Their Zandian Mate (Zandian Masters 9)

And Eslyn didn’t look happy.

Not at all.

“I smell them on you. In this room. What in the veck did you do, Eslyn?” Elit advanced on her, menace glazing his eyes.

“You,” she hissed. “You don’t get to come in here and ask questions. I did my part—I got you free. But you didn’t give me the same courtesy.”

He laughed—a dark, crackling sound that seemed to snap her bones in its wake.

Banf stood with his back against the door to the children’s room, arms folded over his chest. Both of them had hollows under their eyes, which should’ve called up her sympathy, but it didn’t. They deserved every ounce of hell they’d received in that dungeon. And more.

“You never were the brightest in our little family, were you?” Banf sneered.

Elit joined in. “Hmm, let’s see… there’s only two Zandian females left in the galaxy so I think I’ll just hand over mine so she can breed with the remaining population. Are you really that vecking stupid?”

“Yes, she is. She really thought she was going to get to spread her legs and let some other male claim what we already bought.”

“Bought?” she spat. “How do you figure?”

“Fifteen years of taking care of your whiny ass!” Banf snapped. “Complaints and tears and a whole lot of bitterness is all we’ve had from you and now you want to deny us our due?”

“I’m not your due. I’m going to tell Prince Zander that I lied today, and you both deserve to rot in that dungeon with Sankro!” she spat.

She didn’t see Elit’s fist flying because Banf had lunged for her throat at the same time. Her head snapped back on her neck and she fell to the floor. Banf straddled her, choking her breath with a tight squeeze under her chin.

She scrambled beneath him, legs kicking uselessly, unable to cry out. Terror gripped her, as it always did when they choked her. Her vision popped with lights around the edges, then bled with darkness.

A rushing sounded in her ears.

She clawed Banf’s face, dug her nails into one of his sensitive horns.

The last thing she saw was his bared teeth as the room darkened to black.

And then she was dragging in long breaths of air, as the sound of grunts and thuds crashed all around her.

“Get her up out of the way.”

Was that… Damon’s voice?

Laake’s concerned face swam into view and she rose in his arms, scooped onto the hover disk and gently arranged. Behind him, Granit’s fist slammed repeatedly into flesh and bone with a sickening wet sound. Two figures wrestled back and forth across the room—Damon and Elit.

“Stop,” she croaked.

“She said stop.” Laake spoke across the melee. He’d put his body between hers and the rest of them, guarding her.

Granit’s fist paused in midair, but Damon continued his assault on Elit, sending him flying over a hover chair and sprawling onto his back.

“I’m not finished,” Damon gritted, leaping over the fallen chair in a graceful bound.

“I’m with you, but don’t make her watch.”

Damon also paused. “Right.” He swiped blood from his mouth and glanced over at her. For the first time, she saw his expression go soft, the way his brothers always looked at her.

She dragged her hand up to her throat, coughing. Her head pounded, eyes gritty.

Dimly, she heard Damon issuing commands into a cuff on his arm, something about guards and dungeon.

Then all three of her males—the ones who mattered to her—gathered around the hover bed, brows furrowed, fingers gentle as they stroked her hair from her face, caressed her arms, held her hands.