Chained (Brides of the Kindred) by Evangeline Anderson Page B

to rescue you, didn’t I? Everyone deserves
a second chance.”
    “Why you—” Lady Pope’nose began but Maggie
slapped a hand over her skinny lips.
    “Please, Kor,” she said, looking up at
him. “Please—I don’t want you to kill her.”
    He took a deep breath and the red glow
began to fade from his eyes. “You really are courageous to stand between
The Demon and his kill,” he murmured. He crossed his arms over his bare chest,
which made his muscles bulge in a most distracting way. “All right, blondie.
I’m pretty sure you’ll regret it but I’ll spare her life—only because you
spared mine.”
    Inwardly, Maggie breathed a sigh of
relief. “Thank you.”
    “Welcome. But if you let her go free,
we’ll never get out of here. So what do you suggest?”
    “Well…” Maggie took a look around and her
eyes happened to fall on the discarded pain collar and chains. “I have an
idea,” she said, smiling at Kor. “What do you say we give her a taste of her
own medicine?”

 
    * * * * *
    “I’m afraid Lady Pope’nose isn’t going to
be too happy for the next week,” Maggie remarked as they finally made their way
(very quietly) out of the huge opulent building her hostess lived in. The busy
street was quiet for once, almost devoid of traffic in the early morning dawn.
    “She got what she deserved—and then some.”
Kor smiled, remembering his former mistress’s sputtered demands and protests as
he had fitted her with the pain collar and chains and poured a scoop of verium
on her head. The broken inhibitor he had folded up and put into the pocket of
the new slave pants he now wore.
    Maggie had wanted to get out of the house
immediately but as the rest of the household appeared to be still asleep, Kor
had taken a moment to survey Lady Pope’nose’s assets and steal a new outfit
from the slaves’ laundry. His new pants were made of black leather and were
uncomfortably tight in places—obviously he was bigger than most of his former
mistress’s slaves—but at least they didn’t scream “escaped slave.” His new
black boots were likewise tight but the leather was stretching nicely.
    “Hopefully her slaves will think she’s at
the spa. No one should find her before the week is out,” he remarked.
    “They’d better not.” Maggie sounded
anxious.
    “You wishing you’d let me kill her?” He cast
a sidelong glance at her.
    Maggie flinched. “No—of course not!”
    Kor shrugged. “All right. But the dead
don’t talk.”
    “What are you, from the Mob?” she
demanded. “Were you some kind of assassin? Did you go around ‘whacking’ people
or something?”
    “What?” Kor stared at her blankly.
“Nothing you just said made any damn sense.”
    “I’m just saying…never mind.” Her eyes
flickered over him uncertainly and then she looked away.
    Kor wondered what he’d said to upset her.
He was a warrior—he killed people. Was it really that difficult to understand?
    A new thought intruded. Maybe she’s
just upset because she’s scared half to death after I nearly blasted Pope’nose
to dust.
    It was a sobering thought. Kor wasn’t sure
what the hell had happened with his eyes—all he remembered was feeling so angry
that he literally saw red. And then the blast of energy had come from him like
a shout of pure rage. He had felt like that before, when he was fighting in the
arena and he knew his eyes were said to glow when he was in a rage, but he
supposed the inhibitor had stopped anything from happening. Now he was without
it for the first time in years—what else might he be capable of?
    But even more troubling than the situation
with his eyes was the fact that he had let a prospective kill escape. True, he
had never killed females—it was always males that he fought in the arenas of
the Blood Circuit—but he had been more than willing to make an exception in
Lady Pope’nose’s case. The bitch had done nothing but torture and taunt him the
entire time he was in her care