Page 8 of Hunted (Love and Revenge #5)

She just stared at me from the eyes of the man I loved, their gaze haughty and cruelly amused.

“Oh, I will so enjoy draining you once you’re back in my menagerie where you belong, naga.

” Josh raised one eyebrow and gave me a sly look.

“You know, initially I was planning on simply using the useless human to get you to come back to the cathedral. But then I realized I could put him to much better use now that the two of you are cowering with the little rebel court. She tilted his head. “But I’ll make you a deal.” She leaned forward as she whispered, pressing Josh’s chest firmly against my hands and grinding our hips together while I fended her off.

“Leave the rebels and willingly come back to my menagerie like a good little pet and I’ll sever my link with Josh. ”

I laughed in her face. Even if I was okay with betraying the rebel court and walking away from Ruya—which I would never do—I knew Acacia was lying.

She had a disgusting obsession with my blood and my body, and the high she got from making a prince into her slave.

But there was no way she’d give up her goal of replacing the emperor just for the return of a blood and sex slave.

If I went to her, she’d just imprison me—permanently this time—and continue to use Josh as she saw fit, until she achieved her goals and was done with him.

At which time, he’d become useless to her and she’d have him killed just for fun.

I was not born yesterday. And I had plenty of experience with this bitch and her insane whims. I didn’t bother vocalizing this time. I simply mouthed the words, since I was sure they’d be understood.

Fuck. You.

My head slammed into a table leg before I even knew I was being attacked.

Apparently, Josh’s new vampire strength and speed were even more impressive than I’d realized.

Acacia was standing over me in an instant, wearing Josh’s body like a borrowed suit.

“Aww... poor baby,” she crooned as she leaned over me and swiped a finger through the blood leaking from my hairline, making sure to speak slowly so I could read her lips.

“Just imagine how upset little Joshy is going to be when he realizes he just drained you dry.” She popped the bloody finger into her mouth and groaned as she sucked the blood off.

Then she grinned with glee. “Oh! And that uppity bitch who calls herself a princess will be livid over how badly she failed to protect her supposed people. Shifters are so easy to manipulate, with all their stupid animal instincts. Serves her right for dragging her feet when I gave her instructions. What fun!”

Josh reached for me, and I braced myself, prepared to let him hurt me, since I couldn’t stomach the idea of fighting back and hurting him in the process.

His movements went jerky, and he stumbled, falling to his knees on the floor beside me.

“Oops!” he said, that manic light still in his eyes that said I was talking to Acacia.

She spoke too fast for me to read her lips.

“Looks.... business calls. Ta for now, Sadavir. It’s been. .. chatting with you....again....time.”

Josh bent forward and gripped his head in his hands. His shoulders hunched and his body shook with what could either be pain, tears, or yelling. I sat up and reached for him, forcing him to lift his head so I could see what was going on, so I could figure out if she’d hurt him...

Blood dripped from his nose, and he angrily wiped it away.

His hazel gaze was his own now, filled with fury and horror.

“Sadavir,” he signed gasped. Then he started signing with bloody fingers.

“I’m sorry. Did I hurt you? Did I...” He looked from his bloody fingers to me, as if he couldn’t quite remember everything that had happened but was slowly putting things together.

“Did I...” he said as he patted his own body, down his chest, pelvis, and thighs, his hazel eyes gone wide and shocky. “I...I...”

Fuck. I was going to murder Acacia slowly with my bare hands when the time came.

She had almost succeeded in making me violate Josh, tricking me into crossing a boundary that would feel wrong to him, especially because he wasn’t in charge of his body at the time.

I grabbed his hands and pressed them between mine, letting my aura swell out and suffuse the room, using it and his beta instincts to urge him to settle and let me deal with any threat.

“No,” I verbalized. “I might be a horny asshole, but I’m not that dumb.”

He let out a sigh and some of the tension left him. “Oh.”

I released his hands to sign. “I know you, Josh. That wasn’t you. You’re safe.”

But he just shook his head sadly as he looked around the room and arched a brow at our current location on the floor, where he had thrown me like I weighed nothing. “Clearly not true,” he signed back with a grim expression on his face.

I shook my head and stood, pulling him to his feet as well. “I’m fine ,” I signed, stressing the last word for emphasis. “Naga are hardy people. Warriors.”

He just gave me a look that I recognized all too well. It was one that said there would be no coming back from this, but he was going to pretend everything was fine, all the same.

I rubbed the bump on the back of my head, at a loss for how to convince him that this wasn’t his fault.

“You should go,” he signed, waving me toward the door. “You’ve got to help overthrow the emperor. And I’ve got reading to do.”

I glanced at the books piled on his bedside table and the small breakfast table on this side of the room. Spell books. Books about vampire history. Journals. Piles of useless paper that Richard the dhampir dragged in here whenever he came to visit.

I was pretty sure they weren’t going to find the answers to this problem in a book. But maybe it gave him comfort to feel like he was doing something.

“I’ll come back. Later. Or sooner. Whatever you need,” I signed awkwardly. Things had always come so naturally between me and Josh—our friendship, our working relationship, our falling in love. I had never struggled so much with how to handle things between us. I hated it.

He gave the smallest nod. I turned and slowly made my way to the door. The silence between us wasn’t comfortable, and I hated that too.

Growling, I spun on a heel and strode over to where Josh stood staring morosely at the pile of books that had been knocked off the table when he threw me into it.

His eyes rounded in surprise, but he didn’t stop me when I gripped his chin and made him look up at me.

“I love you,” I said out loud. Then I kissed him. Hard.

Josh might be on the brink of giving up on himself. But I never would. Pulling back, I nodded at him once, curt and final, then I left.