I smiled at him in greeting, but my smile fell as I took in his expression. His nose was wrinkled, eyes narrowed, and his mouth a thin line. Disgust practically radiated from him, and if I could sense it, it was likely stabbing into Kyla’s heightened senses.
I was covered in mud, water, and blood, and I stank of the swamp. Vas likely wasn’t much better. But it wasn’t us he was looking at—other than the quick glance of contempt as he took us in. No, that disgust was all for his sister.
Kyla flinched.
I gaped at her. I was so used to her tough exterior, I’d forgotten she had a vulnerable side. I’d only seen it a few times, and one of them was when she’d told me about how she’d been psychologically tortured, and then turned against her will by her ex. But her voice had broken when she’d talked about how disappointed her brother would be at how she was turned.
This wasn’t disappointment, though. This was pure fury.
“Ian–” Kyla attempted a smile and took a step toward him. He just shook his head.
“Not only are you a werewolf, but you’re colluding with filthy demons?”
Ouch.
Kyla narrowed her eyes at him, but her voice was shaky. “These are my friends, Ian. This is Danica and this is–”
“I don’t care.”
She flinched, and Nathaniel took a single step closer.
“Watch how you speak to her,” he warned. Dominance lay heavy in his voice, and Ian tensed.
“Kyla is my sister.”
“And she’smywolf.”
Ian swallowed at that, his gaze returning to his sister. “So that’s how it works? You’ve completely turned your back on us?”
Now Kyla growled. It was low, deadly, and her brother turned white. She stalked several feet closer.
“You accuse me of turningmyback on you? Where were you when Joel was preventing me from seeing my friends? When he declared we were moving two hours from my office and I had to quit my job? When I didn’t get to say goodbye to granddad before he died? Where the fuck were you then? Oh, I know. You were best buddies with Joel’s friends, and you didn’t want to piss any of them off.”
Vas stiffened, but it was Nathaniel’s snarl that made the hair on the back of my neck stand up. Obviously, he hadn’t known that little tidbit from Kyla’s life.
Ian slowly turned, finding Nathaniel practically breathing down his neck. The Alpha’s eyes had turned that eerie pale blue, so light it appeared almost white, and his canines had lengthened.
Nathaniel had perfect control most of the time, so if he was allowing a hint of his shift, it was because he’d decided to scare the crap out of the asshole next to him.
Fuck it.
I called my power to me, darkening the air around us. Next to me, Vas let his wings appear, spreading them wide. The griffin, obviously feeling left out, decided that was the perfect moment to let loose one of his ear-splitting roars.
Nathaniel gave me a look that said we would definitely be talking about the creature I’d brought into his territory.
Ian’s gaze darted between all of us. To his credit, he didn’t piss his pants, but his hands trembled as he took a step back.
Nathaniel had allowed him to visit, obviously unaware that he was a judgmental fuck. I had a sneaky suspicion that Ian wouldn’t be invited back.
“Why did you come here?” Kyla snapped.
“To find you. I’ve searched for you since you went missing.”
“Why? To see if you could tolerate being around a werewolf?”
He stayed silent and she laughed. “These are my friends. That’s the future Underqueen who you just insulted. She’s guarded my back for the past several weeks. Oh, and she gave me a job.”
“Kyla–”
