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  Yet she couldn’t stop herself. She wanted to hurt them.

  Kill them.

  She tried to shake it off, fear rising inside her.

  The female reached them and Lyra focused on her work, trying to shut out that dark need to fight that pushed her to lash out at the woman.

  “I need information about a group of mortal hunters seen around this part of Hell,” Grey said.

  Lyra translated it into the ancient fae tongue.

  The female looked Grey over, stoking Lyra’s urge to fight the bitch, and then looked off to her left, towards a shadowy corner away from the bar.

  “Speak with him.” The bartender pointed at a lone male seated at one of the tables.

  Grey looked at Lyra.

  “There’s a male who might be able to help us.” She slipped from the stool when Grey moved off, and managed to smile at the bartender as she said, “Thanks.”

  Grey prowled through the busy room and she followed on his heels, flashing fangs at a few of the females who looked their way.

  “You know of mortals in these parts?” Grey said, voice darker than before, and she wondered what had gotten into him.

  She stepped around him.

  Oh my.

  The male the bartender had told her to speak with lounged in a wooden chair made for two, arms stretched along the back and his right ankle casually resting on his left knee. Black trousers hugged his long legs, polished leather riding boots reaching his knees, and a matching black tunic fitted snug to his lean figure.

  Violet eyes lifted to her and the tips of his ears grew a little more pointed, poking out of his wavy blue-black hair.

  An elf.

  “I don’t speak his language,” she said to Grey, but he wasn’t listening.

  He was glaring at the male.

  “I do speak yours,” the elf offered and swept his right hand out towards the space beside him. “Come. Let us speak of mortals.”

  Grey pushed past her and sat where the elf had wanted her to be, his broad frame shoving the male to one side, pinning him into the corner of the chair.

  “Speak then, Elf.” He pulled a stack of folded papers out of his backpack and slammed them down on the table. “I need to know where this place is they speak of here.”

  “Why not just skip straight to this entry?” The male pressed a finger to the paper further down the page. “I can tell you where this place is.”

  Grey looked closely at the papers, some of the darkness leaving his eyes as he read whatever was on them at the point the elf had marked. She tried to see, but it was impossible to read when it was upside down to her.

  She moved to her right, coming around the table.

  Grey lifted his head and a strange sensation built inside her as he stared at her.

  She stopped moving towards the elf to get a better angle on the papers and looked at Grey.

  Right into eyes that were bright blue in the low light, glowing around his pupils.

  An unsettling feeling went through her.

  One that whispered Grey was experiencing the same dark need that kept trying to consume her.

  The urge to fight.

  CHAPTER 7

  The ferocity of the feeling that swept through Grey the moment the elf looked at Lyra shook him to his core.

  It was strong, overpowering, commanding him to fight.

  For her.

  He tried to focus on the elf and on finding out what the male knew, but it became impossible when Lyra moved closer to the male.

  Grey’s hands shook as his claws lengthened.

  His fangs emerged, itching for the taste of blood.

  His heart slammed against his chest.

  He grabbed the papers and his bag. “Excuse me a moment.”

  He was out of the door before Lyra could say anything, had placed at least thirty metres between him and the village in the next heartbeat.

  Leaving her with the male.

  Grey growled, his fangs punching long from his gums and his claws sinking into the straps of the backpack as he slung it over his shoulders.

  The hunger to shift and rip out the elf’s throat blasted through him.

  He forced himself to keep moving away, to place more distance between them and find some space, some air, anything to help him get the urges running rampant through him back under control.

  He was halfway across the valley before it finally began to abate and he could breathe again.

  “Wait.”

  Lyra.

  He made the mistake of turning towards her.

  The second he saw her, a different urge struck him, this one far more powerful than the need to fight.

  He needed to dominate her and drive her into submission. It wasn’t him, and he didn’t like how it made him feel. He didn’t like it at all. He wasn’t one to force his will on anyone.

  He was a protector first and foremost, a male who took care of others not one who did things that would hurt them.

  He breathed hard, desperately trying to subdue the instincts rising inside him before she reached him and saw what she did to him, and the things he wanted to do with her.

  He couldn’t let her see it. She was terrified of males now, afraid of anyone touching her. He didn’t want to frighten her. It would kill him as sure as a blade through his heart.

  “Wait.” She held her hand up as she limped towards him, a wild edge to her blue eyes, one that had him waiting for her when he should have kept walking and putting more distance between them.

  With her injury slowing her down, he could easily outrun her and leave her in the dust, unable to follow him.

  It was pointless.

  He could outrun her, but he couldn’t outrun this feeling, the urges that struck him and tried to control him whenever he let himself slip.

  They were never going away.

  He stared at Lyra.

  Because she was his fated one.

  That killed him.

  He couldn’t take it.

  “The elf says it’s in the dragon realm.” She stopped near him and leaned forwards as she fought to catch her breath. “You left before he could say. Why?”

  She lifted her chin and hit him hard with those blue eyes, her black hair falling forwards to brush both of her cheeks.

  “Thanks.” Grey turned away from her because he couldn’t bear looking at her, wasn’t sure he was strong enough right now, not in the wake of the revelation that she was his fated female.

  He had thought he would never have one, yet here she was, the one who had been made for him and him alone.

  A female for him to cherish, to protect and to love forever.

  But she would never be that for him. He wasn’t a fool. He could see the damage her captivity had done to her, how it had shaped her feelings about males and about anything that might be a collar, whether it was a physical restraint, or a blood bond.

  She would hate it, and hate him for it.

  He started walking again, his heart leaping about all over the place in his chest, a need to turn back around and stay with her warring with a deeper need to leave.

  He didn’t want to hurt her.

  He might if he stayed near her.

  He wouldn’t be able to live with himself if he lost control and did something he would regret.

  Something she would regret too when she realised what he was.

  He didn’t think he could bear her inevitable rejection.

  “Thanks?” she snapped, a sharp edge to her usually soft voice. “Thanks? That’s all you have to say to me?”

  “You helped me. We’re even. Just keep on the same bearing we took to reach the village and you’ll hit the portal. Go home, Lyra.” Gods, those were the hardest words he had ever had to say.

  She didn’t want to be around him though, and she had done what she had promised. She had translated for him and now he had a lead to follow. She was free to go. He had things from here.

  After everything she had been through in Hell, she was proba
bly already walking away from him, taking him up on the offer.

  Only when he focused on her, he found she was moving closer instead of further away.

  He looked over his shoulder at her. “What are you doing?”

  “My debt is far from repaid, and I know the way to the dragon realm.” She scowled at him. “I’m going to help you.”

  Gods.

  He couldn’t bear it.

  The need to crush her in his arms, to bruise her lips with a fierce kiss that would make her see that she was his, and his alone, and he was hers, was too strong, consuming, driving him to do something. He couldn’t do this. He couldn’t take her with him.

  He wasn’t strong enough to keep fighting that need.

  She was asking too much of him.

  “Just point the way,” he bit out. “You’re not coming with me. I don’t need your help anymore.”

  “You do.” Stubborn hellcat. She planted her hands on her hips. “It’s better this way.”

  No. It was better his way. It was better for both of them.

  “Go.” He reached out to grab her and push her away from him.

  She bared her fangs at him and hissed.

  His hand dropped to his side, self-loathing sweeping through him. He had almost overstepped the line already. If they stayed together, he would end up doing something terrible. He would cross that line in the worst of ways.

  It wasn’t him.

  But at the same time it was.

  He had never been aware of his hellcat side, but now he was aware of nothing else. It ruled him, pushed him into seizing Lyra with both hands and bending her to his will, doing whatever it took to make her belong to him.

  No.

  He closed his eyes, clenched his fists and swore he would never be that male.

  Because Lyra was leaving him right here, right now, and he would never see her again.

  She started walking, moving away from him, and relief poured through him, lifting some of the weight from his heart. Thank the gods, she was going to do as he asked and leave him.

  It was what he deserved.

  He didn’t belong with a female like her.

  He didn’t deserve any female.

  Even if he had managed to control his dark urges around her, eventually she would have seen him shift, and she would have witnessed him in his feline form.

  She would have seen him as his pride did.

  Not a beautiful tiger with gold and black fur like his twin and the rest of his family.

  An aberration.

  A freak.

  The relief that had washed through him like cool water dried up when he focused harder on Lyra.

  And realised she was heading in the opposite direction to the portal, walking towards the mountains they had traversed to reach the valley from the one on the other side where the slave camp had been.

  He opened his eyes and looked at her as she limped determinedly away from him, his black t-shirt and cargo shorts swamping her slender figure, and her skin marred with dark dust that reached halfway up her calves.

  “Where are you going?”

  She didn’t look at him as she answered.

  “I just remembered I had some business in the dragon realm.”

  CHAPTER 8

  Something was eating away at Grey again. Lyra had thought him distant and quiet before, but since the village he had shown her that it had been the mere tip of a very cold, very forbidding iceberg.

  He had barely said a word to her in the past day.

  The few times he had spoken, most of them had been attempts to make her leave him.

  Why?

  She had said she would translate for him, and she would.

  Although part of her still wasn’t sure why she hadn’t taken the out he had given to her.

  With everything she had been through at the hands of males, when he had offered her directions to the nearest portal and told her to leave, she had expected to take him up on it.

  Something had made her stay.

  She wanted to say it was that feeling that he was far from home. Alone in this dark realm.

  Lonely.

  It still struck that chord in her, even more so as she walked beside him. There was only ten foot of space between them, but it felt like an ocean. She felt alone, even when she wasn’t. Lonely.

  It was Grey.

  He was too quiet, hadn’t spoken to her in over three hours now. That time he had wanted her to leave, but something in his eyes had said he didn’t mean it, so rather than arguing, she had just kept walking.

  How long had it been since he had last asked how her leg was doing and whether she needed a rest?

  She was starting to miss that gentle, caring side of him. The cold front had closed in shortly afterwards, chilling the air between them, that much she did recall.

  Okay, so maybe that was partly her fault since she hadn’t been able to hold back the urge to bare her fangs at him, the thought that he believed her weak and vulnerable still pushing her to threaten him.

  He wasn’t a threat to her though.

  She knew that deep in her heart.

  He had merely been concerned about her, hadn’t viewed her injury as a weakness he could exploit to overpower her or hurt her.

  She had no reason not to trust him after everything he had done for her, yet she couldn’t bring herself to have faith in him. Had she lost her ability to trust? Was she always going to feel this way now, act this way?

  Had she closed herself off?

  Her gaze slid towards Grey. She wanted to trust him.

  Fuck, she wanted more than just trust between them.

  It had been slowly dawning on her from the moment she had first seen him, and now she couldn’t shake it. The need to fight the females who looked at him in the village had been the last clue, the one that had helped her see the truth.

  She wanted him.

  Desired him.

  He was gorgeous, a warrior with a big heart, an enticing blend of dangerous and tender that drew her to him, made her ache with a need to know more about him and move closer still, until she was under his skin as deeply as he was under hers.

  “Do you need a break? Are you hungry?”

  Gods, she had missed the sound of his voice. It hit her hard, left her feeling she had gone days, weeks without hearing it rather than a handful of hours. She soaked it in, savoured it as she would water in the driest desert.

  He only ever seemed concerned about her. She couldn’t remember ever meeting someone like that—someone like him.

  Was he ever concerned about himself?

  Would he just keep walking, not resting nor eating, unless she said she wanted it?

  “I still can’t believe you charged into a slave auction to free everyone.” She let the words slip from her lips, a gentle outpouring of her feelings that she hoped might entice him into talking to her, telling her more about himself.

  So she could learn to trust him.

  “I couldn’t stop myself,” he said and then sighed, his bare chest expanding with it.

  She resisted the urge to look at it and kept her eyes locked on his profile. “At first, I thought you might be someone from the auction.”

  He stopped and when she looked back at him, he was scowling at her, his eyes dark and silvery brows knitted hard above them.

  “I know better now. You can’t blame me for not trusting you.” She hoped he didn’t anyway. She hadn’t really thought about how he might take it. The words had just come out. Maybe she wanted to open up a little to him too, to allow him to get to know her better. “You have to admit, most people would have watched that procession march past and then carried on with their lives.”

  “It was just something I had to do.” He shrugged and started walking again, long legs carrying him back towards her and then past her.

  She followed him over a small hill and down the other side, towards the base of a mountain that cut a valley in half down the centre. “Because of what happened to your
sister and your brother? You must have been raised well.”

  He rolled his shoulders again and she had the feeling he didn’t want to talk about it.

  Surprise swept through her when he spoke.

  “Maybe. My position in the pride was that of protector.” He adjusted the left strap of his backpack, far too interested in it.

  Avoiding her.

  Why?

  A lot of things she had been admiring about him suddenly made a lot of sense, and no matter what angle she looked at it from, it didn’t paint him in a bad light at all.

  “What did you protect?” Curiosity firmly took hold of the helm and steered her towards getting an answer to that question.

  When she had first met him, she had formed an instant opinion of him—he was a warrior, a male born for war and honed by it, one who obeyed the call of violence.

  She couldn’t have been more wrong.

  The warrior was still there when she looked at him, but he had proven himself so much more than that.

  He looked at her out of the corner of his eye again, sighed and fixed his gaze ahead of them. “My little sister.”

  The one who had found her mate.

  She wanted to smile at that, at the thought of him playing the role of bodyguard to his sister. Beneath the growly exterior was a big heart that beat with a need to protect the innocent.

  He had said he had attacked the auction because of what had happened to his sister and brother, but it was more than that, she felt sure of it. He would have done the same thing even if his sister and brother hadn’t been held captive in the past.

  It was just the male he was.

  His need to protect would have driven him to serve justice the slavers and free everyone.

  “So do you protect the pride now that your sister is mated?”

  He didn’t look at her. “No.”

  And that sensation she had about him, that loneliness she picked up in him, made sense at last.

  His role in life, the mission that had probably been his and his alone to fulfil for decades or more, had suddenly come to an end and he had been replaced by another male, the role of protecting his sister passed on to her mate.

  Had there been nothing to keep him at the pride?