“Have you bonded with him?” Norman sounded like someone had closed a fist around his throat. His arms shook more violently as he gestured with the gun. “Tell me! Did she fucking bond with you?”
There was the shakiest inhale behind him, then, in a voice so hurt and bewildered it threatened to tear his heart in two, Atria said, “That… was why you wanted to bond with me? You wanted the boost and— and when you couldn’t get it, you resorted tom-siphons,Norman?”
“You and I were supposed to be forever,” he shot back, volume rising. “We were going to change the world! But you wouldn’tlistento me, and then you wouldn’t bond with me! What was I supposed to do? Just sit and do nothing? Ineededthe energy.”
“There arepeoplein there,” she cried.
“So? They’re not doing anything with their lives. What you and I are doing— we’re different.” His tone took on a fervent, pleading edge, almost as if he expected to be able to win her over to his side. “They weren’t using their magic for good, Atria. I needed it. Is that so bad?”
“Why?” Kaz shifted his foot backward, giving the toe of Atria’s sandal a nudge with his heel.Move back.“I understand obsession, but this goes way past that. Who do you have to answer to?” He tilted his head to one side and narrowed his eyes. “Who is bankrolling you, Norman?”
Norman’s chest heaved with large, gulping breaths. The stink of fear — sour sweat, salt, and something indefinable the predator in him recognized immediately — melded with the metal and oil in the air. “I am not telling youanything,you— Atria, don’t fucking move!”
She’d taken a step back, toward the workbench covered in heads and the rack of hanging, half-dismembered m-droid bodies. Heedless of the danger, Norman swung his gun in her direction.
Kaz took the opening.
Shoving Atria onto the floor with one hand, he snatched the barrel of the gun with the other. A bolt went off, searing a path through the air to land somewhere over his shoulder with an explosion of metal and plaster.
His ears rang and his hand was briefly scorched, but Kaz didn’t notice either discomfort. Wrenching down and to the side, he forced Norman to release the gun or break his trigger finger. It took training to fight the natural instinct to let go in the face of a threat to one’s bones. Luckily for them, Norman didn’t have that training.
The struggle was over in a handful of seconds.
Kaz palmed the bolt gun, twisted it around, and then cracked it across Norman’s cheek and jaw. It wasn’t quite a hit — he didn’t want the man dead yet, after all — but it was enough to send him to his knees with a distinctly animal wail of pain.
Rage was not a veil covering Kaz’s vision. Itsharpenedit. The world was thrown into stark relief and every thought was perfectly clear. He felt no heat. No red haze. He was cold and merciless as he exacted his mate’s justice.
Landing a solid blow to the back of Norman’s knee with his steel-toed boot, Kaz sent him sprawling. When he was on the floor, he landed that same boot in the center of his spine and held it there, pinning the man to the ground like the writhing little bug he was.
Pointing the gun at the back of Norman’s head, he calmly asked, “Princess, are you okay?”
Hoarsely, Atria answered, “Y-yes.”
Kaz flicked his gaze over to where she sat on the floor by a messy tangle of wires and a half-open cardboard box. Her hands were planted on the ground and her legs were partially drawn up to her chest, but aside from a thoroughly shaken expression, she appeared unharmed.
“C’mere,” he ordered, gesturing behind him with a nod.
For a second, she sat there frozen, her eyes locked on her ex-boyfriend. He had to say her name twice more before she jolted. Scrambling onto her hands and knees, she pushed herself up and clumsily hurried over to his side.
“Please don’t shoot him.”
A low rumble left his chest. Curling his free arm around the back of her neck, he dragged her into his side before he leaned down to plant a fierce kiss to the crown of her head. “You’re a soft touch, princess. I’m starting to like that about you. I don’t want that to change. But this motherfucker pointed a gun at you. That only ends one way.”
Atria gripped the hem of his jacket and held on for dear life. “Can’t we just call Chain Enforcement? He’s got at least three m-siphons over there, Kaz. They’ll put him away for life!”
Norman began to squirm in earnest. His bloodied face smeared against the gritty floor as he struggled, babbling and begging to be let go. Before Kaz could press his foot down, Atria turned on the prone scientist with a surprisingly vicious snarl.
“You, staydown!”she barked. Atria lifted both hands, raising Norman several inches above the floor. When she slammed them back down, he felt Norman flatten into the floor with a pitiful wheeze.
“M-siphons!” his mate raged, inconsolable. “M-siphons, Norman! Howdareyou! After all the stories I told you! After all the survivors you met!” Tears flowed in earnest as she began to raise and lower her hands, lifting and dropping Norman again and again beneath Kaz’s boot. “I should let Kaz shoot you, you vile piece of shit! But I can’t because Ilovedyou!”
“Princess,” he rumbled, catching her hands with one of his. “Princess, breathe.”
She turned those wet eyes on him and damn near broke his heart. “I’m soangry,Kaz.”
“You’re right to be angry,” he assured her. “But you aren’t built for this, princess. That’s why you have me. You want me to call Enforcement? I will, but I want to handle this for you.”
Wordless, she turned to press her face into the base of his throat. Her fingers curled into the thin, stretchy material of his shirt, holding on for dear life. At her feet, Norman coughed and squirmed, desperate to be free.
