She broke her gaze from me, looking up at him with a pout. “Awww… but honey. You took away my toy I want to know when will you be done with yours so we can go back to just us. I’m bored, and she’s in the way of my fun.” She snarled at me. “Not to mention an insult that you’re parading her around like she’s important.” Her eyes widen as they dart back to him. “Or are you toying with her to make the game fun. Oh please say yes. I want to join in on the fun. Can I toy with her, too?”
Mika was slowly moving her hand toward my hair when Kane slapped it away, letting go of me. “I will not warn you again. Take heed from whatever rumors you heard about our night out and know that a man was dismembered, killed then reborn for touching her wrist. Do not test how far I can be pushed. She is no toy, and this is no game.”
Her pout returned, this time more exaggerated. Then, not just her expression but her stance shifted, and she snarled. “You can’t be serious.”
“I am.” His words were punctuated.
“But she’s human… weak.”
“She is far from weak.”
“How can you choose her?” she shouted.
His teeth ground. “Leave it be, Mika. Leave it be and go to your chambers. This is none of your concern.”
Mika scoffed. “You are blinded by your lust for her.”
Kane took a step toward her. “What I feel for her is more than lust. With you I felt lust. And see what all I have done for you over the years. Imagine what I would do for someone I truly fell for.” His hand reached back for mine.
I ran my hand down his arm and started to step around them as their eyes were locked on the other like two feral beasts deciding if they could battle. “You two obviously have some things to work out. I don’t need to be here for that, so I am going to go in and let you two talk.” I started to move past them.
Kane nodded, his eyes still on her. But Mika, faster than I’d even seen Kane move, was before me. Her fingers wound through my hair as her leg swept, knocking my legs out from underneath me. She tugged and I fell, hitting the floor with a sickening thud. My breath pushed out fo me, and I struggled to take in another as she rested her foot on my stomach.
She sneered at Kane. “Weak. As I said. Not worthy of you.”
“I will decide who is worthy of my,” he roared.
He started lunging toward her, but he didn’t reach her. As I lay there, under her foot, things slowed. Or at least they seemed to. And a strange sensation rose from the center of my abdomen. A protectiveness that almost moved me.
There was no forethought. And to be quite honest, I wasn’t even sure it was all me. But before I knew it, my next few actions unfolded into an ballet of motion.
A wind picked up in the corridor, and all of the torches went out with a woosh. My hand gripped her leg, and I pushed forward with the deepest, most achingly painful sadness. The emotion knocking her back as she stumbled a few steps. Free again, I stood and pressed my hand to her forehead, releasing a flood of dark emotions into her, accompanied by flashes of images of warn and death.
With a snarl, I moved my hand back, releasing her into the wall only a half step from her back. I rubbed my fingers together then opened my hand, palm up, and the torches roared back to life.
I stood, a single step before her as she crouched on the floor. One hand in the air, then other on my abdomen, I looked down at her. “True weakness comes when you can not see your competition’s strengths.”
She coughed between sobs that she desperately tried to control. “What are you?”
Kane’s hand landed on my shoulder. “She is mine, as I am hers. I told you to leave it be.”
Slowly, she slid up the wall to stand, refusing to look at me.
I lowered my hands, the one still resting on my stomach. “Do not ever touch me again.”
Before either could say anything, I whipped away and started for the door, wanting to put as much distance between myself and Mika. I din’t want to face why she was so adamant that I was wrong for Kane. Nor did I want to think of their past that she seemingly was begging to get back. And I certainly didn’t want to think about what I’d just done – the level of magic and force I’d just revealed. Hell, it scared even me.
I pushed the door open, finally letting my hand drop from my stomach. Looking back, Kane had Mika by the arm, watching me. A hint of something different was in his eyes. Something I swore was a mix of admiration and fear. But when he spoke, his tone was a mixture of stern and sad. “I need to have a word with Mika. I will be in shortly.”
I nodded and went inside, closing the door behind me.
With my back to the carved wood, I heard Kane and Mika moving down the hall without a word. A part of me spiked with jealousy. There was obviously a past there that I knew almost nothing about, but that woman was fiercely trying to regain it in her own bitter way. All I could do was hope that he didn’t get pulled back in.
Then I wanted to curse myself for feeling so protective of something that wasn’t mine. At least not permanently. I was
