“Don’t make me do it again!” Penny screeched right before a yeti’s pain-filled roar rolled across the field. “Sasquatch-shedding sonuva donkey! That throw was Reagan’s idea!”
She’d be fine. She was still stuck in the phase of blaming everything on me.
Roger rolled his shoulders. “This isn’t the time for this,” he said as I stopped twenty feet from him. I wanted a running start.
“Two thises don’t make a right.” I hefted the practice sword. “It’s a practice field. It’s the perfect time for this. And look.” I tossed it up, grabbed the blade end, and threw it like a knife. It did a lazy half-turn, right for him. He stepped to the side, and it flew past him. “That would’ve hit you. See? I have aim.”
“I commanded the shifters to stay in human form. You undermined that command.”
I furrowed my brow, then gestured to Penny, who looked pretty funny jogging backward and wagging her fingers, her hands raised in front of her body. I couldn’t feel the spell from the distance, but given she was still facing the (quite slow) lumbering beast rather than blindly running in the other direction, she was handling everything pretty well. The spell wouldn’t be that nasty. It would just really hurt. “I didn’t do anything. She did it. Punish her.”
“Do you think I’m stupid?” Roger asked.
“Do you really want me to answer that in front of all these people? It wouldn’t be a good look.” His stare made my bowels a little watery. So I gave him a little spur to get things moving. “Big, dumb doggy.”
The green, swirling magic intensified. He was trying to keep control. The guy was hard to crack.
“Isn’t it a rule that shifters can defy a command when their life is in danger?” I asked, going about this a different way. I didn’t want to keep belittling him, or he might hold a grudge. Or more grudges. But I did need him to change, so as to allow his people to change. Romulus said that shifters and fae fought incredibly well together—they loved the pairing—and these particular fae would never see that unless the shifters were in animal form. Roger needed to make that command, and to do so, he needed to give in to his beast.
But also, trying to get him to lose control was a little bit of fun, and I was doing insanely well on my job of turning everyone’s attention our way. This whole situation checked all the boxes. As long as Roger didn’t hate me forever because of it, obviously.
“Cole’s life was not in danger,” he growled.
“I suppose not, though Penny could certainly take him on. But I was talking about you.”
“We’re on the same team, Reagan Somerset.”
He’d used my full name. He knew what was coming.
I grinned. “I know. You’re welcome.”
I slapped him with air. Then I ran at him, catching up as he tumbled ass over head across the ground, and thwapped him in the head with the wooden sword, something that required perfect timing. I only got it wrong a couple of times—slapping his face—before getting it right. The instant he completely stopped, his legs flopping everywhere, I jabbed him between the butt cheeks. Strangely, he didn’t jolt as I would’ve. Then again, he probably hadn’t occasionally gotten prodded in the wrong hole during an intimate moment. That kind of thing made a person jumpy.
He jumped up as if on springs, so I punched him in the face. He jolted backward. I kicked him in the balls. Would nothing break this guy and force him into his wolf form?
“Enough, Reagan,” he commanded, and a stray thought curled around me. Or I’ll make you beg for mercy.
“Oh, kinky.” I jabbed at his jugular, expecting him to dodge—which he did—and roundhouse-kicked him in the face. He staggered back. You couldn’t increase face muscle like body muscle. It left him wide open to people who knew what they were doing. Or to those who were crazy enough to try.
“Here, doggy.” I whistled again, back-pedaling a little. Hunching over, he wiped the back of his hand across his mouth. A sliver of red interrupted the line of his lips. “Does the itty-bitty-widdle doggy want a treat?”
“You sound ridiculous.”
“You look ridiculous. Your mom said so, and that’s saying something.”
“Two saids don’t make a right.” He ran at me.
“Different tense! Doesn’t count! Don’t steal my jokes—” I dodged his punch, felt his other hand press against my side, and knew I’d screwed up. “And don’t steal my moves!”
His other hand touched down on my ribs, and just like that, I was airborne, his strength easily that of an elder vampire.
I wrapped my magic around me and slowed my flight, then stopped, hovering in the air. His eyes widened.
“Yep. This bitch can hover. And you are starting to annoy me. Your life is officially in danger, Roger. Give in. Fight me how you were meant to fight me. Show these little fae what an alpha shifter can really do. Fight me!”