Page 189 of Memories Like Fangs
Then, my father lunged.
His fist came toward my face with the precision of a targeted missile. I was barely able to twist aside, feeling the rush of air and power past my cheek. I brought my forearm up to block the next blow, but the jolt numbed my wrist. I ducked low, driving a strike at his ribs, but he absorbed its force without even flinching. I landed a jab to his shoulder, another to his side, even an elbow to his cheek. But it was nothing against my father. He was, after all, where I got my ability to take a hit like a fucking tank.
No! This is exactly what I didn’t want to happen!My mother’s voice. I couldn’t let my eyes stray from my father, but she sounded like she was… crying?
Every blow I managed to land added to his momentum, like he was stealing my own inertia. My father came at me with a relentless rhythm of punches, hooks, knees, kicks, elbows, and more, but the tempo and beat changed every time I learned the pattern and got used to it. I parried and dodged as much as I could. My only weapons were my body and wits. I literally couldn’t pull out my daggers because that would mean I wanted to duel. So, I could only rely on my instincts and knowledge of my father.
We have to do something!Cole’s voice this time.
Like what? Look at us, bro! None of us can fight Uncle Diego,Cody argued.
Father was faster and stronger than me. Every breach of my defenses—which there weremany—was another strike on my body. Each impact shook my entire skeleton, not just the main point he had landed a hit on. My ribs were fractured over and over again. The bones in my limbs weren’t faring much better, muscles tearing from my overuse. If I were human, I knew I would have internal bleeding from all the blows to my abdomen I had taken. My jaw and face stung as the bones tried to patch themselves together, but they couldn’t make much leeway before another blow came to my face. Blood flowed from my broken nose like a fountain. All I could taste on my tongue was the coating of copper there that seemed like it was a permanent part of my mouth now. My breath sawed in and out of my throat. The attacks I did land were losing their frequency and power as fatigue settled. It wasn’t from exhaustion, but it was from my body’s desire to heal being denied with extreme prejudice because of my father’s never-ending barrage of blows.
I was losing.
I was losingbadly.
The voices were overlapping now. Some called my name. Some brainstormed ideas. Some tried to encourage me.
But, one ripped through the rest?—
“Quinn!” Both out loud and in my mind, Byrd’s scream was loud, sharp, ragged, and pained.Sopained. The force of her frantic panic and desperation across our bond reminded me that she felt it, too. We were connected, our anguish shared just as much as our pleasure. The realization made me hate the mating bond for the briefest of moments.
Quinn! Please hang on! You can take him down!You can figure this out! Just keep fighting! Do it for me, please!Her words flooded my mind in a furious rush.
It’s always for you, my love.
A blow to my stomach that knocked the wind out of me.
I do it all for you.
The crunch of my knee breaking roared over my rushing blood.
You are the best of me.
An elbow straight to my temple landed so hard that the room tilted. Blinding white-hot pain exploded throughout my skull, rattling my brain within it. My head swam. Everything went black around the edges. Tears boiled over and poured down my sore, aching cheeks. The burden of fatigue was so heavy that I lost control of my body.
I was too weak.
Just like my father said.
My knees buckled. The hardwood splintered from the force of my landing. Everything fuckinghurt, but I could take that. The physical pain was nothing compared to knowing that I was causing my girl to hurt, too. She was hurting because of me. She wanted me to keep fighting, but… I was so tired. I just wanted to close my eyes… Just for a moment… To sink into the dark and let go…
But I didn’t want to do it without Byrd.
“Qué jodida decepción,” My father said.
What a fucking disappointment.
Then, everything shattered.
Byrd’s roar clawed through the house, the sound so powerful and resonant it made the walls tremble and the windows burst in a spray of glass. For the first time since we entered the room, I took my eyes off my father to follow the glass fragments. Instead of falling outside, they flew to surround her in a domeof chunky, deadly glitter. She yanked off her pullover and tossed it aside to reveal her strappy bikini bra underneath that doubled as a sexy crop top. Her tattoos came alive in a surge of magic that outdazzled the stars. Her patches of scales surfaced along her tawny skin. Her tail burst through the hole in her magicked leggings that wasn’t there before, whipping behind her with pure rage. Her dragonfly wings unfurled from her back, the iridescent pastel membranes catching in the recessed lighting as they spread wide from the straps of her top. They fluttered, vibrating so fast behind her that they were no longer wings, just ripples of motion. Her pupils narrowed into thin slits in the brown topaz of her irises as they landed on my father. She roared again, the glass points rotating to aim at my father.
He marveled at Byrd, his expression giving nothing else away as he took her in. Then, recognition lit up his dark eyes. “Ah, I see. You are the daughter ofher, the lava dragon. You have herfire.”
Byrd bore her four descended fangs at him, hissing at the distaste he wrapped around the mention of her mom. “What do you know about my mother?”
“I know that she was a hunter-killer,” My father explained, like he was talking about a poor-performing employee who had left his company years prior. “The bounty on her head was massive because she fucked around, killed the wrong group of hunters, and made the dumbass decision to let some of them escape. I will give her credit. She did put up onehellof a fight. Taking her out was the pride of my career.”
