… but…

“Are you with me?” Wren’s voice was careful, and my gaze flicked from him to the twins, who were still staring at us with their eerie, reflective eyes.

“I’m… yeah. I’m here. I’m with you. I’m…” I held my hands out in front of me, monstrous and tipped with claws, then glanced at Wren. “I feel fine.”

I really did. I felt stronger, more solid.

I felt like I could stand beside him andprotecthim.

When I started across the circle, a slender arm wrapped around my chest, and the knife I’d run through my body came back to my neck.

“Just because you proved that you’re hard to kill doesn’t mean you don’t need to be put down.” Helix’s voice was smooth, cool.

Delighted.

Like the fact that I’d somehow survived the sacrifice I was more than ready to make only made the situation more amusing.

But it was different now.

Ifeltdifferent.

I jerked out of his hold, wrenching my body forward with all the strength, all thepullI’d felt from the light earlier.

The thread between Wren and I flared bright, and the man behind me snarled and let me go. I half fell into Wren when he ran toward me, and his arms around me felt likebliss.Like home.

“I’m going to fuckingkillyou for that.” Wren hissed it in my ear, his hand pressing over my chest like he could take back what I’d done. “Fuck.Fuck.Don’t youdare…don’t youever…” He was crying, stuttering over his words. “Don’t leave me like that ever again. Ifeltyou go.”

“I won’t.” I wished we were alone for this, that my words were a promise I knew I could keep.

But at least we were holding each other again as I turned to the men—to the oldgods.They stared at us with fury in their eyes, then that gaze trailed past my shoulder.

To Aiden.

Aiden, whose eyes were liquid, prismatic.

Metal, just like theirs.

“Brother. Unfair.” Helix’s voice was a whine, and he wasn’t talking to Celio.

His eyes were on Aiden.

“Aiden?” Wren’s voice was still thick with tears and grief, but he lifted his head to look at the man behind us.

Aiden sighed, like the entire situation was more annoyance than anything. “I don’t interfere with your little war, Helix. I let you fight for your own amusement… but these two…” His eyes shifted to us. “They’re mine now.”

“What?”

It was the other twin who spoke this time, the one with eyes as gold as the blood on Wren’s hands. “You couldn’t just leave the humans to war with the Enmity, could you? You had to intervene, to make something to give them strength and power. Soulmates.” Celio sounded almost petulant.

“What else can Fate do when his brothers decide to squabble?” Aiden stepped forward until he stood between us and those mirrored glares.

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