Page 172 of Lana Pecherczyk
Blake gasped and pointed. “He learned that word from me!”
Instead of getting possessive and aggressive, River’s laughter erupted, raw and genuine. The humor was infectious. Jokes and insults mingled with grunts and curses. The rain had lessened to a gentle mist, but mud now spattered every participant, creating tribal-like patterns across bare torsos and arms.
The next round, River snagged the beaded silk—the one the first mother had offered Blake. He tucked it under his arm, proclaiming loudly that he’d win it back for her, and broke free from a pile-up to sprint for the Umbria trove. He was magnificent. Muddy, sweaty, dark hair plastered to his temples,eyes blazing with competitive fire as he checked to see if she watched him.
He was so magnificent, in fact, that Blake wasn’t the only one who noticed. A cluster of females had gathered at the field’s edge. Their feathers fluffed as they chattered behind their hands, pointing and aiming sultry eyes at him.
River ran directly toward them and executed a completely unnecessary but undeniably hot mud-spraying slide past their feet as he evaded capture from the opponent. The females shrieked and giggled, wings flaring in delight. He flashed them a devastating wink, then veered toward the Umbria trove.
“What the actual fuck?” Blake sat up straight, eyes narrowing to slits.
Was that flirting? Did Riverwinkat them? Like how he’d winked at her on the first day they met?
Mine.
Possessiveness burned through her veins before she could stifle it. Her fingers curled tightly around her still-full glass. She wanted to hurl herself onto that field and tackle those preening bitches.
She’d never been enough for Jeff. Not pretty enough. Not sophisticated enough. Now that she knew how he’d truly felt about her, she wondered how many of those football groupies were ‘just annoying fans’ as he’d claimed. How many had he actually fucked behind the locker rooms while Blake waited in the dedicated area for WAGs?
“I’m going to fucking pluck out their eyes,” she snarled.
“Whoa there, sister-matriarch.” Lark’s voice carried rich amusement as she leaned closer. “Deep breaths. Ruffle your feathers later. Let him see you watching.”
Lark subtly adjusted her position, angling toward Tommas, who was on his way to do the same thing. “Remember when Ilaughed at how you thought a courtship swoop was unfair on the female?”
“Yeah.” Blake forced her fists to unclench and took a shaky sip of moonshine. The burning beneath her skin intensified, spreading across her back like wildfire.
Lark casually waved at Tommas, black claws extended from her fingertips. His face paled, and he quickly changed trajectory, heading to the opposite side of the field. “That’s because their hands are busy grabbing us during the swoop. But ours aren’t. Their balls are free game.”
Except that Blake didn’t have claws.
As River triumphantly slammed another prize onto the Umbria trove pile, the air changed. Electrified. A visceral wrongness scraped across Blake’s nerves.
Her mate felt it too. He froze mid-celebration, arm still raised in triumph. His attention darted to somewhere beside the canopy she sat beneath and widened.
His silent scream of danger pierced her through their bond.
She followed his gaze to a lone figure. Tall. Clad in tattered Guardian leathers. Black, wavy hair stuck to a handsome face. Who else could it be but Cloud? Two bloody stripes slashed from each brow to join at a stubbled chin. Somehow, it remained intact despite the rain.
“Oh shit,” Lark muttered.
Blake thought the Corvus had presence, but this guy—this menacing, tattooed and leather-wrapped dark angel—was a force unto himself. He was the axis on which this world turned. He pulled gravity with his gaze as it swept the field.
Slowly, deliberately, he unbuckled his weapon belt. Daggers thudded softly onto the damp earth. Knuckle dusters. A sword. More knives. More sharp things. He peeled off his jacket and then his undershirt. Almost every inch of revealed skin was riddled with ink—the oil slick, power-enhancing kind.
At River’s glare, a small, almost imperceptible smile touched Cloud’s lips. It held no warmth, only a chilling vacancy. His voice was quiet, but somehow still carried across the sudden, absolute silence.
“Room for one more player?”
Chapter
Fifty-Two
How quickly things changed.
One moment, River was floating, drunk on physical exertion, mud slicking his skin, basking in the territorial heat in his mate’s eyes as she tracked his every move. More than his mate, she was part of the murder. A crow. And he was already planning how this new possessiveness of hers would add to the surprise he’d planned later.
Then his intuition spiked, and everything felt cold.
