Page 39 of Forsaken Dream
“Why don’t you come make him.” Angelo chuckled, a flaming sword materializing in his hand. He wiggled it mockingly at the Unseelie jerk. “You think we didn’t know that you were the one sending the shades to corner her so you could pluck her like a piece of ripe fruit the minute you knew where she was? Your plan didn’t work fast enough, though. We found her before you did. How unfortunate.”
Sipping tiny gasps of air, I couldn’t summon the strength or the will to tell them about him being the fourth mate. I knew I had to before they killed him, though, as much as I wished at the time for him to be gone from my life. Everything I’d become hated him as much as everything in me wanted him near. How was that for a clusterfuck of epic proportions? I had to come up with something to send the Unseelie male away so I could think. Having all four of them in one place was turning me into a frantic, hormonal mess who was headed right for a mental institution with all bells and whistles, horns blaring.
“Why don’t we let the lady decide?” Proving what I knew of him was true, his arrogance had no bounds. His eyes didn’t move away from my face as he read my expression, deciphering it like an open book.
Jerk.
“She decided as soon as you showed up,” Tyler snarled. “She said no. Either walk away or fight me, scum.”
“She was promised to me, so you have nothing to do but watch me take her where she belongs. The Seelie throne is mine, and that, unfortunately, requires her ass sitting next to me.” Another roll of his shoulders almost sealed his fate, and mine.
A scream lodged in my throat, choking me when the gargoyle threw himself at the Unseelie prince, his shape transforming in the air. Tyler’s body grew in size, his shoulders broadening until they were wide enough to block my view of the other male. A loud crash rattled the structure of the building, and my head ducked, mushing my face into Vaser’s chest from fear the roof was about to fall on us. The angel was gone too, and with that so was the heat from his body. I peeked to see him and Tyler circling the Unseelie male as he rolled back to his feet.
Dust and cobwebs clung to the Unseelie’s immaculate clothing, his black slacks and button-down shirt turning into a camouflage uniform over his slender frame. His long, dirty blond hair swished around his head, and in a mocking move, the angel took hold of the long ponytail, slicing it to the skull of the male. The cut-off hair dangled in Angelo’s fist while he grinned like a fiend. The removal of it revealed the pointy tips of the Unseelie’s ears, which were much like mine, though I had the feature hidden with glamour.
“No, don’t.” Fear clawed at me, the words coming out as barely a single breath passing my numb lips. I didn’t want them to maim or kill each other.
As much as I hated the jerk, I didn’t want him dead.
Tyler’s fist connected to the Unseelie’s face, sending his head jerking to the side. Another slammed into his ribs, the crunch of bones making me shrink and clench my teeth. The gargoyle was oblivious to everything around him, his fury centered on the obstacle he needed to remove. Tingles spread over my body, paralyzing me. Internally, I was screaming at them to stop. I was begging Tyler not to kill him. On the outside, I couldn’t move a muscle, my lips fused together completely so I was unable to utter a sound. When I shifted in Vaser’s hold and he stumbled under my weight, I realized that it wasn’t fear paralyzing me.
Angelo had blocked their powers.
The Unseelie male was as good as human, while Tyler had already shifted, making his fists as hard as a rock.
The gargoyle didn’t need supernatural powers to kill the male.
Fear was replaced by anger.
Shockingly, my skin didn’t bubble with it from the lava that flooded my veins. My magic burst through me, yanking on the connection I had with the four mates. The wards the angel had cast popped like a balloon that had met the sharp point of a needle, but before I could do anything, the Unseelie male roared.
Shadows descended around us, and I stared stupidly as they attacked the gargoyle and angel. There was blood everywhere, and chips were flaking off Tyler’s body wherever those dark shapes clawed at his arms and back. The bright light of the flaming sword blinked through the darkness, while the angel carved a way out of the writhing shadows.
A new wave of fear and anger washed over me.
With a strength I didn’t know I possessed, I pushed out of the incubus’s hold, landing on my feet. The three males were a mess of carved flesh, with open wounds that had blood crusting over two of them, and sharp edges of broken rock on one. Without thinking, I threw my body in the middle of the fray and everything stopped like I’d pressed the pause button. Panting, all three of them breathed like dragons around me, while I stood with my arms outstretched like some referee in a soccer match. Luck was on my side for one thing, at least: Proto hadn’t shown up with his attitude—along with the songs from his butthole—to add to the mix.
“Enough!” My voice bounced off the crumbling walls of the mill.
“Echo, step aside,” Tyler growled, his voice like rocks grinding together.
Think, Echo. Think damn it.
“Step aside, Echo, so your toys can learn how a real male fights,” the Unseelie mocked the other two, despite his split bottom lip that was trickled blood down his chin.
“Shut up, you jerk.” His eyes widened. “I can’t hear myself think with all four of you blubbering about like old maids.”
The Unseelie had a shit-eating grin growing, while the others frowned in confusion. I hated that they thought I was hiding something from them. Bracing for the reaction, I took a deep breath before delivering the biggest slap in the face in the history of the supernatural realms.
“He is the fourth mate.”
Roars of rage and a torrent of choice words followed my statement.
