Chapter 18 Aiden
AIDEN
Ichased Heath down the staff hallway leading to the bar’s employee parking lot. Wyatt was hot on my heels, Elijah seconds behind him after he stopped to inform Bernard, the bar’s proprietor and friend of his uncle’s, to lock the door and keep everyone out of the back.
One minute ago, the four of us had been sitting around our table, drinking booze that wouldn’t get us drunk and brooding like a bunch of sad assholes because our mate had stormed out of the bar.
Wyatt’s previous antics with Callista had come back to bite us all once again, as well as, apparently, a brief fling Elijah had with one of the avian girls months before any of us had even met Avery.
Wyatt’s attempt at damage control had gone as well as expected, and then Avery had left the premises entirely, allegedly out on a joy ride with our sisters, who had no business being in this particular part of town at this hour.
So when a panicked Brody ran up to our table, grabbed Heath by the shirt, and told him that Kace Mahoney was probably about to kill Ian behind the bar and that Brody had sent Avery back there to stop him?
We were on our feet and sprinting to the back without another word.
The moment Heath shoved through the heavy exit door, the terrifying roar of a tiger blasted through the parking lot like a detonating bomb.
We breached the first and only line of cars just in time to witness our mate’s gorgeous beast leaping into the air, her shredded clothing falling to the ground behind her.
Mahoney—the bastard who’d injured Avery right in front of us in the arena while we could only stand there, helpless, murderously angry, and utterly confused as to why seeing this girl hurt affected us so intensely—had two seconds to comprehend that the girl he’d shamelessly attacked during training had just shifted into a very large and very powerful silver tiger.
And that she was about to tear him apart.
The wolf’s gray eyes went comically wide before the tiger slammed into him, knocking him out of the air and rolling him across the asphalt like a furry log.
“Perimeter,” Heath barked.
We fanned out, each of us taking up a post around the lot so that we could collectively cover all entrances and exits.
Avery’s friend Mallory and her wolf mate stood nearby, both watching with wide eyes and slack jaws as our beautiful tiger tore a huge chunk of flesh from Kace’s shoulder.
Brody jogged over to them, relief evident on his face.
He didn’t appear surprised—only awed—by Avery’s beast, but then he must’ve known what she was or else he wouldn’t have sent her up against an Alpha wolf.
The doors of the red BMW parked haphazardly in front of the lot’s entrance opened and ejected Willow, Winona, and Clara, all three of them gaping at the sight in front of them.
Kace recovered from his shock and scrambled to his feet. With a vicious snarl, he lunged, teeth aimed for Avery’s throat.
He wasn’t going for submission. He was trying to kill her.
My jaguar growled in my chest.
Avery swatted the wolf’s head away with her big paw, raking her claws through his flesh as she did. That rang Kace’s bell hard, and he staggered away from her.
“Holy fucking shit,” Willow hissed.
“What. Is. Happening?” Winona stage-whispered, her blue eyes saucers as she blinked at the scene.
“She’s beautiful,” Clara added.
A small silver fox scurried up to Clara. She gasped with delight and picked him up, squeezing him to her chest like a teddy bear.
So there was Ian. The fox was bleeding in a few places, but he appeared to be in one piece.
His boyfriend glowered at him from across the parking lot.
Clara turned her wide eyes on me. “Aiden! Is this what you guys have been hiding? Look at Avery! She’s even bigger than your jaguar.”
Speaking of my jaguar, he was greatly testing my control. An enemy beast was attacking our mate, and the drive to be in battle beside her was all-consuming.
By the look of the violently glowing eyes of the rest of my quad, they were in the same boat.
But we wouldn’t intervene. Both beasts and men knew that our mate could hold her own in this fight, and it was her right to protect her brother and avenge the assault Mahoney had perpetrated against her in the arena.
I cleared my throat. “She’s bigger than me by mass. Our beasts’ frames are about the same size.”
Kace lunged for Avery again, this time getting his teeth into her flank.
She snarled and whipped her powerful body around, shaking the wolf loose.
Kace flopped to the ground, rolled, and launched himself at her again, snapping and snarling and pumping suffocating pheromones into the air designed to smother a weaker shifter into quivering submission.
My mate hissed her displeasure, rearing up to intercept the wolf’s attack.
She batted him with her paws, rending more flesh with every swipe. The wolf’s eyes liquified into blazing silver, blood and saliva flying from his jaws as his attack became frenzied, lunging and snapping at the tiger’s throat with reckless abandon.
“He’s lost it,” I barked at Heath.
Lost to the beast. No humanity left at the controls.
“I know,” Heath replied. His voice was calm, but his shoulders were practically in his ears and his jaw was rigid enough to break his teeth. “I can feel it.”
Across the way, Elijah was still as a statue, his knuckles as white as the wolf’s fur. Wyatt loomed near our sisters, his eyes blazing red with the rage of his bear.
Kace managed to get his teeth into Avery’s shoulder, just below her throat, and she roared in outrage.
She reared up again and shoved him to the ground, using her larger mass to pin him down.
She tore into the flesh of his chest with her claws, and she used her advantage to sink her teeth into his throat.
With those strong deadly jaws and her muscular neck, the tiger shook the wolf violently.
The crack of his spine echoed through the parking lot.
Heath and I exchanged a look. Wyatt met my gaze next, and finally Elijah, the vertical slit pupils of the basilisk staring back at me.
We were all on the same page.
The wolf would not be leaving this parking lot alive. There were scant few people on this planet with whom the knowledge of Avery’s beast was safe, and Kace Mahoney was not one of them.
His father, Arthur Mahoney, regularly did business with my dad.
The tiger wrenched her head away from the wolf, taking a huge chunk of his throat with her. She spat it on the pavement and unleashed a growl that sent a shiver down my spine.
Blood dripped from her mouth and stained her beautiful fur. She stared at Kace where he lay on the ground, blood pooling around his upper body, his abdomen heaving with labored breaths.
If we left him long enough, his beast might be able to heal. Avery hadn’t taken his whole throat—the killing blow of most big cats.
Intelligent blue eyes took in each of the spectators surrounding her. Finally, she landed on Heath. There was a question there, maybe even a plea.
“Aiden,” he said softly. “Finish it.”
Before he’d even finished saying my name, I was striding forward, yanking my shirt off as I went, followed by my glasses, which I shoved in my pocket. My shoes were next, and finally my pants.
My body hardly registered the sharp pinch of the shift. My jaguar flowed more effortlessly from my body than ever before, the tiger’s presence a shining beacon calling him forward.
With an inhuman growl, the wolf rolled and began to climb to his feet. Blood dripped from his neck and his mouth, his insane silver eyes focused only on Avery.
He’d dug deep, lost in his beast, and he was going to attack her again.
Animal instinct melded with the very human need to protect Avery from harm, and I shot forward, sprinting on powerful feline legs toward the wolf.
With no hesitation, I struck, sinking my teeth into the back of the wolf’s skull and crushing it.
Killing him instantly.
“By the Moon,” Clara whispered.
Later, I’d probably be horrified to have killed another shifter in front of my little sister, but right now, I only had eyes for my mate. She stood over the wolf’s body, those luminous blue eyes blinking at me.
I slinked over to her, purring loudly. She lifted her chin with a haughty little snort, but she didn’t move away.
I rubbed my head along her soft neck and then against her cheek.
She rumbled a noise, not quite a growl, and not threatening enough for my jaguar to even consider stopping what he was doing.
I licked her face.
She snapped her teeth at me.
I nuzzled her neck and purred some more.
“All right,” Heath said, striding over to us.
He gave my flank a grateful pat, and then he corralled our tiger with a burst of Alpha dominance and a few loving strokes along her furry forehead.
“You were fantastic, Killer. You protected your brother and made quick work of an Alpha wolf lost completely to the beast. And you made it look easy.”
She huffed, but she couldn’t hide the tiger’s preen.
Elijah, looking only slightly less vexed, appeared on her other side. “Dove, you are viciously magnificent,” he said, running a hand along her back.
Wyatt joined us, giving my head a rub before he stole some ear scratches from the tiger. “That’s our girl, Wildcat. What a fucking show.”
She let them pet her for exactly three seconds before she shook them off. She growled, baring sharp teeth, and extricated herself from their huddle. With a shake of her silver fur, the tiger receded, and a gloriously naked Avery rose in her place.