Page 29 of Her Vicious Beasts: The Beginning
I cringe as I stride out of the mansion to the solitary waiting car, crossing my arms over my nipples again and almost cutting myself on the giant diamond I’m supposed to now wear. I glance behind me to see if my astral prisoners are still here, but it’s only Beak and Scuff who stand next to my father, Uncle Ron, and Uncle Ben. I shove my fourth shield up again, completely unwilling to let my mates back into my life. My heart keens for them to return to me, but two of them hate me and the third just wants to fuck me.
What a piece of rotten luck that I had been born the way that I had.
When I get back to my house, five snakes—female guards from my father’s court—greet me with a collective menacinghiss.They’ll be ‘guarding’ my house tonight, Charlotte tells me with a grimace, but I know she really means they’re here to stop me from running.
It’s midnight when I feel a familiar presence pounding on the outside of my shield.
“Aurelia? Aurelia!” Uncle Ben’s panicked voice sounds from outside. I lower my house shield and he lurches towards my front door.
There’s real terror in his voice. Something is deathly wrong. I rush to the front door and throw it open. “I’m here, Uncle Ben! What’s happened?”
Outside, my serpent parole officers are nowhere to be seen.
Uncle Ben rushes to me, still in his tartan summer pyjamas, his eyes wild, arms reaching out for me. He roughly shakes me by the arms. “Aurelia, you need to leave, rightnow.”
That sense of dread I feel is suddenly in my throat. “Why?”
“Halfeather’s mansion has just been burnt to the ground. Everyone is dead. Halfeather, the staff, all murdered. Just one security guard escaped. Ron and your father are fine. I’ve sent the guards there to retrieve him as a ruse.” My blood pools into my feet as a sinister cold sweeps over my entire form. If anyone from my mating group had died, I would have known about it. Felt it. But I’d not felt?—
“Aurelia, the prisoners in Halfeather’s dungeon have all escaped somehow. And Beak, the security guard, said one of them kept repeating a name over and over again.”
I already know whose name would be on the lips of the prisoners.
Uncle Ben is frantic. “Aurelia, Beak said it was one of the Slaughter Brothers, the wolf, who kept saying your name. He told me to secure you. Your father is telling everyone you caused the fire to get out of the marriage.”
Shock at the injustice of this hits me like a blow to the head. But I don’t need Uncle Ben to tell me to leave a second time. While I run to my room, Uncle Ben takes my keys and runs to get my car warmed up. I grab my duffle bag, shoving my wallet and the remainder of my hidden cash in it.
Once my father knows I’ve run, he will freeze my bank account or track my debit card, so I have to rely on cash from now on. I bolt out of my house, quickly checking the night sky for any sign of the sweep of a dragon’s wings.
They know exactly where I live and having been pulled here once, they’ll come to check here first… except they also know my car! I swear internally as I pull my house door shut and bolt to the driveway. I need to shield my car as well, then.
Uncle Ben gets out of the car and yanks his wallet out.
“Take this.” He’s holding a couple of notes.
He is already taking a great risk. “Uncle Ben, I?—”
“Aurelia. Your father will have your head for running. You know that. You’ll be on your own now. You need everything you can get. This is the best I can do for you.”
The backs of my eyelids burn as I nod and accept the few notes he’s holding out.
“Go, Lia. And fast.”
Throwing my bag and then myself into my car, I hit reverse and head out to the street, slapping a shield of invisibility over my car. This time of night, it will be fine to drive unseen, but once daytime comes and traffic increases, I’d be asking for someone to crash into me. Hopefully, I’ll be far, far away by the time the sun clears the horizon.
Chapter 20
Xander
Istand with the Slaughter Brothers Inc. behind the smouldering ruin of Halfeather’s mansion, wiping the old beak’s blood off my face. Tearing Halfeather’s skull in half had been both pleasurable and satisfying in every possible way. Burning his mansion to cinders with my own flames was another type of dream come true. I’d have to thank whoever had started the fire, but only dragon fire could turn a building like this to cinders.
We’d let the female staff go except one Scythe had tied up and thrown outside for the police with a message tied around her neck. Of the males, only Beak escaped, who Savage had really wanted to get his claws on for flirting with the snake girl. Before us stands her father, the Serpent King, looking down his nose at us with beady black eyes. Eyeing him with my magical sight, Mace Naga is shrouded in heavy, oily power. Scumbag serpent magic. The filthy, slithering creatures are known for it, and it’s one of many reasons everyone hates snakes and the purge had been done,andwhy a dragon would never lower himself to deal with one.
The fact that my mate had come from this evil bastard? I’ve done many shameful things in my twenty-three years, but I’ve never been so ashamed in my life.
But as a member of this mating group, I am bound to help these males who have become my brothers. We are just as soul-bound to each other as we are to the snake girl.
We fight like brothers do, and it is just as well that these beasts are some of the few males who can handle my angry blows—Scythe had laughed the last time I’d landed a lucky blow and shattered his nose. The one and only time Ihadseen him laugh, crazy bastard.
