Page 106 of Hunted

Because yes, I’m a virgin.

Who was just eaten out by the vampire who claims I’m his fated mate.

And the worst part is, I don’t know how to explain that I didn’t feel taken. I felt pulled. Not by glamour or fear or even threat of the potion failing, but by something deeper and more dangerous than all three. I should feel violated by my own surrender, but I don’t. I feel terrified because whatever drew me towards him was stronger than self-preservation, stronger than every warning I have ever trained myself to obey.

If there is a patron saint of women losing the plot, I hope she’s taking notes.

Movement snaps every instinct back into place.

I straighten on the sofa, fingers fumbling with clothes, seams and dignity, dragging fabric back where it belongs and shoving every dangerous thought into the deepest vault I can manage. ‘Tell me.’

Valentin drags his fingers through his hair once, which vexingly restores the lustrous strands I well and truly tousled. Then he tucks his hands behind his back.

He would be the epitome of furious suave control if not for the massive boner pressing urgently against his fly.

An obscene erection he does nothing to hide when he catches me looking.

I cross my arms, denying every craving that wants to touch that shaft, cradle and stroke and⁠—

‘The Location Teleporter,’ he says. ‘Tezra. That name matters to you?’

I freeze, heat turning to cold so fast it hurts. ‘Of course it does. You know I used him yesterday.’ I swallow. ‘What about Tezra?’

Before he can answer, the door opens.

Malachi enters, and I scramble my face into something approaching composure.

It probably fools no one.

He takes in the room in one sweep. The disordered cushions. My flushed skin. Valentin standing too still with hunger and irritation warring in his shoulders.

At the very least, his vampire sense of smell can pick up what we’ve just put down, but Malachi is a master at making judgement look like architecture.

‘Sire,’ he says, inclining his head, then his gaze cuts to me for the briefest second. ‘Hunter.’

‘Speak,’ Valentin says.

Malachi does, and every word strips the room colder.

‘Tezra was lured with a job request just after dawn. Routine transport on paper. High fee, low profile. Pickup in Lower Manhattan, drop in Brooklyn. The request came through a relay channel used by fringe contractors and emergency magical couriers, one he has worked before without incident.’

My mouth goes dry.

Tezra would take something like that. Fast money, simple jump, in and out before breakfast. He liked the easy ones because they let him get home before the kids were fully awake and sticky with cereal.

‘The location was staged,’ Malachi continues, voice flat and merciless. ‘Wards disrupted his exit vectors the moment he arrived. They held for seconds only, which was all they needed. He was struck with silver-laced anchors before he could fully phase. Brutal and precise. No signs of feeding.’

I stare at him. For a second, the words don’t fit.

Tezra is quick. Slippery. Tezra can be gone in one second and still have time to laugh about people underestimating him because of his size.

Then it lands.

He’s dead.

Shock hits first, a hard blankness hollowing out my chest.

Then fury crashes in, hot and useless, because whoever did it knew exactly what they were doing. Knew how to pin a teleporter just long enough to butcher him.