needed more energy. More power. Only one person could’ve supplied it—through a blood link.”
A beat in her neck pushed back at Charles’ fingers. He sighed in relief as Jonas came running up, blood gushing out of his arm. Behind him loped the huge tiger and a mountain lion.
“She ne eded you,” Toa accused the Boss, still not able to stand.
The Boss stared back, uncertainty warring his blank mask.
“If you won’t use your blood link, Stefan, you need to allow someone else to enact one. She cannot be this vulnerab le again. You nearly killed her,” Toa pushed, anger contorting his face into something out of a nightmare.
“You have to figure out a way to link with her magically,” the Boss retorted.
“You think this is over?” Toa shot back, stunning everyone mute with his uncustomary animation. “There’ll be more demons. There’ll be more perils. Maybe tomorrow. Maybe in a week. Right now, you are her only hope. And you’ve failed once—what about the next time? What then? Will you let your pride kill her, or will you let someone else help her to live? A blood link is the only way!”
Charles barely had time to witness a flash of anxious defeat cross the Boss’ face before he was hobbling up with Sasha in his arms, Jonas helping him stand. He didn’t have time for the challenge that was sure to follow—Sasha wasn’t out of the woods yet.
Chapter 4
I was giving Toa a run for his money in the blank stare department. “I’m sorry, come again?”
Toa sat across from me in one of the many rooms in the mansion. Calm and unaffected, as normal, he was trying to convince me to gnaw on his vein. This, to him, was a perfectly normal request.
“With magic like yours, it is sometimes necessary to establish another blood link so you can acquire help in times of…stress,” Toa explained for the millionth time.
“You are creating the current times of stress, Toa.” I grimaced. The thought of drinking his blood was…revolting. Drinking blood period, when I logically thought about it, turned my stomach. But with Stefan it was intimacy so acute that I felt it the length of my body. It didn’t seem abnormal with him. Even the taste was sweet and earthy, pleasurable.
“No, Toa. Just… ew. No. And Stefan would flip.”
“Stefan has given his consent.”
My flat stare became incredulous. Toa’s stare never wavered. “Stefan gave his consent? Stefan. The guy that made my bodyguard pee himself when he thought Charles might’ve laid a hand on me. That Stefan?”
“ He realizes that his inaction nearly killed you the other night. You are the most precious thing in his life; it is not asking overmuch to secure your survival. He sees the value in what I propose. He is facing issues from his childhood that shaped him in both negative and positive ways. He’s latching onto the negative, clouding his judgment. He has realized this—he is an excellent leader to have done so. It now becomes your obligation to follow through. When he can’t help you magically, you will need to turn to another.”
“And that’s you? So you’re going to what, shadow me the rest of my life?”
“We could’ve lost you, Sasha. Your father, this clan, and our entire organization would’ve suffered. We need to take steps to prevent that.”
“Okay,” I waved my hand like I was swishing away flies. “You can cut out the lecture tone and talk normally. You don’t have to be all professional about it.”
“That is exactly what this is—a professional arrangement. You share a very soft link with Dominicous. He is family. Would it be so strange if you extended that link with the person who shares his blood link?”
“Y es. It would.”
We were back to the stare -off. Those ice blue eyes held mine serenely, his hands clasped in his lap. I wouldn’t be surprised if he asked for a cup of tea next with a pretty little flowery cup and a saucer.
Still…I had to concede that it had been a
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