Page 26 of Primal Bonds

“Got it,” Adric said mildly. Jace could tell he was trying not to laugh. He tucked the money back into his wallet and glanced at his quartz. “Luc’s here.”

Jace held out a hand to Evie. She hesitated, jaw tight, but took it.

“Thank you.” He squeezed her hand. “And you, too, Kyler. I won’t forget this.”

“Fine.” The kid shook his hand, then jerked his chin at the door. “Now leave.”

He moved closer to his sister so they stood shoulder to shoulder, expressions hard. But beneath the anger there was fear, and that made Jace’s heart twist.

Because he’d stood like that with his sister, too. More than once.

With a regretful nod in their direction, he followed Adric out the door.

Chapter 8

Outside the sun was rising over the alley. The storm last night had cleared the air. It promised to be a bright, cloudless day, the kind that made Jace itch to run free as his cat, far away from humans and buildings and roads.

Luc was waiting in a jeep. Luc was another lieutenant, although unlike Adric and Jace, he was a wolf, with his animal’s narrow, hard-boned face and amber eyes. When Adric’s cougar uncle had been alpha, he’d appointed only other cats to top positions. But Adric was too shrewd for that. If a man was good, he was good—didn’t matter what his animal was. In fact, out of his four lieutenants, two—Luc and another man, Zuri—were wolves. And the fourth was a female, Adric’s sister Marjani.

Jace approved. The clan was the stronger for it. Diversity at the top meant everyone was represented when Adric met with his lieutenants. What they lacked were older, wiser heads. All five of them including Adric were younger than thirty-five turns of the sun, but that was because most of the elders had died during the Darktime.

Adric rode shotgun with Luc, while Jace eased himself into the backseat. He leaned against the door and stretched out his legs, trying to get comfortable. That last shift had been a bitch, and now his body, especially his injured abdomen, was protesting.

“Damn,” Adric said as Luc put the jeep in drive. “Woman’s a wildcat, isn’t she?”

“Leave it,” Jace said. “She’s part fae, remember?”

“Sure, dude.” Adric shot him a look. “She’s not for you, you know.”

“You think I don’t know that?”

“All I know is there was something going on in there. Your cat was protecting her—from me.”

Jace closed his eyes. “She saved my life. I owed her. End of story.” And it wasn’t a lie—it just wasn’t the whole truth.

“What the hell happened, anyway?” Luc asked as he pulled out of the alley.

“Night fae,” Jace replied without opening his eyes. “Son of a bitch stabbed me with an iron knife.”

Luc snarled. “Tell me he’s dead.”

“He is.”

“What the fuck were you doing in Grace Harbor?” Adric asked. “I thought you were in Rising Sun, examining that new vein of quartz.”

Jace opened his eyes. It was clear the alpha wasn’t going to let him rest until he answered a few questions.

“I went to Rising Sun first.” On a normal day, Jace wouldn’t have been at the mine; he was the clan’s chief tech, not a miner. But the miners had found a new vein of high-grade quartz and he’d wanted to see it for himself. “By the way, those crystals just might work in the clan’s smartphones.”

Every fada had a Gift, and Jace’s was to work with the tiny crystals in quartz. He’d designed a quartz smartphone that had promising applications, but they were still working out the bugs.

“No shit?”

“Yeah. We’ll have to run some tests, but it looks promising. I asked the miners to send some to the Factory for testing.”

“That’s good news.” Adric permitted himself a rare smile.

Jace nodded. “Anyway, after work, I went out for a drink with a few of the guys. Some of the Rock Run men were there, too. Tiago do Rio invited us.”

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