Free Wild Hearts (Blood & Judgment #1) by Eve Newton, Franca Storm

I don’t know, but something is coming.
    I can just feel it.
     

Chapter 8
    ~Ember~
     
    I pace as I wait, stalking from one end of the sitting room to the other, like a caged animal. The need to hunt is strong, because I am on edge. I keep trying to figure out why the Ambassadors are trying so hard to kill Aria and why her pack deserted her when she needed them? It makes no sense.
    I pause as I hear a noise coming from the window on the far side of the room. I tilt my head and I hear it again. A snap of a twig. I race quickly to the window, fangs and claws at the ready, when all of a sudden, the door behind me bursts open and in race three of the largest male vampires I have ever seen.
    Dammit! Edric’s men. How did they find me so quickly?
    I turn to face them, unleashing the beast within and I snarl at them, flexing my shoulders.
    “Such a pretty little bitch,” one of them drawls in his south London accent.
    “And yet, such a massive pain in the bollocks,” another one says with a howl of laughter. “I am going to enjoy bringing you down.” His sinister smile turns downright menacing and I take a deep breath.
    “We can’t hurt her,” the last one says, definitely the least brazen of the lot.
    “No, we can’t kill her,” 'bollocks' vamp says. “The master didn’t say anything about giving her a little punishment.”
    “Are you going to fight, or just stand here and talk me into insanity?” I ask archly, giving them the impression of my full attention, but meanwhile scouring the area with my heightened senses for the best place to maneuver.
    “I am going to smack that mouth of yours,” 'bollocks' vamp says and clenches his enormous fists, then releasing them with his claws drawn.
    Well, size isn’t everything. I am stronger, quicker and more agile and far better trained than these lumbering oafs and they have clearly underestimated me. Which is precisely what I had hoped for. They aim for a three-pronged attack, but that just gives me the opportunity to pick them off one by one. Idiots.
    I scoot around the edge of the room, hoping that none of them decide to check out the bedroom while they are here and catch Aria passed out.
    'Bollocks' vamp lunges at me, but I am ready for him. Before he reaches me, I slam my foot into his groin with a smirk.
    “ Now , I’d say I was a pain in your bollocks,” I say to him as he drops to his knees with a choked groan and I rake my claws across his throat. He gurgles unintelligibly, the surprise registering that I have gouged him so deeply, before his head lolls to the side, hanging onto his neck by a thread. He clutches at his throat and I lean forward to grab a hold of his ears. The 'pretty little bitch' vamp attacks me from behind, but I slam my foot into him, sending him careening back into the wall. The foundations shake at the force of which he hits it and I cringe when I think of the damages I am going to pay for this little encounter.
    The quiet one is watching me carefully and with a flash of my fangs at him, I tighten my grip on the vamp’s ears and twist his head so forcefully it snaps off his neck with ease and he disintegrates to ash at my feet. I brush off my hands as I turn back to the vamp about to attack me. He swipes at me, full of anger that I am beating them, but I duck out of the way. Rage will only get you so far.
    I tuck myself into a forward roll and end up on the other side of the room. I jump up onto the dining table as the quiet one rushes me. I look up and then jump to grab hold of the dangling light fixture. I kick both of my feet out at the vamp and he roars with pain as one of my six-inch heels connects with his eye.
    “Eww!” I cry out as I push off with my left foot to get my right heel out of his eye socket in a disgusting slurping action. “My shoe! You fucker!” I land on top of him as he slaps his hand to his eyehole and I punch him in the temple. He drops like a rock and then I go sprawling as his friend kicks out my legs