The air was poison.
Lyra could hardly breathe with Kael on one side and Darius on the other, their grips like shackles, their bodies so close she could feel their hearts pounding against hers. Two heartbeats, two bonds, two storms ripping her apart.
Her skin burned where Darius’s teeth had grazed her, a false claim that still sizzled down her spine. And yet Kael’s hands on her arms set fire to her blood, the true mate bond raging against the intrusion.
“You can’t have her,” Kael snarled, voice raw, half-wolf, half-man.
Darius’s lips curved into a sharp, cruel smile, though his silver eyes glittered with hunger. “She’s not an object for you to hoard. She stays because she wants to.”
“I don’t—” Lyra’s voice broke. She tried to pull away, but both their grips only tightened, dragging her
