Collector walked over to me, signalling three guards to accompany him. They stepped around me, and I used my vampire scent to pick out each power. Shifter. Water elemental. Vampire.
Collector approached me with interest as his gaze swept over my trembling form. I didn’t have to fake that. My body was still in shock.
“Miss Coven?”
I frowned. “Who are you? Where am I?” I asked him.
His eyes practically smiled as the wheels turned in his head, and he regarded me with opportunistic intent. Me, an empty, weak girl with no memories. He could use me all over again.
Fuck. That.
High level demons like Collector were hard to kill. There was only one way that I knew of, and it was nearly impossible if the demon expected a fight.
But he didn’t.
With all the stealth and deadly grace I’d learned from my spider, I locked eyes with Collector.
A single second. That’s all I gave him to see the truth behind my damsel in distress façade.
His eyes widened for a moment, but I already had my hands wrapped around his thick neck. One twist, a single monumental crack, and then with all the vampiric strength and speed I possessed, I pulled and yanked the motherfucker’s head off, enjoying the sound of his tendons ripping, his skin tearing open as I pulled. Then tossed his head at his own feet.
For you, Aunt Marie.
His body hit the floor a second later, and then his entire form burst into ashes.
I wanted to spit on the pile, but I didn’t have time. I was already flashing toward Crow, using the last seconds of shock that I had left to gain the upper hand. I dragged my bare feet across Crow’s circle on the floor, breaking the chalky lines of the ritual. I flashed in front of him and yanked on the weakened chains with all my might. Now that the ritual circle was ruined, and the restraints had lost their power, he’d be able to tap into his powers.
“Get Tomb!” I yelled, already racing away, because I knew he had my back.
The second his feet hit the floor, shadows burst from his outstretched arms and shoulders, and a cacophony of furious crows burst into existence. They crowded the room in an instant, hundreds and hundreds of them taking form. I heard their shrill cries, and then I felt the ground shake when a roar sounded behind me, and my lips split into a grin. My gargoyle was free.
The room had erupted into chaos. Supes started to use their powers, and birds converged to attack. My mates were fighting off guards, but I ducked and dodged it all as I ran for Risk.
“Stop her!” my father’s voice boomed through the pandemonium, his finger raised to point me out.
I hissed in pain as a shot of fire lobbed and managed to hit me on the leg. It knocked me down, but I scrambled forward on hands and knees, hurrying to Risk’s side.
I ripped the remaining chains from him, and his body slumped to the floor. My hands came to his cheeks, but his skin that was normally always hot felt cold to the touch. “Come on, Risk. Wake up. I need you,” I told him, but he didn’t wake. I shook him, pleading with him to wake up, but he stayed locked in his unconscious form.
Hands suddenly locked around my middle, and I was hauled up, the breath knocked out of me as the person’s grip locked around my ribs.
“You’ll be punished for this,” my father spat in my ear. “You just ruined everything! Belvini was my fucking chance!”
Furious spittle hit my ear as he hissed against me, his arms squeezing so tight that I felt one of my ribs snap. I screamed, black dots littering my vision.
“You’re really going to hurt your own daughter?” I choked out.
“I don’t claim you,” he hissed.
Fucking bastard. He never did, though, did he? I guess now wasn’t any different.
I raised my hands out of instinct to shoot him with silky strands, only to remember that I didn’t have any webs anymore. People from the audience were scattering, leaving the room as fast as they could go, as Spector guards struggled to take down my mates.
Tomb was in his gargoyle form, blasting through people left and right, their bullets merely nicking off his skin. Crow was hidden in a cyclone of shadows and feathers, as more birds than I’d ever seen flew around the massive room, causing mayhem and violence in their wake, making it difficult to see.
I suddenly felt my father’s hands grip my neck. “Stop, or I’ll kill her!” my father’s voice shouted behind me.
I watched Tomb falter. The birds in the air paused, their beady eyes focusing on me. “No! Don’t listen to him! Get yourselves out of here!” I screamed.
But my stubborn mates didn’t listen. They immediately stopped fighting, and a sob tore from my throat as Spector guards converged around them. “No! Go! You have to go!” I cried.
“We won’t leave you. Ever,” Tomb growled, sweat tracking down his obsidian body.
“You’re our mate,” Crow said as he rushed forward, his body bruised and battered. My heart squeezed. They were still mine. Still my mates, even if the bonds were gone.
“Now you get to watch her die, and then I’ll kill you both,” my father’s icy voice cried out.
I heard my mates scream my name just as my father’s hands tightened around my throat.
And then he snapped my neck.
Chapter 31
Tomb
I felt the mate bond sever when the black widow demon was ripped from Motley’s soul. Like a limb suddenly being torn from my body, it was cleaved away
