Page 19

Chapter nineteen

Kai

I t was better to ask forgiveness than permission, right? That and I was pretty sure I’d go crazy if I didn’t do something now that I knew where Rainn was. We weren’t so far from the city that it would be that hard to find it… and I knew Nash wasn’t going to take me there until after he’d found Koth and killed him.

I was halfway to packing up all of my stuff so I could take off at a run toward my friend when I realized something…

I couldn’t leave Nash. I was pretty sure if I up and completely disappeared, he’d probably end up waging an entire extra war to find me. That and… from the sound of the letter, even though Nash’s brother had been attacked, Rainn hadn’t been.

Fucking my own human mate. One who came through the portal around the same time I did. I didn’t believe in coincidences that big.

Yeah. He was probably safer where he was than if I found him and dragged him back here with me. Nash’s warning about me leading danger straight to him was still stuck in the back of my mind too. Rainn was safer without me there.

Especially if Nash was going to go after this Koth dude and not hold back.

But I still needed to do something … and by the time I realized that “something” wasn’t running away, it was probably too late.

The best I could do was compromise. I knew the road the messenger had taken, because it was the road we were traveling… and he’d only left a few minutes ahead of me. As long as I stayed on the road and not in the trees, I couldn’t get lost.

It did take me a little longer than I wanted to write up a quick letter for Rainn—telling him I was here, that I was blaming this all on him and all the smut he’d made me beta read… and letting him know that I was happy.

Fuck , I was happy.

But still, he needed to come and find me ASAP. If he was fucking the Emperor of the whole land, I was pretty sure he’d be able to manage a little request, right? Maybe he could talk his newfound royal lover into coming to help Nash so no one got hurt.

For the third time, I glanced around the camp to make sure that none of Nash’s guards were watching me, and then I slipped out and took off at a jog down the road.

It didn’t feel good, leaving without telling Nash, but I had a feeling he wouldn’t really appreciate me asking Rainn for help—he was stubborn, and he thought he could do everything on his own.

And…

As I continued to jog in the direction of the messenger Nash had dispatched, I realized he sounded exactly like me.

Not asking for help. Doing what he thought was right, what he thought he had to do to take care of the person he… loved.

“Fuck, I really love him, huh?” The words came out soft on my tongue, and they didn’t sound strange, they didn’t feel wrong .

They were just… there. And real, solid enough that they’d kept me from running off again, weighty enough that they were going to keep me here in this world, by his side.

I was ready to leave everyone and everything behind, because I’d finally found where I actually belonged.

And that place I actually belonged… was probably going to try to spank me again if he found out I’d run off without telling him. As much as the thought made my cock twitch in my shorts, I would probably be better off hurrying up and getting back before he noticed instead.

The good news was, I’d actually gone in the right direction for once. I saw the back of the messenger’s head as I rounded the corner.

“Mol!” I shouted his name and let out a small snicker as his head whipped back and his eyes went wide.

“No. No! Back to the camp with you, Kai. If Nash thinks for a moment that I helped you in another escape attempt, I—”

His words cut off, his eyes going wide… and I didn’t realize why until his body fell forward with a knife sticking out of his back. His gaze lifted to me—at least he wasn’t dead—but…

“Mol?” My attention turned to the trees—to the orc standing there with a grin on his face and another knife in his hand. His eyes were all for the injured man on the ground.

And…

I realized I couldn’t let him hurt him.

If Mol was one of Nash’s people, he was one of mine, and… he was already hurt because I’d distracted him.

“Kai, no…”

But I was already running forward and tackling the asshole standing there with every bit of force I had. It sent us both falling back, and I realized with the smallest ounce of regret that we were at the top of a hill.

Well, we had been at the top of a hill. We were going down now.

At least I’d gotten the fucker away from Mol.

That didn’t stop me from getting the wind knocked out of me as we tumbled into the trees. I landed hard on my back with a painful thud.

I was trying to get my vision to stop swimming when the low grunt of a voice to my left let me know that the guy I’d tackled had obviously landed a little better than I did.

“This is Nash’s human?”

Nash’s human.

I clutched my fingers in the grass beneath me and glanced up through my hair as I forced myself into a kneeling position. I was close enough to the asshole now that I could get a good look at him—the side of his head was shaved, and his eyes were a hard, dark blue color that made me shiver when he looked down at me.

Because he was looking at me like I was some prize he’d just found, some leverage he could use.

Maybe I didn’t always know what was going on, but I was pretty sure this was the guy Nash was hunting down.

The one who he’d been worried about finding me.

The whole reason he’d refused to let me go anywhere out of his sight and the safety of his camp.

“Fuck. I’m about to be Nash’s dead human if he realizes what happened.” I muttered to myself as I tried to push back a few feet to put some distance between me and the danger that was obviously standing in front of me. “You’re, uh… Koth? Yeah?” I tried for a winning smile, but I was pretty sure it failed. What I wanted to do was stand up and swing on him for hurting Mol, for trying to hurt Nash. But… well… I needed to buy some time until I could catch my breath.

I needed to pretend I was just a dumb, helpless human.

“Yes, I am Koth.” He’d lost the small knife he was holding at the top of the hill, but that just gave him room to unsheathe a larger blade he’d strapped to his back—the same kind of machete-sword thing Nash carried around. He tipped it beneath my chin, forcing me to look up at him. “And you are correct. You will be a dead human by the time Nash finds you.”

Fuck. I knew Nash was being protective, but I’d kind of thought he was being overly protective.

It was weird—I’d been here for a few weeks and I still wasn’t used to the fact that I wasn’t the biggest guy in the room.

“Look.” I held my hands up, trying to channel my inner helpless maiden that I was sure was buried somewhere deep inside me. “I’m sorry that I tackled you, but I thought you were… uh, trying to rob us up there? I’m just trying to get to the ci—” The sharp feel of metal pressing into my chin cut my lie off before I’d had a chance to get started.

“I know who you are. I know what you mean to him, and I know that you will be the perfect lure to bring Nash to his knees. He would do anything to protect his mate .” From the way the orc in front of me scoffed the word and the snarl on his face, I half wondered if he was some kind of scorned lover, pissed off that Nash hadn’t picked him. He sure as shit was giving off those vibes. “I will make use of your death to make sure his is a long, drawn-out thing.”

I frowned. There was no way I was going to let this fucking asshole use me to get to Nash.

Not when I’d been the dumbass who got myself into trouble even though he’d warned me over and over not to go out alone.

Fuck… not when I was in love with him. Orc magic, dildo-thief karma… whatever it was, I knew it was true.

I loved Nash… which meant I’d do whatever it took to keep him safe. And maybe the asshole in front of me didn’t realize that he wasn’t just dealing with some helpless little human who wasn’t going to fight back.

I’d spent my entire life protecting the people I cared about, and I wasn’t about to stop now.

I jerked away from him and felt a sting of pain along my throat. I wasn’t some hardened orc warrior, and I wasn’t trained in machete-sword orc fighting, or whatever magic Koth probably had.

The thud of something hitting the ground and the sudden garbled, snarling sound that came from Koth’s throat made me look down.

The collar I wore—the one Nash had slapped on me when we first met, the one that let me understand what he was saying—was on the ground. And it was spattered with blood.

Koth’s eyes dropped to my neck, to the hot liquid I could feel sluicing down along my skin, and he smiled .

Shit. I was probably in trouble.