Page 20

Chapter 20

Bjorn

M y tentacles rip the man’s hold from my mate and wrap around him. I yank them back to me, hurtling him from the dock. He shrieks as he plunges into the bay. I sink with him, squeezing him tightly with my tentacles and pulling him to face me.

His eyes are wide in panic, his face etched in horror, but he’s immobilized in my grasp. This man will die for touching her, but I want him to suffer first. It was already too long before I got to her.

I shudder at the memory of the bolts of fear her distress call sent to my heart. History will not repeat itself tonight. She is mine and I will protect her. I won’t fail her.

My feelers crawl until they find skin, their jagged hooks piercing his flesh, stunning my prey. My ink clouds around us, the poison thick. It will distort his vision, detaching his mind from reality and sending him into a hellscape.

Penelope’s shaking voice calls through the bond. “Bjorn, you can’t hurt him. Come back to me.”

I squeeze the man tighter, increasing the pressure.

My Wildcat tugs on me, a sharp twitch in the bond that matches the pinching sound of her voice in my head. “Now, mate. I can feel your resistance, but a disappearance is too risky, and you’re not allowed to kill my ex. Only rough him up a little.”

Her ex? That makes the need for vengeance rise. We are at war, my Beast and I, though for once, we’re on the same side. We want to obey our mate’s demand. At the same time, we need to protect her, keep her safe. I already disliked her ex. Now I want to make sure he never puts his hands anywhere near her again.

I let this happen, let him get close to her.

The fear that I am losing her is not something I want to live through again. I can’t lose Penelope; I would never recover. She has brought her sunshine-soaked curiosity into my world, and I never want to lose her light.

Her voice shakes in the bond when she speaks again. “I know you’re scared. Come back and we’ll solve it. Together. But this isn’t the way.”

My hold does not let up, but I rise from the muddy bottom of the bay, surging through the water until I’m floating near the surface.

Penelope huffs. “Bjorn, don’t make me wrestle a kraken.”

The sound of Penelope’s exasperated determination tugs me the rest of the way to the surface. She would wrestle a kraken shifter and I have a feeling that I’m about to see her do it.

When I poke my head out of the water, she’s standing on the dock, arms crossed, glaring at me. I do not relinquish my hold on her ex, but my lips twitch in amusement at the stubbornness etched on her face. She’s pissed and I want those fierce lips on mine.

Her eyebrow lifts.

Despite how cute my mate is when she’s ready to battle, her safety is serious. “Penelope, he laid his lands on you?—”

“He did. The asshole.”

My chest rumbles and anger rushes through me again.

“But you’re not in a shifter world anymore. I want a life exploring with you, not a life on the run. So, you’re going to have to let him go.”

“Sweet Violet—” I plead. He can’t put his hands on her and be allowed to live.

“They’ll come for us. It could expose your secret. Or I could go to jail for murder. Or?—”

I sigh and heave the man from the water with my tentacles, dropping him onto the dock. If I’m too rough, I don’t plan to apologize.

I could make him disappear. This is not a problem. The problem is my mate. Life was easier under shifter law. I’ve been a ghost in the human world, surviving but not living for too long. But I’m going to live in Penelope’s world now. Or at least we’re going to find some compromise between the two. I would do anything to protect her. I guess this is one of those things.

Climbing from the water, I shift, returning to my human skin. As soon as I stand, I’ve got my arms full of my mate. I hold her for a long moment before pulling back to check her over. She’s sporting a bruise on her cheek and her nails are a mess. My instincts flare, pulling me back toward the man.

Penelope squeezes her arms around me, latching on like a mollusk and climbing me until I pick her up. She squeezes her arms around my neck. “Thank you for protecting me.”

“He’s still there! And I was late. He hurt you.” I pull back enough to look at her face, my thumb tracing along the puffy skin of her cheek. My heart twinges with sadness and shame.

“No, you don’t. This was on him, not you.” She clasps my face, her eyes pleading with me. “You weren’t late. The fact that he will live but I’m safe means that you protected me. All the rest, that’s his fault, not yours.”

“He never should have gotten this close. I’m sorry I wasn’t here sooner,” I murmur, leaning my forehead against hers and breathing her in, letting her scent calm my raging desperation.

She’s safe.

“I know. I was scared too, but I’m okay. We’re okay,” she says softly.

We stay like that, dripping wet and clinging to one another until my world tilts back into balance.

“What did he want?” I ask, needing to understand what happened.

“Money. My trust fund was frozen by my family when I left. At first, Daniel tried to win me back, and when that wasn’t working, he thought I could help him get the artifact so he could sell it.”

“Is that when he laid his hands on you?” I squeeze her tighter, my chest rumbling. “I want to strangle him?—”

“I think you did! He will live, right?” Penelope asks, peeking around me to look at her ex laid out on the dock.

“I assume,” I grumble.

Penelope tugs on my ear. “You have to check!”

I grunt and set her down, then I kneel beside him. Calling on my Beast’s enhanced sight, I assess her asshole ex. I roll him to his side and beat on his back until his lungs clear. “Unfortunately, he will live, but he’s injured, and I can’t vouch for his mind.”

“What do you mean?” Penelope leans over my back, staring at the wreck I’ve made of him.

“I’m a warrior, Wildcat. One of our strengths in battle is the ability to use our ink to distract our prey’s mind. I have a poison in my ink that confuses the mind, causes hallucinations. It helps to weaken an opponent—with the added bonus that if they live, they’re confused about what happened. Only the Knights ever learned to battle against it.”

“Does that mean he won’t remember you? Will he remember anything?”

“It’s hard to say, but it’s likely most of the last memories will be distorted. It will feel like a dream.”

“What’s it made of? How does it work?” Penelope sucks in a breath and she’s off, curious as ever, leaning over to inspect her ex. “Have you ever accidentally inked yourself? Am I immune? Does it also make fish trippy?”

“Slow down, Wildcat. I don’t know and I’m not gonna be your lab rat. It’s magic. That’s how it works.”

Penelope sits back and looks at me with wide eyes. “That’s kinda badass. Is it bad that I think that’s badass?”

I laugh, picking up my mate and tucking her against me in a bridal carry.

“Where are you going? You’re naked! And he’s passed out!” she shrieks, swatting my chest playfully.

I look down into violet eyes, my sign of hope. I’m in love with everything about her and I can’t wait to discover more with her. She reaches up, seeking a kiss, and I brush her lips with mine. “I could have lost you.”

She tugs on my beard and murmurs into my lips, “But you didn’t.”

“I spent lifetimes in the darkness until you brought your light, and I won’t settle for anything less than lifetimes to love you.”

“I was waiting to love you too.” She brushes her soft lips against mine, smiling into the kiss. “Let’s go home.”

“Home. But first cover our tracks. Then I’m pinning you to bed where you can’t ever leave again.”

She taps my nose like a bad puppy. I laugh at her put-out expression. “What’s the first lesson in bondage?”

“Never let you go.” I carry her up the steps and toward the research facility.

Penelope makes an angry buzzing sound. “Wrong.”

We tease one another all the way back to the lab and through the cleanup, making sure to remove any evidence of her ex ever having been there. After Penelope assures me no one will notice, I steal a pair of scrubs from the lab.

The drive back down to the docks is quiet, the somber mood returning. After we wipe down Daniel’s car, Penelope goes to the dock and gives her ex one last look. He’s laid out on the wood, soaked and worse for wear, but he will wake soon. Probably with one hell of a headache and no idea how he got there.

She turns away from him, her heart aching and tugging on mine in our bond. Despite how well she’s been rolling with tonight’s events, my fierce Penelope is also delicate-hearted. And my mate is wrecked by what happened. Both of us are.

“Come on, my mate. Tonight has been shit and I want to hold you in my arms. Let’s go home.”