Page 122 of Vengeful Mates

“You don’t really want him dead, do you?” Pity burned a hole in my palm.

She bit her lip, chewing on the injustice. “Yes and no.”

Right then, my Love powers kicked in, giving me a read on the situation, and I smiled. Some part of her still loved him. Recognized him as her mate. Yearned for him. Wanted him with her. The scorned part of her didn’t want to fall in love with him. Wanted to keep him away. Protect herself from being crushed again.

“Killing him won’t make it any easier.” I eased my hand toward her slowly in case she didn’t want me to touch her heart. Love god at work. “It’ll leave a bottomless ache in your heart that you’ll never recover from.”

She sniffed and swiped at her nose, beautiful even with a ruddy complexion and smudged skin. “Speaking from experience?”

Ahh. That old trick. Throw it back at me. We weren’t talking about me.

Discussion for another time. Colton would contact us any second now.

Right on cue, my phone rattled in my pocket. I already knew the identity of the caller before my phone announced it.

“Yeah,” I said into it.

“Bring Faline with you to the meeting point I text you.” Ice cold. Pissed. Plans foiled. Fuck him. He disconnected the call and I waited for his text.

My phone announced the address, and I pocketed the device.

Zethan pressed his hands to Faline’s ears again. “I’ve killed her hearing. Any last plans of attack we want to discuss?”

“Play along with my game,” I ordered my VP and enforcer and they nodded. “Distract the cunt for as long as we can. Genius, use the international clock to count down the time.”

“What if he uses magick to block us?” Castor asked.

“A good possibility.” I glanced at Zethan for a backup to my VP. “Activate the timer on your phone and warn me on the bond when it goes off. If there’s no magick, he can’t kill that unless he kills the battery.”

Zethan did as instructed and shoved his cell phone into the pocket of his cut.

I grabbed the ropes securing Faline’s wrist and tugged her to her feet. “Get us there, Zethan.”

My enforcer reinstated Faline’s hearing and carved a hole in space to the location Colton gave us.

Flames of hope flared in my chest that we got to Aaliyah in time to save her and the babies. If we didn’t make it, my heart would shatter like glass, never to be repaired.

The four of us stepped through the portal to the abandoned production facility that smelled of pigeon shit, grease, and dust. My lungs contracted with fear that I had to lasso and get under control.

A timer ticked in the back of my mind. At the sight of Colton with Aaliyah lying bleeding on his table, the darkness of what I was about to do cloaked me, dampening the sound of the clock. I searched for her bond, her pain, her emotion, but it was gone.

Molten steel poured into my veins to give me the strength to take this cunt down. Flames sprung to life on my free hand. Good to know my magick worked. “What the fuck did you do to her?”

“Slade, calm down,” Aaliyah pleaded. “The babies are fine. You got here before he hurt them.”

Relief detonated in my chest like a series of land mines. Thank fuck they were safe. Pain rang in my ribs at the blood leaking from her abdomen.

Colton’s eyes surveyed his mate. Heat blazed up my spine as I took my first step forward, dragging Faline. My enemy’s wolf snarled at us savagely for capturing her.

He collected the canopic jar from the edge of his counter. “I started by removing a kidney. She can survive on one.”

White-hot rage sparked in my breastbone, and I lunged, and both Castor and Zethan caught me before I let off the first explosion.

Zethan’s hand came to my shoulder to stop me from doing anything rash. His logical eyes came to mine communicating his next step. Negotiation time.

“Give us back our woman, Colton.” Death god to Death god.

Fury passed over our enemy’s face. One of few expressions of emotion the cunt ever made. “Did they hurt you, little outa?”

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