Mackenzie’s gaze shifted to Hartt as a spark of anger ignited her blood.
“That’s why you said you couldn’t teleport both me and Grave that time.” She huffed and eased into a crouch before him, her brow furrowing as she gazed up at his face. “You should have told me that teleporting us here would do this to you.”
The look in his eyes said he had known she would stop him, would insist she remained behind while they visited Rosalind, and that was the reason he hadn’t told her. Because only he and Fuery knew this location, he had been forced to teleport Mackenzie and Syn here, followed by Grave and Night. According to the argument that had broken out when Hartt had nominated himself for teleportation duty, Fuery’s ability to teleport was unreliable at best, took a monumental effort on his part. He had ordered Fuery to teleport here alone, leaving himself to bring the others.
“Visitors!” A bright, cheery female voice with a strong British accent cut through the darkness. “Some welcome… some not.”
A petite woman with long ash-blonde hair strode across the grass towards them, the distant lights of the house and the moon combining to throw her shadows in two directions across it. Loose black bottoms dotted with white stars shifted with each step she took in her fluffy pink slipper-boots and she wrapped her arms around herself, tugging a thick black cardigan closed over her chest and huddling down into it.
A vicious growl pealed like thunder around them and then a darkly handsome male stood right before Mackenzie, between the blonde female and the vampires.
The mad elf prince himself.
Onyx armour rippled over his body as his jeans and woollen jumper disappeared, formed razor-sharp claws at his fingertips and even rose up over his head to cover it like a helmet. The metal scales remained clear of the area below his eyebrows, but dipped lower above his nose to offer it some protection, and flared up around the crown of his head to form spikes like dragon horns.
Rosalind loosed a sigh and looked at Hartt. “You should have known better.”
Mackenzie closed ranks with him, her instinct to protect him forcing her to move in case the mad elf prince meant to attack him.
“Leaving them behind wasn’t an option.” Hartt sounded strained and tired as he straightened and a flicker of worry lit Rosalind’s blue eyes and made Mackenzie want to growl and claw them out. He waved the witch away, sparing her. “I am fine. Just a teleport drain. It is passing.”
“You should have left the wretches behind,” Vail growled in the direction of the vampires, his eyes never straying from them.
Rosalind sighed dramatically, stepped up to her mate and wrapped her arms around his right one. She looked up at him, an adoring expression on her face, bright silver stars sparkling in her eyes, as if she was snuggling up to a teddy bear rather than a dark, dangerous and deadly elf who apparently despised vampires.
Mackenzie marvelled as Vail became just that as his gaze dropped to Rosalind and lifted to the vampires, only to immediately return to his mate and soften. His hard expression melted away, all the darkness lifting from it as he stared down at her. The power of a mate. Did Mackenzie have such power over Hartt? Having a kick-ass and powerful assassin for a mate might have its advantages.
Like, maybe she could convince him to ditch his guild and join hers.
They would make a killer team. Quite literally.
It only took one look at him to know that while she might have the power to wrap him around her little finger, there would be no convincing him to leave his guild. Fuery lived there, and the times he had spoken of other assassins under his command, there had been a warmth in his eyes that had revealed what those people meant to him. His guild was his family, just as her guild was her family.
Maybe she could settle on the guilds teaming up, forming a sort of super-guild with two offices. Sometimes she could help Hartt out with a job, and sometimes he could help her. Both guilds would prosper and if hers just happened to surpass his in reputation and popularity, so be it.
“It turns out you were right and a witch is behind everything.” Hartt’s deep voice rolled over her, made her want to purr as heat suffused every inch of her. She eased closer to him, wanting to hold his arm as Rosalind held Vail’s, but didn’t want to look like some moon-eyed girl. Hartt took hold of her hand as soon as she was within reach, interlinked their fingers and held it tightly, showing her that she was the only one with a problem where public displays of affection were concerned. “Mackenzie here lost her family to his kind and retaliated by taking out most of his family during her escape. Grave was hired by one of her remaining kin to find her and kill whoever was holding her, only she had escaped by the time he reached the mansion where she had been held.”
Her heart melted a little as he left out the fact she was a phoenix shifter, skilfully avoided revealing it to the witch and her mate, keeping her secret for her.
“I took out some witches who returned to find the building in ruins,” Grave added, earning a black snarl from the elf prince. The vampire met it with one of his own, baring his fangs at Vail, and Night stepped closer to his brother, forming a formidable wall with him. If Vail lost it and decided to fight Grave, he was going to have to take on both vampires at once.
Something Mackenzie doubted would be a problem for him.
Rosalind smoothed her palm down her mate’s arm, regaining his attention, causing that miraculous transformation that fascinated Mackenzie. Savage wolf to sappy puppy in the blink of an eye.
“It is the same witch I fought in the mortal realm, one who was working for an Archangel huntress.” Hartt held his free hand up when Rosalind looked alarmed. “Not the one you’re thinking of. This one had targeted Harbin, a snow leopard shifter in my employment, ruining his life and coming close to destroying his pride a few decades ago. She went after him again, and we were able to eradicate her, but the witch escaped. Harbin took his mate to Underworld, where his brother works, to protect her… sure the witch would come after him. Only he didn’t.”
“Because he was too busy putting together an amazeballs plot to bring all three of you down.” Rosalind beamed at Hartt, as if she was proud of this witch for pulling together a plan that had almost succeeded.
“We need to find him. We’ve searched the destroyed mansion and looked in a few other places, but we’ve turned up nothing.” Hartt ran his hand around the back of his neck, and Mackenzie felt his fatigue, how badly he needed to rest. She admired him as he took command of the situation despite how weary he was, discovered another quality she liked in him. He huffed. “The last time I came here, you sensed magic on me. Can you use that magic to track him?”
The petite blonde released her mate and crossed the grass to Hartt, ignoring how Vail growled low in his throat and looked as if he wanted to drag her back to him to stop her from being near Hartt. Mackenzie made a mental note of that—some elves didn’t lose that instinct to keep their mate away from other males once they had claimed her.
The witch raised her hand and went to press it to Hartt’s chest.
Mackenzie snatched hold of her wrist before she could make contact, loosed a vicious snarl that shocked even herself as fire blazed through her, heated her flesh and brought her dangerously close to going nuclear.
Rosalind slowly turned wide blue star-pricked eyes on her. “Oh, I like you.”