Page 9 of Broken Souls

Please don’t be Rudy,I think instinctively, liking him the best. No one who takes the time to help ducklings cross the road deserves to die.

Feeling a presence behind me, I turn to see Maddox, the youngest Shadow at twenty-two, enter the vast living room, which is connected to the kitchen through the archway I’m standing in. He doesn’t look like he’s lost a brother, and the tension in my shoulders eases a little. Whatever happened last night might have been serious, but it wasn’t lethal.

Maddox looks me up and down, then flashes a cocky grin. “Well, you look like you’ve been properly fucked,” he says.

My neck heats, the marks Varius left on it burning hot. The ones on my thighs and breasts tingle to awareness too, but I tell myself he can’t see those.

“I’m surprised you would know what that looks like on a woman,” I say. My eyes widen as my brain suddenly catches up with my mouth.

He laughs. Then winks. “Only because I have them rail me in front of mirrors.”

My mouth drops open as my blush shoots all the way up my cheeks and to my ears. Maddox is a shapeshifter, able to take the form of another – maleorfemale.

“Are you saying you…” The rest of my words turn into a strained noise. Deciding I don’t want confirmation, I blurt, “What happened last night?”

His smile evaporates as his eyes shift to the long wooden counter humming with magic. “Talon nearly died.”

“How?”

“We tried to kill Antonio.”

“We being you and Talon?”

He snorts. “All eight of us.”

My mouth hits the godsdamn floor. “And youlost? With Khalid there?”

He’s the Family reaper, a badass motherfucker who hunts down those who turn traitor. Meaning he’s the best of the best. His soul magic is utterly terrifying. With it, he’s able to kill from anywhere in the world as long as he has their DNA.

With all of the Shadow brothers attacking Antonio, that should’ve given Maddox enough time to study his molecular makeup so he could shapeshift into the werewolf alpha and then give Khalid a part of ‘him’ to use in his soul magic. The fact that the Boss of the Death Hunt isn’t dead? Means he had an ace up his sleeve that no one knew about. Which begs the question, what other surprises does he have?

“Khalid got distracted.”

“Khalid?” I stress, shaking my head. “Mister Won’t Even Glance at a Supermodel’s Boobs gotdistracted?” I have legit seen that happen. One of the capos brought his mistress to dinner a couple months ago. She was absolutely gorgeous, so much so that evenIlooked when her dress accidentally slipped when she reached down to grab a dropped napkin.

Unfortunately, that ended up killing her as Varius caught me looking. Which was a shame; she had great boobs before he cut them off and then slit her throat.

But Khalid didn’t even glance over with a quick side eye, not when she bent down nor when Varius killed her. He just kept eating his steak. His focus is insane.

“By what?” I ask incredulously.

Maddox sighs. “You want to cook while I talk?” he says as he glances behind me. “I’m fucking starving. Been out all night babysitting the fucker.”

I blink.

Blink again.

Then I turn and head into the kitchen while he follows me.

“Is Sau okay?” I ask as I start pulling out what’s needed to make egg and bacon sandwiches for the entire household. Normally, their mom is up before me – the role of a female Shadow being one of servitude. But Sau is the only true healer in this family. If Talon was that fucked up, she would have ignored her curse, which requires her to sacrifice time off her life in order to use her magic, and healed him.

“Yeah. Ma’s fine. She’s just exhausted after saving T’s ass.” He settles on the counter, seemingly indifferent to the black magic electrifying the air around it. Me? I keep my distance from it, using the other side of the kitchen to do my prep work.

“Counter’s fine,” he says with a grin. “It ate enough blood last night to keep it sated for months.”

I look at it warily. I want to ask him what the fuck that means. Sau hasn’t explained why it hums with so much dark magic – a family secret I’m not trusted with yet, but I don’t want to get distracted from what happened last night. Varius might have instigated the blood bond, but that does not mean he’s going to treat me like a partner in the Family business. A woman in the Shadow Domain is nothing more than a breedmare; she doesn’t need to know anything other than when her husband wants her on her back. Perhaps one day I can change that, but it will be two thousand years of tradition I’ll be fighting – as well as Varius’ paranoia about a coup.

He’s survived too many to not instantly see my innocent attempts at becoming his equal as a veiled threat.