“No,” I told him. “We all go or we all stay.”
Determination threaded through me like steel lacing my bones. I wasn’t leaving any of them this close to the prison. Not Fin. Not Maddox. Not Rogue. Not my asshole.
He let out an aggrieved sigh as the other member of the Seven raced back toward us. It was weird. I could almost see him move. It wasn’t a blur so much as he was just out of focus, like a stop motion shutter on a camera. Each click brought him closer and closer.
I slammed my hand out a split second before he got to us, and the light blazed like it had when Alfred purged the shadow taint from me the second time. Stranger still, the power pulsed right off my hand, and the former angel in front of us—right, all of the Seven were. Including my asshole. Alfred pulled me to him, even as Fuckface flew backwards and cracked through two trees.
The shouts around us grew louder, and I glared at the vampires swarming in. They were no match for my guys, but I could taste Maddox’s fury, Fin’s irritation, and Rogue’s annoyance. All of them were so angry on some level, but nothing compared to how incandescent Alfred was next to me. I swore he glowed.
Glancing at where his hand wrapped on my arm, I stared. We were both glowing. I’d kind of done that earlier when I’d burned Dorran. Not a one off?
“Um…”
“Behind me, Hellion.” Alfred thrust me behind him, even as Maddox let out a blistering roar and fire flooded the whole area in front of us. One moment, Fuckface was there, the next, it was a firestorm.
Rogue and Fin hit me from either side as they gripped Alfred and dragged him backward until the three of them formed a triangle around me. The air shimmered as Fin’s magic bubbled, cutting out the sound of Maddox’s roar, the smell of scorching bodies as vampires turned to ash as did trees, and fuck me, even the rocks cracked and split open just before they exploded.
Tucked right up against Rogue, I let out a breath. He cooled the air inside the bubble that had been sweat-drenching just seconds earlier. The blaze of red, orange, and yellow suddenly went blue, and I swore my eyes had to have rounded.
How hot did my dragon’s fire get?
Very hot, Beautiful. His mate was about to take on one of the Seven. He could burn this whole mountainside down then take out the city, so let’s take a beat and not rush into danger again.
I scowled. “I had it handled.”
“Yes, little sváss,” Rogue said in an almost absently soothing tone. “You did very well, and we’ll discuss the fact you took off on us—”
“Again,” Alfred ground out.
“—later,” Rogue finished, as though Alfred hadn’t spoken.
“Discuss it all you want,” I said. “I had to come get them.”
“It’s okay, Beautiful,” Fin soothed and stroked a hand over my hair. “We need to go now.”
“Maddox!” Alfred called, the command in his voice unmistakable as Fin tangled his fingers in my hair and tugged me toward him. Rogue’s arms tightened around me, and Alfred didn’t let me go much farther either, but then Fin kissed me and the heat around us eased almost at once.
“Really fucking funny, Fin,” Maddox growled as Fin swept his tongue around mine and stole my breath. A glow inside of me just amped brighter with every contact, and then I was plucked from all of them and wrapped up against Maddox’s chest, and I let out a laugh of delight.
Genuine delight speared me.
Except…
Arms around Maddox, I glanced past his shoulder to the devastated and scorched areas of blackened earth. Nothing moved. Very little was even standing.
“Closer,” Fin urged, and he pressed to my side, even as Rogue and Alfred boxed in around me. Magic swirled in the air, but movement amongst the dark ash had me narrowing my eyes. Charred like a nightmare, the figure rose and opened its eyes.
Holy crap.
I opened my mouth to warn them but the world blurred around us as Fin’s magic pulled us all along on a spiraling journey that dumped us from the smoky ruins beyond the prison to the snowy recesses just outside the keep. The frigid air had me curling closer to Maddox, who kept an arm banded around me.
Then he pivoted, pulling me away from them as he stalked toward the keep.
“Maddox.”
Only his name and my dragon halted, his whole body tensing. “Not now, Alfred. I need time with her before we have this discussion.”
“We have to have it now,” Rogue answered, not Alfred, and I twisted in Maddox’s arms to look back at them. Both Rogue and Alfred stood like yin and yang sentinels in competing dark and light, with the setting sun blazing orange and red behind them. As much as I’d had to go for Fin and Maddox, I’d missed my asshole and Rogue.
Alfred caught my gaze, and for a split-second, I could have sworn he winked. But his expression remained unchanged, so maybe I just imagined it.
A growl rumbled in Maddox’s chest, and I smoothed a hand over his shoulder. “I’m not going anywhere,” I promised him. All of them really. “I have all four of you back now, I don’t need to flee.”
Fin sighed. “Bath. We can eat, bathe, and then you can steal her away after we’re done, but they’re right…we do need to talk.”
I swore Maddox’s growl deepened. “Fine,” he snarled. “Get the food and the drink ready. We’ll be there in a minute.”
A squeak of sound escaped me as he fled into the keep, and then we were through the main hall and up to the wing where our rooms were, but he didn’t slow until we were inside my rooms and he had me pinned to the wall.
“Kitten,” Maddox said in a rough voice, and I hitched my thighs higher on his hips as I reached between us. His cock was hard and hot in my hands, and it took no urging for me to line him up, but when I would have sank down, he thrust in deep enough my toes curled. “I don’t know if I can be gentle,” he warned, and it was a battle.
The muscles in his neck were rigid, and his expression fierce. Despite all of that, he held himself completely still, even if he shook, and his grip on me—though tight—was not painful. Cupping his face, I ignored the smoky scent and the ash, blood, and sweat streaking his skin and probably mine, and kissed him.
Taut lips softened under mine and then his tongue swept forward, demanding access, and I opened to him. It took one roll of my hips, and he began to piston into me, not once letting go of my mouth as we fought to consume each other. I slid my fingers down to the mark at the juncture of where his neck met his shoulder.
Powerful emotion swarmed through me—love, longing, need, and even aggravation and irritation that I’d risked myself. Laughter tore out of my throat at the thorny emotions stabbing me, even as he swallowed the sound. I dug my fingers into his hair, fisting it as he began to swell, and when he finally released my mouth to kiss down my throat, I sighed.
The need to feel his teeth held me captive as much as the fact that he impaled me on his cock over and over again. Then a whisper of a kiss, a near silent plea. He wouldn’t bite without me telling him yes, so I dragged him closer. “I’m yours,” I reminded him. “You’re mine.”
My vision whited out as his teeth sank in and his knot swelled with his relief, and my whole body bucked against both as pleasure drowned me in waves. It was like the final bit of the puzzle settled where it belonged, and I floated on rapture, a contentment I’d never known filling my veins. Gradually, the pulls at my throat eased, and he pressed kisses along my skin to my jaw, then behind my ear, and finally over my closed eyelids. Whispering brushes of his lips to my flesh, and I smiled at the tenderness rolling off of him.