Free o f31e4a444fa175b2 by deba schrott

to safety.”
    He wrapped both arms around his chest, lips tightening in the stubborn line I knew, all too well. “So I’m supposed to sit back in safety and watch you put your life in danger yet again?”
    My breath whooshed out. I’d hoped he wouldn’t bring up this tired old argument. Why couldn’t he accept the fact that I had to fulfill my duties, same as our mother? Furies were meant to protect those unable to protect themselves from the’ arcane things that went bump in the night. Even at the risk of our own lives. “David, please—”
    Stalking to the oversized bay window, he stared out at the waves crashing against the shoreline. Just as our father had done so many times during my childhood, waiting for our mother to return home from whatever mission she’d been sent on, until the night she went out and never returned...
    “Promise me one thing.” His voice sounded as ancient as he’d joked about being just moments before.
    “Make sure what happened to Vanessa and Mom doesn’t happen to Con.”
    The fact that Con could develop Fury abilities later in life—just as I had—was something I knew must weigh on his mind constantly. His request shattered my heart into a hundred more pieces. But I couldn’t
    —wouldn’t—let him see that. “She’ll be safe. I promise.” The words tasted empty. Too much like the vow our mother made our father that final night.

    “Go. Just go.”
    Once again, I fled the room I’d come to hate without saying another word.

CHAPTER FIVE
    SCOTT LEFT IT ALONE UNTIL WE REACHED THE local high school. “That went better than I expected.”
    I focused on the ball field several hundred feet in the distance. “What, because Jessica didn’t break out a shotgun?”
    This time he didn’t resist the impulse to touch me. I nearly closed my eyes and purred when he stroked a hand along my hair Riss you can’ttake itpersonally She s hurting.”
    “And I’m not?” I wanted the words back the instant I said them. “There they are. Let’s go.”
    He made several more attempts to talk, but I ignored each one. What kind of man actually tried to talk about touchy-feely shit when women weren’t strong-arming them into it, anyway?
    The kind you fell in love with, my conscience whispered.
    Who the hell asked you?
    We pulled up alongside the field before I could continue the pointless argument with myself. I jogged the last few steps to the dugout ahead of him, trying to pick out the coach from the female bodies zipping this way and that. It wasn’t easy. Finally,, I approached the sixteen-year-old holding a clipboard, figuring she would know. She squinted cornflower eyes against rays of fading sunlight. “I’m Coach Jennings. Can I help you?” Those eyes widened when she picked’ out my red leather uniform and low-heeled boots, added them to the snake tats, and came up with the obvious assumption. “Has something happened to one of my girls?” Gods, I was getting old. Apparently she only looked sixteen. She had to be in her twenties at least to be coaching high schoolers.
    “That’s what I’m here to prevent.” Normally I would have flashed my badge to speed the process along, but that asshole Zalawski had confiscated it. I nodded toward the field.
    “Some dangerous people are planning to use my niece, Con Holloway, against me. Her parents sent me here to get her to safety.”
    She tapped pen against clipboard, then barked, “Con! Front and center!”
    My heart picked up speed as one of the girls tossed a ball to another and jogged toward us. Gorgeous cheekbones and deeply tanned complexion came from her mother, but the honey-blond hair and brilliant blue eyes were all David’s—and mine. I’d only seen her in pictures the past . two years and couldn’t believe how much she’d grown. She had to be almost sixteen now—the age where she’d start exhibiting a Fury’s abilities, if she’d inherited any. I both hoped for and prayed against that. Con’s eyes zeroed in