Page 59 of Beast of Eden

Franco nodded slowly, then stood in the center between Terror and Koss. They were wolf shifters, so they weren’t as small as humans, but they were still a full head smaller than Franco. They beckoned up at him, craning their necks like they were looking to the sky.

“So here’s how this is going to go,” Franco began, holding his hands in the air. “Both of your careers are over. I hope you know that. So you can accept that, remove yourself from the race circuit, and get out quietly with very little disruption. Or …”

Franco grabbed both of them by the scruff of their necks, the two of them yelping succinctly.

“Or you can do the stupidest thing on earth and go on like idiots. Either way, you are going to be dropped like a bag of dirt. Make your decision.”

Everyone in the garage seemed to hold their breath, including Violet. She held her phone at her hip, feeling her pulse increase twofold.

For a moment, it seemed like they were indeed going to go quietly. Koss nodded in desperation, but Terror was not in agreement. He bared his teeth, then launched his body onto Franco, pushing him back onto the garage floor.

The garage cleared as Terror tried sinking his teeth into Franco, but Franco grabbed him by the throat and tossed him against the monitor station. They smashed into a million pieces.

“VIOLET! GO!”

Franco had gone onto all fours when he was pushed, the entire pit crew, everyone except Cornel, having run for their lives. The venue had yet to hear the commotion, but it was inevitable. There was no way to hide thirsty shifter fighting.

“You are going to regret your disrespect,” Terror screamed, then ripped off his fire suit.

Violet kept her own feet planted, tossed her phone into the corner of the garage, and then stripped. Franco stared at her, frightened.

“I’m not leaving you,” she bellowed. “We do this together, right?”

The crowd in the VIP section was starting to question the disturbance, with some fans even leaning out over the railing and into the garage. A young man yelled that there was a wolf out on the tracks.

Both Violet and Franco whipped their eyes at the track as Koss and Terror shifted. Yes, there was another wolf out there. It was the one Violet had detected, the one that Franco had chased through the arena a few days before.

Violet got down into her tank top and underwear, with Franco watching her, horrified.

“Let’s do this,” she snarled.

TWENTY

FRANCO

Franco had to admit that Terror had caught him off guard, snapping at him and successfully shoving him to the ground. He was small for a shifter, but the man was clearly wiry and capable. Plus, the insanity in his eyes was surely something that would make up for whatever strength he lacked.

Franco thought of nothing else but Violet once the frenzy began. All of his pit team, the ones who weren’t shifters at least, panicked and broke away. He couldn’t blame them, of course. Watching human skin burst and split like cracked paint was enough to terrify even the bravest of men and women.

So he turned, and after yelling at her to get out of the way and escape the scene, she did the exact opposite.

It was the only context where he didn’t like seeing her strip down naked.

He burned with annoyance and fear once she had taken off her clothes, standing there in her tank top and underwear. Her pupils had bloomed into big black drops of oil, her tigress already emerging from the depths.

She was beautiful and formidable. Powerful and stubborn. He loved her and would love her more than anyone in the world for the rest of his life.

“We do this together,” she said, her lips curling over her teeth.

She was right. She wasn’t some lowly human who didn’t know what the hell was going on. She had fought with equal strength, wit, and skill in the woods when they went on their walk. She was a fierce beast that he trusted with his life.

It was natural for Franco to be protective of her. She was his fated mate, after all. But he couldn’t undermine her. She was no damsel in distress.

And she never would be.

“You fucking bastards!”

Terror screamed as tangled gray weaves of hair sprouted out of his human skin. His jaw cracked like glass, and his snout extended ever so slightly, his human voice box fading into the cerebral snarls of a feral wolf. Koss beside him did the same, except even in his wolf form, he appeared far more rational and reasonable.

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