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Eurig looked over at Bree and winked. An impossible heat filled her cheeks. “I’ll show you mine if you show meyours.”
“You can’t be serious,” she barked back with a roll of her eyes. “That’s the lamest pick-up line I’ve everheard.”
“Oh, I’m not truly coming on to you, Redcap girl,” he said with a wink. “If I was, you would have no hope of turning medown.”
Okay, so this outposter guy was way more irritating than she’d originally thought. He was more than little cocky. He seemed to think he was far better than everyone else in the room. And he thought he could get any female he wanted whenever hewanted.
Bree would show him. How? She didn’tknow.
Rafe stood across the room, frowning at the two of them. He had clearly overheard their entire exchange, and Bree could tell Rafe was not happy about the outposter’s flirtations, even if he was using them in jest. Bree was pretty certain that Eurig was just trying to mess with her head and that he had no real interest in turning any sort of seductive charm her way. He probably wanted to show her up during the shift, knowing that her beastly form would far outmatchhis.
Bree curled her lips into a smile and focused on the beast within. That would be how she would one-up him. There was no way in hell his shape-shifted form was more impressive thanhers.
She went through the motions. Her claws sprouted from her fingertips. Her fangs ripped through her jaws. Her arms bulged and extended, and hair ripped through her skin. At the end of the shift, Bree was left feeling ragged and that old familiar bloodlust sang in her soul. With a curl of her beastly lips, she turned toward Eurig who she could hear panting at herside.
And then her eyes widened. In shock, she took a single step back, her sharp claws scratching against the stoneground.
Eurig shot her a smile full of fangs. She didn’t know how to explain what he was. Some kind of lion-like beast, one who was at least a few inches wider and taller than she was. He had golden fur that curled across an impossibly-muscular frame, and his sharp teeth glinted against the dull light of the moon shining through the overheadwindow.
Bree was something of a wolf. A mangy one. She was strong, and she was powerful, but there was a raw sort of clumsiness she always experienced as a beast. She never felt truly like herself when the wolf took over herbody.
Eurig, on the other hand, wore his lion like a second skin. He practically purred as he gracefully strode across the room to stand just before Bree, everything about him rippling with pure and unadulterated power. She felt like an ant compared to his perfect form, one who hadn’t had a bath in a hundredyears.
Bree curled back her lips andgrowled.
She swore she heard the lion chuckle. He leaned forward and sniffed, and then he open his jaw wide to let out a deafening roar. Growling, Bree flicked her tail and turned away from the lion. Enough of this bullshit. She’d had enough. Bree ground her teeth together and forced her body to shift back into her fae form. Rafe was by her side in an instant, handing her a tunic to cover her nakedbody.
“Well done,” Rafe said, his voice tight. “You shifted faster than I have seen you shift in thepast.”
He did not make a comment about Eurig or point out the fact that he’d practically challenged her to a beastly fight. Instead, Rafe moved over to Lyra’s side, coaching her through a shift while Eurig whispered back into his normalbody.
When his lion-like form dropped away, he stood before her with a smile. Bree tried not to look at him. He hadn’t bothered to grab a tunic from the floor, and his skin glistened from a slight sheen of sweat. Somehow, that only enhanced the tight look of his muscles, a fact that put Bree more than a tiny bit onedge.
He shot her a wink. “I bet you were not expectingthat.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “That you’d be an ass? No, I was expectingthat.”
“There are few fae with shape-shifted forms that can rival yours,” he merelysaid.
Yes, that was true, but she wasn’t going to give him the satisfaction of knowing that she thought his lion form was better than her wolf. Instead, she took a step closer to him, swallowing hard at the close proximity to his naked body. And then she slapped him in the face with asmile.
“That’s for roaring at me. Maybe next time you’ll think twice about challenging a wolf girl to afight.
