Page 44 of Her Feral Beasts

None of them respond, but Savage suddenly looks furious. He’sstillwearing my hair tie, and when he sees my eyes flick down to his wrist, he clenches his jaw.

“What are you doing in here, snake?” Xander spits at me. “Trying to steal something?”

“Trying to save your many prisoners, apparently!” I exclaim around Scythe.

“He a relative of yours?” Xander says, jerking his chin toward the living room with disgust. “A cousin?”

Suddenly I’m fucking annoyed.

“What do you want with me?” I say angrily, as if I didn’t just storm in here on my own. “Whatever you’re looking for, I can’t give it to you.”

Scythe’s icicle eyes flick down to Henry and I turn away from him defensively, bringing Henry up to my neck.

The creature wriggles out of my grip and I’m forced to open my hands and watch him levitate up, but the moment Henry opens his little beak, Scythe lashes out quicker than a viper and snatches him out of the air with his tattooed hands

Henry makes an offended sound as Scythe brings the nimpin up to his own perfectly cruel face, but all he does is stare down at Henry.

To my utter surprise and dismay, Henry bops up and down on Scythe’s palm as if they’re having a silent, cheery conversation. Everything gets worse when Scythe puts Henry on his own shoulder and my nimpin sits there, blinking all innocently at me.

“Traitor!” I gasp, glaring at my blue fluff ball. “You’re supposed to protect me!” But Henry just blinks serenely, as if there’s nothing at all wrong. Horrified, I take another step backwards, but my ass bumps into the rooster’s cage. I’m going to be having words with that zookeeper, Rick, because Henry is clearly faulty.

And then Scythe speaks, and it turns my body into a statue of horror and fear.

“Aurelia.” I forgot that haunting, dark rasp. A sound that should belong to some monster lurking in a cemetery. “I am going to give you one chance, just one, to explain why you are lying about not being our regina.”

My stomach turns to a jelly that is now trying to escape up my throat. The implication in his voice. The threat of it. The way it caresses my skin like fingers is extremely terrifying and arousing at the same time.

Am I scared? Heck yes. Am I more fearful of what awaits me if I tell them my secret? Also, heck yes. I have no choice but to lie. These guys already hate me. Even if these maniacs are safe for me, if I agree to be their regina, I’ll be in danger of every beast here knowing what I am.

Then I’ll have a mark on my head. A big red neon sign that says, ‘breeder’ and ‘money’ and ‘catch immediately and sell’.

But it’s still hard, because in the cage of stubbornness I’ve placed her in, my anima is keening, whining,wailingthat these are my mates. That this is the pack I belong to and there are only three lonely beds in this room.

But it gets much worse than that because Henry is not the only traitor. My body is responding to the closeness. Mypussyis throbbing and I can’t help but clench those muscles in frustration.

Shit.

Their very presence strikes my body like a flood of warm honeyed heat and there suddenly surfaces a deep desire for Scythe to hold me, to caress me, to fuck me silly.

But the repercussions of that are a level of danger I just can’t tolerate.

So I say through gritted teeth and flap my hand at my neck where I know they can’t see our mating mark. “I’m not your regina. It doesn’t make sense.”

The temperature of the room plummets below zero. Xander sort of moves his head in an arc that tells me he’s rolling his eyes, and he scoffs like he expected my response. Savage literally bristles with rage and Scythe has gone so still that I don’t even think he’s breathing.

My instincts are screaming at me to run. My anima is screaming at me to jump into Scythe’s arms. In short, I’m a confused puddle on the floor.

“Aurelia.” Scythe’s rasping voice makes my skin flush and crawl at the same time. “I will not be disrespected by you. I do not tolerate liars. And there is nothing I won’t do to destroy those who wrong me.”

I’m literally going to vomit and I only just stop myself.

Danger and lethal promise lace his words, and I know this is a beast who is never disobeyed. But his words take me aback because this is about survival.

“It’s not about respect,” I blurt like a fool. “It’s just that you have it wrong.”

“I think they call this gaslighting,” Xander drawls. “That’s what they told us in therapy. Are you gaslighting us, snake girl? Because we fucking saw your mark when you spread your pretty legs for Savage. Or do you not remember when youpinedfor us on a siren call in the middle of the night and all five of us rocked up to your disgusting hovel in astral form?”

I don’t know if I’m more taken aback by the fact he called my legs pretty or that he called my cute bungalow a disgusting hovel. It kind of was, but still, he hadnoright. Also, how can I explain the siren call if I’m not their regina? He has me in verbal and literal corner.

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