Page 28 of Bound to the Minotaur
“Shut up,” he snapped, his voice cracking. I could feel how he was on the edge of his control, it was fraying, ready to snap. He yanked harder, and the two of us ducked around a fallen tree. Our pace was as close to a run as my dad ever got, his expensive loafers squishing against the debris of leaves and twigs that carpeted the forest.
“You’re weak,” I spat, my voice shaking with fury. “You always have been. All your power, all your men, all your guns, and you’re still just a scared, bitter little man who can’t accept the world is bigger than him.” I saw the truth now, he was a man who couldn’t control anything unless he resorted to violence or blackmail. That was the only reason he still pulled me with him,still let me breathe, because he thought he could use me to his advantage somehow. I wasn’t going to let him.
Behind us, the battle was a thunderstorm of howls and crashes. It felt like the earth itself was trying to swallow our sins. He shoved me forward. I stumbled, fell hard, cold leaves and dirt biting into my palms. I turned just in time to see the gun in his hands, pointed at me. “If I’ve lost,” he growled, “then I’ll damn well make sure you go with me.”
So that was his final play? He was well and truly backed into a corner if he thought killing me now was his only option. He was an idiot, and he didn’t know what Gregory would do to keep me safe.Wasdoing. “You’ve already lost,” I whispered, tears pricking at the corners of my eyes. “It’s over. You’re done.” I rolled to my knees, sat up straight, chin raised, defiance in every line of my body. Let him see it, let him know he had lost me, that he’d never had me.
A shaft of cool, late-fall sunlight lit up his face, the lines etched deep into his skin, the silver at his temples, the madness in his eyes. My father. The man who taught me to fear first, ask questions later. I had never noticed how old he’d gotten, but he looked old to me now.
Avis screamed—yes, screamed—and leapt for the gun. “No!” I shouted, trying to block him with my body, my arms raised instinctively. Despite the threat, I still didn’t believe my father would shoot. The cat collided with my side as the gun cracked again. The sound was deafening, final. Avis yowled in pain and collapsed beside me, unmoving.
“AVIS!” I scrambled to reach him, to touch him, tears blurring my vision, but my father was looming, the barrel inches from my face now. I could smell the gunpowder, see the pitiless decision in his eyes.
Gregory’s roar echoed, closer now, but still too far away. Too far. I twisted my head and saw his beautiful, mystical shape coming through the trees. He wasn’t going to make it. The gun fired. Everything went white.
Was I hit? Was I—
Chapter 19
Gregory
The snake's body writhed one last time before falling still beneath my hooves, scales torn and bloodied, the earth around us gouged with the scars of battle. My breaths came hard and fast, steam rising from my nostrils, every muscle trembling from exertion and the high of adrenaline. But my victory turned to ash the moment I realized she was gone.
Kess.
I turned, massive frame pivoting toward the house, heart crashing like a war drum. She wasn’t there. Not on the porch, not near the others. The scent trail hit me a second later: sharp with fear, spiced with her sweat, and laced with the expensive cologne of Romano, which hid sour fear, soiled sweat, and stale cigars. He’d taken her. Dragged her into the woods while we were all too damn distracted to notice.
How had I not noticed? A roar tore from my throat. It split the air—a sound of rage and anguish—enough to startle a murder of crows from the trees. He’d taken her, and I’d been distracted by that damn snake shifter.
I charged into the woods, passing Arden just as he rolled the car and crushed the two mobsters who had been firing at him, their bullets rolling uselessly off his thick Trollkin skin. Ted and Lizzie’s hyperactive niece had two more men pinned, tying their hands behind their backs now that they were in human form again.
Then I was across the small back road and thundering into the forest. Branches cracked, undergrowth flattened beneath me. I tore through the woods, chasing the trail of her scent like a mad thing. My hooves pounded the ground, the wind howled in my ears, and still, it wasn’t fast enough. Not when every step screamed she was farther away. Too far. Too damn far. And the danger she was in was as great as ever. I had not done a thing to change that, not yet.
Then I saw them.
Avis was sprawled in the dirt, fur knotted and tangled, one leg twitching as he tried to rise. His chest heaved with shallow breaths, his eyes fluttering but burning with defiance. I could smell his pain—sharp and wrong. He’d fought. He’d tried to protect her.
And there stood Romano, looming above her like death incarnate, gun lifted, arm steady, and eyes colder than ice. That gun was aimed at Kess. My Kess. Her golden hair was tangled, her face streaked with blood and grime, but her eyes—wide, glassy—were fixed on the barrel of the gun.
No.
Time slowed. The breath left my lungs, a void opening in my chest as the worst possibility took hold. My blood turned to ice, my limbs to stone. I was too late. I had found her only to lose her.
The terror, the helplessness, it was worse than any pain I’d ever known. She was my soul’s other half, the tether that kept the man in me grounded. And in that moment, I saw the rest of my life without her: a barren, burning wasteland.
I wasn’t going to make it; there was still far too much ground for me to cover. Romano had seen me, and though he couldn’t possibly know how much his daughter meant to me, it seemed to me that he was satisfied. That he was looking at me and gloating as he squeezed the trigger.
Then a blur.
Orange and black streaked between the trees, muscle and motion, fluid and fast. A tiger, massive and silent, vaulted from behind a fallen trunk. The forest barely rustled with its passing. It moved with a grace that belied its size, every inch of it radiating deadly precision. The stripes flickered through the light like living fire.
It was closer than I was, faster, too. It slammed itself between Romano and Kess just as the gun fired. Bullets hit fur and flesh. The gunshot cracked like lightning. Blood sprayed into the air like a grotesque flower blooming.
The tiger let out a grunt—low and pained—but didn’t cry out. It absorbed the bullets, shielding her. It staggered on thick paws, back arched, sides heaving, but did not fall immediately. It turned slightly, as if to ensure she was still alive.
Rage gave my legs wings. I covered the last dozen yards in a heartbeat, the forest a smear around me. Every pulse of my heart was a drumbeat of vengeance. Romano barely had time to register the sound of my charge before I slammed into him.
There was no grace in the impact. Only force. He hit a tree with a sickening crunch, ribs or spine; I didn’t care which. The gun skittered from his hand and vanished into the leaves.He crumpled, unconscious before he hit the ground—a heap of arrogance and failure.
