Page 39 of My Blood Is Yours

Sariel shrugs. “If anything, you two seem perfectly matched.”

My eyes flick up to Sariel’s twitching lips. Evandriel scoffs, looking thoroughly affronted. “I may be many things, but I can assure you that a slimy, slippery, conniving little thief isn’t one of them.”

My eyes roll. “That’s a little dramatic, don’t you think? I mean… maybe she’s desperate. And clearly, those teenagers are well cared for?—”

Even Sariel’s brows pinch with concern as he gives me a mildly admonishing look.

“—theirschoolclothes are nicer than anything I’ve seen in my life unless it was from behind a thick glass window pane. Maybe she’s desperate. Maybewecan also help her.”

Evandriel’s hardly listening. He scowls in the direction of the female he thinks he’s been cursed with, and my heart gives asympathetic squeeze as I consider the pendant around my neck and the bundle of letters in my hand.

“I’m going to talk to her.”

Sariel growls as I attempt to step out from beneath his arm. “She’s not going to bite me for trying to talk to her!”

Sariel’s frown deepens—as though the prospect is entirely within the realm of possibility. I scoff, turning on my heel, but grin to myself as his presence looms protectively behind me.

My footsteps rush forward as the female makes a hasty exit from the square. Sariel and I weave through the crowd inside the park until we burst through the other side, and my eyes hastily scan the vicinity frantically.

“Curses. We lost her.”

Not that themundrapedracan’t remedy that. There isn’t a place in any realm she could hide from us. I turn towards Sariel—just as my eyes snag on a streak of blue bolting around a corner—and slamming straight into Evandriel’s chest.

EVANDRIEL

Awhoosh of air punches out of mysoulbound’slungs as she runs face-first into my chest. Her expression swiftly shifts from one of shock to disbelief—then anger. “Seriously,what the fuckdo you want?!”

My lip curls. “You stole from those children.”

She rolls her eyes at me as one would a petulant child as she tries to sidestep me.“Typical.”

“I beg your pardon.”

The female has the audacity to clutch her nonexistent pearls and put on a face that matches her mockingly haughty voice.“Oh, I beg your pardon.”

She then proceeds toshoveme out of the way with shocking strength that sends my large frame stumbling backwards. “Fuck off, Mr. Holier-Than-Thou. I’ve got shit to steal, people to pay, and aguillotineto avoid.”

Despite all her venom, her words have my hackles rising for an entirely new reason.People to pay? Guillotine? What mess has this female gotten herself into, and why-the-fuck do I feel the need to make it my problem?

Blasted soulbond.

With a growl, I trot forward to catch up with her, feeling Sariel and Elowen at my back. But before I can reach her, she lunges for me. In the blink of an eye, she has me pressed against the stone wall of the alleyway and a blade at my throat.

Her eyes are narrowed as sharply as the tip of her dagger as she speaks to me through gritted teeth.

“Why are you following me?”

How twisted is it that fate would have the bond between us awaken and give us its first pulsing flare as she threatens my life. It’s promptly followed by a tingling shiver of arousal licking up my spine at the sensation of her body pressing against mine.

And from the look on her face, she can feel it too.

Only in my weakest and most desperate moments had I sought or accepted the touch of another in the ten years since Ffion passed. And never did it feel anything like this.

I hate it.

I vowed to find Ffion, and now the mere presence of this blasted female is threatening to upend all of my plans! Ten years! Ten years of pinning and hoping and longing—of trusting in Ffion’s words that wewouldmeet again.

Gods damn it.

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