Rather than respond, she merely took a hard left. In any other situation, he would have been impressed with her ability to move so fast in the dark, wearing a pair of strappy sandals and a long, flowy skirt.
As it stood, he wasn’t impressed. He was rapidly losing his already tenuous control on the feral urge to snatch her up, lift that fairytale princess skirt, and make herscream.
That last shred of control was sorely tested when he briefly lost sight of her, then caught a startled yelp in the dark.
Heart thundering in his ears, he burst out of a densely packed row of corn at full speed, only to realize too late what had triggered that sound: the sudden appearance of a deep, muddy drainage ditch between cornfields.
His reflexes were well-honed, but even they couldn’t save him from the cruel hand of forward momentum. Kaz spat out a curse as he slammed into Atria’s back, sending them careening down the muddy embankment.
His instincts switched tracks seamlessly. The lust bled out of him as he rapidly calculated how much damage a fall could do to her.
Kaz tried to protect her from the fall as much as he could. He banded his arms around her and cupped the back of her head with one hand, shielding her from the rocks and debris that met their tumbling forms.
They landed on their sides with a viscous, soupy splash.
ChapterNine
Luckily— or unluckily, depending on one’s viewpoint — it was a dry spring, so there wasn’t much water at the bottom of the ditch to speak of. Unfortunately, the water thatwasthere happened to be mostly mud, animal leavings, and algae.
They both laid there for a moment, catching their breath. The mud was cool, and all around them bugs and critters made night sounds. It might have actually been kind of nice, or at leastfunny,if the mud didn’t stink of decay and if his mate hadn’trun from him.
Apparently realizing how tangled together they were at the same time that his temper reignited, Atria squirmed to sit upright. The mud was thick and his grip was tight, but she was a quick little thing. She’d already gotten on her knees and had begun hauling herself up the embankment by the time he looped his arms around her waist and dragged her back.
“You and I are gonna have aconversation,”he snarled into her mud-streaked hair.
“Let me go!” She thrashed, arms and legs flying, as he hoisted her up against his chest. Finding his feet with an annoyed grunt, he began to climb back up the way they’d fallen.
“Here’s what you need to get through your head, princess: I am not letting you go. Period. Full-stop. End-of-fucking-story. Not happening. You’re stuck with me, get it?”
“You can’t just kidnap a person! You can’t just kill three people and then kidnap me!” she snapped back. There was a high, hysterical edge to her voice.
If he wasn’t so angry with her, he would have given her the look that statement deserved. “I am not kidnapping you,” he growled. “I amrescuing you.”
He’d done a lot of shady shit, but kidnapping was not his MO — particularly when it came to her. Orcs had a long, colorful history with the practice of mate snatching, and he wanted none of it. So what if his cock was actively attempting to bust a hole through his jeans at the thought that he’d hunted her down and tackled her? What he felt when she took off was just… anomalous.
He was attracted to her. He wanted to fuck her more than he’d ever wanted to fuck someone in his entire life. It had nothing to do with kidnapping, or snatching, or the fact that he loved it when she felt like prey.
This is not a kidnapping,he reassured himself.I am not following some fucked up orc instinct right now. I am protecting her. It’s different.
He was saved from listening to his own paper-thin lies when Atria demanded, “Why should I believe you? I have no idea who you are! You’ve dragged me to the middle of nowhere! Youkilledthree men in a parking lot tonight!” Kicking him with her heel to emphasize every word, she added, “And—you—took—my—phone!”
“First, Itoldyou who I was.” And didn’t it still rankle that she had absolutely zero memory of him! “Second, I explained to you that we’re staying out of all major cities until I know who the fuck is hunting you.Third,I killed those gargoyles to save your fool life. A little bit of gratitude would be nice!”
“Gratitude!” She began to kick him in earnest then. The thin soles of her sandals bounced harmlessly off of his shins as he followed the edge of the ditch back to the road. “I should be in a hotel room right now! I should be planning a meeting with the Orclind team! I should be wondering how bad the room service is! I’d be grateful forthat,not being tossed around and kidnapped by a fucking orc with a gun!”
Kaz’s control snapped. “All right, enough of this shit.”
Walking quickly toward their car, he wrestled her around until she was facing him and then plopped her ass on the hood.
Before she could wriggle away, he stepped between her legs and snagged both her wrists in one hand, both mitigating her pesky ability and pinning her in place. He stared down at her with a vicious scowl.
Ofcoursehis mate would be the one person in the world who could see it and be completely unmoved by it.
Men three times her size had nearly wet themselves at the sight of his scowl, but this little witch looked up at him, mud-streaked and beaten, like she was ready to spit nails in his face.
Lust was liquid fire in his veins, mixing with the rage that never really died down. He wasn’t sure what was the elvish urge to bite his mate, what was the orcish need to hide her away, and what was justhim.All he knew was that in that moment, when she was filthy and pissed off, he was somehowmoreattracted to her than he was before.
His cock was pressed painfully against the fly of his jeans, and when she bared her blunt little teeth at him, he wanted to press her back against the hood, hike up her filthy skirt, and fuckingfeast.
