I focused all my attention on Connor, as if I could pour my own strength into him. Even monster seemed to lean forward, to urge him on.

Cade tried a spinning kick. Connor hit the ground, rolled to avoid the shot. And when Cade tried to kick Connor on the ground, Connor grabbed his foot, twisted, sending him off balance and to the floor. He hit with a hard thud, then rolled and came up again.

Connor dodged a blow, then another.

“Quit fucking around,” Cade gritted out, and this time aimed lower, hitting Connor in the hip. But Connor spun away in time, so the blow was glancing. He came back with a round kick that had Cade’s head spinning back, then dropped down to avoid a clumsy jab.

“Just toying with him,” Alexei murmured. “Tiring him out.”

“What?”

“Oh, yeah,” Dan said, with cool amusement. “They’re both alpha, but Cade’s got nothing special. Not on Connor.” He put two fingers in his mouth, whistled. “Fuck him up, Connor!” he shouted, then glanced at me apologetically.

“Sorry.”

“No worries,” I said, but watched more closely now, trying to see what they did. There was a blooming bruise on Connor’s right cheekbone, and one of Cade’s eyes was cut and bleeding, adding that particular peppery magic to the air. But with each shot, Cade’s fist seemed to grow heavier.

And then Cade swept Connor’s legs and sent Connor to the floor.

“Wanna ask your girlfriend to help you up?” Cade asked, body slicked with perspiration.

“Don’t need help,” Connor said, flipping himself to his feet again. He was sweaty, too. He flung damp curls from his eyes, grinned back at Cade. “Want me to ask your girlfriend?”

Cade cursed and barreled toward Connor, picking him up at the waist and sending them both careering into the opposite wall. Shifters scattered to avoid the shot and the plaster that flew from the divot they’d made. Then they hit the floor, grappling and trying to gain purchase on sweat-soaked bodies.

“Get up!” someone called out, and they were hauled to their feet again and pushed back to the center of the room. Both were breathing heavy now. And Cade, who’d managed to hold out this long, was getting cocky.

“You know what’s going to happen to vampires when I’m head of the Pack? Stakes,” Cade said. “It’s the best they deserve.”

I think he was trying to upset Connor, to put him off his focus. Unfortunately for Cade, it had the opposite effect.

In a strike so fast the motion was blurred, Connor punched him in the face, then again, and again. Cade wobbled, hit the ground on his butt.

Connor leaned down. “Say that again, asshole.”

Cade licked blood from his upper lip. “Stakes,” he said, drawing out the word slowly. And climbed to his feet.

And then I felt something click into place. Magic, seating itself home. And it was coming from Connor.

He closed his eyes as magic—new magic—spread through the room. It was strong and bright and clean. I’d have said it felt like sunlight, if sunlight was something I could easily feel.