Page 37 of Blood Moon Heat

The prime watched her go, a calculating look on his face.

Fuck.

Finally, he opened the top drawer of his desk, took out an envelope, and slid it to me. “This needs to be dealt with urgently.”

I took it.

He studied me. “Let me know when it’s done.”

I inclined my head and walked out. Mina rushed to my side as soon as she saw me, and I strode briskly to the elevator.

I kept hold of her hand as we left the building and marched across the lot. Pretender knew better than to get out, and he waited for me to usher Mina into the car. Then he planted his foot, tearing out of the lot.

“What’s wrong? What just happened?” Mina asked.

Pretender looked at me in the rearview mirror. “Nero?”

“It was the prime.”

“Fuck,” my ward muttered.

“He knows what I’m capable of. It’s whether he’s arrogant enough to test me on it.”

The prime wouldn’t dare come after Mina, not directly, but he’d be thinking of ways he could use her to get to me, I was positive. Nothing in the past had ever worked. Yet he’d still tried repeatedly.

“Nero, what’s going on?”

I snatched her off the seat beside me, pulling her over my lap. Fisting her hair, I tilted her head back and gripped her jaw, my eyes locking on hers. “I made a mistake. I should never have let you come with me. That won’t happen again, Mina, do you understand what I’m saying?”

I’d even considered taking her out to dine, away from the apartment, giving her another taste of freedom. Like some smitten, fucking fool trying to impress his female. That wouldn’t be happening now.

“You’re going to lock me away in that room and never let me out, aren’t you?” Her lavender eyes were huge and filled with pain. I felt it, fuck, it washed over me. Emotion smashed into me, that anger rushing back that I hadn’t felt in so very long. The ice in my veins had melted and now fire seared its way through me instead.

I dragged my nose along her throat, sliding my tongue over the vein fluttering wildly. “You did this to yourself, little doll.” Fuck, her scent was making me insane. “Anyone following us?” I asked Pretender.

“No.”

If Pretender said we weren’t being followed, then we weren’t. Besides my brothers, my young ward was the only other being I trusted. His eyes met mine in the mirror, and I nodded.

“You know what happens now, don’t you?” I said and scraped my fang along her jaw.

She shivered. “Are you going to punish me?”

“Oh yes. I told you, there’d be a price to pay.” The scent of her fear was mixed with desire now, rich and drugging. My little Lalka was just as depraved as me. “I hope you can run in those shoes.”

Twelve

Mina

I shivered at the ice in his voice. “Why are you doing this?”

He lifted my purse and hefted its weight. “Disobeying me and putting yourself in danger would be enough to warrant what’s about to happen, but attempting to manipulate me so you could try to escape? Well, that can’t go unpunished.”

Fear and dread coiled with a twisted heat in my lower belly. “I wasn’t… I would never—”

“Your attempts to lie to me further only fuel my desire to make you scream, Lalka.”

The car pulled over and was immediately engulfed in silence. I couldn’t see anything outside. It was too dark.

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