Unchained Beauty (The Deadly Beauties Live On 5)

“Not now, Dice,” I say while dematerializing to Slade.

I’m not really sure how I feel about almost dying because of a crush, now that I have all the details.

“You might have clued me in on some of those details when I was defending her, because I think I just reignited whatever spark had finally died, and now I wonder if she’s the reason I feel the urge to close my curtains every night.”

His lips twitch just slightly.

“You close your curtains because you feel me watching,” he decides to point out.

“You really step back and take a look at how much perspective plays a part in how you view the people in your life. A strange girl leaves me to die, and I fear she’s been looking in my windows. You tell me you’ve been peeping, and I get little stupid butterflies,” I grumble.

He makes that warm, gruff, laughing sound, his arm going around my shoulders. “She’s under a blood oath. She can’t harm you,” he finally says. “I told her I’d let you kill her eventually.”

Again, somethings really should not be romantic. But I’m not killing Simone unless I have to.

“Will you tell me how the hell your mother created that forest?” he asks, causing me to laugh before I can stop myself, and he turns to give me an unimpressed look.

“Purgatory residue, basically. She designed a core that drew all that power to it, and it became a part of that forest, sealed inside to become its own entity.”

“Rather anticlimactic now that you’ve explained it, but incredibly intriguing process of thought. How’d she do it?” he asks.

“Her magic,” I state flatly, causing his eyebrows to lift.

“You really don’t know me at all if you think I’m capable of rattling off one of those long equations. It’s still all just magic to me,” I dutifully remind him.

I must say the magic words, because his arms go around me and pull me to him before he kisses me. Simply standing so close to him has already put the beasts back into hiding, even though I ache a little to fully shift.

“Everything I do is because of you,” he murmurs against my lips, then deepens the kiss before I can call him out on being sweet again.

He pulls back abruptly, smirking as his eyes grow a lighter silver. “Come on. I know a better way to train you.”

Chapter 26

ELLA

Stepping into the new location Dad has procured for us over the past couple of days, I look around, finding the place…odd.

Everything is very flowery.

Dice’s back is to me as he concentrates really hard on stacking up some dominoes. No wonder Slade used to think we had no focus. Okay, so maybe he still thinks that, but Dice really shouldn’t be the reference point of our group.

“What’s with the floral patterns everywhere?” I ask, startling Dice into knocking over all his dominoes.

“For fuck’s sake, woman! Can’t you see I was almost done?! Why the hell don’t you assholes just use the door?”

“If you hadn’t been in here, I would have thought I was in the wrong place. Did someone bring my stuff?” I ask, ignoring his tangent.

“No, someone didn’t bring it. I brought it,” he grumbles. “Karma’s pissed at me, then I get demoted to bellhop. All because of you.”

“Me? What’d I do?” I ask incredulously.

“You walked in and became the person I blame for all my problems,” he says as though it makes all the sense in the world.

“Got it. So my stuff?”

“Upstairs. First room on the right. Don’t know why it matters since you’ve been staying furry with the scarred menace the past two weeks,” he calls to my back as I dematerialize up the stairs, checking my phone as I go.

“Stop calling him that,” I call down. Then add, “And by the way, staying furry with Slade is helping me get a lot more control over my power.”