“Like hell it will,” I growl. “Madi won, fair and square.”
“And no one but us will ever know it.” He grins like the cat who caught the canary, and I want to punch him again.
Phoenix beats me to it, and a second later Caspian is charging Rod and the five of them are in an all out brawl. Madi screams at them to stop.
None of them hear her cries or the menacing growl from the stairs.
44
“Stop!” I yell, but Rodrick takes Phoenix to the ground, and Hunter charges for Carter, who’s running his mouth about me again. Branson rubs his jaw and cheers them on.
My heart twists in on itself. I want recognition for this discovery, but not at the cost of my men getting hurt. How does this end? Branson won’t back down just because a few punches were thrown. This won’t solve anything. Think, Madi, think.
Before I can come up with a plan, there’s a growl from right behind me that has me spinning on my heels. Two of those aquatic cat monsters leap into the library, one after another, teeth bared.
They must have followed us, picking up our scent even in the water. They both ignore the fighting men and lunge toward me. I’m frozen, unable to do anything but scream. Hunter is too far away. Caspian is locked beneath Rod.
Branson blinks at me, then jumps between me and the monster. The aqua-cat sinks his teeth into Branson’s shoulder,and the alpha howls in pain. Shit. Shit. I don’t like Branson, but I don’t want to see him hurt. Why the hell did he do that?
My gaze quickly searches the room for something, anything I can use to help. There’re a few pots in a corner. I dash over to them. The biggest one is too heavy for me to pick up, so I grab a smaller one and hurl it at the monster’s head.
It spins on me, charging this way. Not knowing what else to do, I keep throwing pots.
The beast shakes off each hit and keeps coming. Just before it reaches me, a body slams into it. Hunter tackles it to the ground. Behind him, I catch sight of Caspian and Phoenix taking on the second cat with spears they found somewhere. Rod and Carter huddle around a bleeding Branson.
Hunter grabs the animal’s face, holding off its jaws as it snaps its teeth at him. My heart pounds in my ears. I need to do something. I can’t let it hurt my mate.
Where did they get those spears? I finally spot them on the other side of the room. I run, grab the closest one, and dash back to Hunter. The beast takes no notice of me as I sneak up behind it. I have to make this count.
It goes in for a bite of Hunter’s neck, and I see red. That neck is mine. He’s mine. I jam the spear right through the animal’s head with all the force I can muster.
It goes suddenly limp, blood dripping from the wound and onto Hunter’s face.
Phoenix whoops, and I turn to see the other cat running away with a gash in its side.
“That’s right,” Phoenix yells after it, as if it understands. “There’s a new apex predator in town.”
I look back at Hunter just as he rolls out from under the aqua-cat. It flops on the floor, motionless.
“Is it… dead?” I whisper, even though deep down, I know the answer. My body shakes uncontrollably as I stare at it.
“Yeah,” he replies softly. “It’s dead.”
I stare at the dead beast at my feet feeling a sharp twinge of sympathy for it. It was just hungry. It’s not its fault that it viewed us as food. I didn’t really mean to kill it, but when it came for my mate something just came over me. It all happened so fast.
I’ve never killed anything before. Well, unless you count spiders, but spiders are just… ick. I shudder thinking about the creepy crawlies. But the shivering doesn’t stop. It’s like my insides have turned into jello salad.
Hunter stands. He takes my shoulders and steers me away from the dead animal. “Come on, sweetheart. You don’t have to see that.”
I let him lead me away, but look back over my shoulder. Caspian leans over the animal. He closes its eyes and says something in that weird rolling cadence that is his native tongue. It feels almost like a ritual, and I decide to ask him about it later. But the shaking is even more intense now, and I wonder if I’m going into shock. Do people go into shock over something like that? It’s not like I killed a human, but it was still a living, breathing thing. Rare and ancient.
I feel so cold. Is this what shock feels like? I wish I could look it up. My phone is in my dry bag, but there’s no way I’d get service down here.
Shock is supposed to wearoff, though, right? Or do I need to do something to stop it, to reset my body and snap out of it?
I keep replaying the moment the sea-cat nightmare lunged for Hunter, the fear that took hold and made me see red.
At that moment, I knew, deep in my bones, I can’t live without him anymore. I love him, even if it’s too soon, even if I haven’t told him yet.
