Prowled Darkness (Dante's Circle, #7)(4)

Seth handed her a glass of water and she grinned at him. “Thank you,” she said. There. That was nice. Not the crazy pregnant chick.

“You’re welcome. Do you need anything to eat? I can get you something.” He was out of his chair before she could answer, hovering as if waiting for an order.

She couldn’t help but laugh. “I’m fine, Seth. Take care of your mate. I won’t break.” She looked over at the others. “I won’t break,” she repeated. A vow of her own.

They nodded back at her and Tristan scowled before muttering something about fate under his breath.

Eliana sighed. “Fate had nothing to do with this, Tristan,” she said calmly. “Malik was human. He wasn’t my mate, wasn’t my true half. He’s gone now, and I’m going to be a mom. That’s not fate. That’s life.”

Tristan froze, his jaw setting. “What did you just say?”

She blinked. “That’s not fate. That’s life?”

He shook his head, his hands shaking. “No, about Malik being human.”

She didn’t understand why he was acting this way. “Malik was human. Right? I mean, he’s your friend and all.”

Tristan cursed and stood up quickly, practically knocking his chair to the ground. “No. Malik is a lion shifter. He’s in line for the throne. I thought you knew he wasn’t human and that’s why…f*ck. Oh, f*ck.”

Eliana set the glass down on the table, afraid it would slip from her fingers. The others talked around her, asking her questions, speaking to Tristan as if he held all the answers.

“He…he never met any of you.” She took a deep breath. “And I never mentioned…it’s not like I have lightning-struck on my forehead or anything.” Her eyes stung and she tried to focus. “He’s a…he’s a lion?”

“Why didn’t you tell us?” Amara asked Tristan, worry on her face.

“Because I thought you knew!” Tristan scowled. “I swear to the goddess, I thought you all knew.”

Dante shook his head and tapped his tongue ring to his lip. “None of us met him. I thought at one point I scented a lion on Eliana, but that could have been anyone.” The dragon met Eliana’s face. “While you were dating him, we didn’t see much of you. None of us knew.”

She tried to catch her breath. “So he’s a lion. Okay. But that doesn’t mean he’s my true half. I didn’t change into my paranormal self when he had sex like what happened with the rest of you. He didn’t claim me as his. So he was just some random lion that left me. We aren’t mates.”

Tristan looked pained. “It’s not that simple, Eliana.”

She set her jaw. “Why? Why is the fact that Malik left me not simple?”

“Because lions don’t mate the way other supernaturals do.”

The hairs on the back of her neck rose at the sound of the deep voice behind her. She knew that voice. It haunted her dreams, and at one point, had made her shiver just from being softly spoken.

She slowly turned her head so she could see the man that had shattered her heart. His dark hair looked like it hadn’t been cut since she’d last seen him, so long now it brushed his shoulders. His light brown skin stretched over thick muscles and she couldn’t breathe at the sight of him.

“Malik,” she whispered.

He glowered at her then let his gaze trail to her belly. “It seems we need to talk.”

It seemed they did.





Chapter Two


There were times in a man’s life when he felt like he held the world in his hands. There were times where that man could conquer that world and know instinctively what to do with the life it held.

This was not one of those times.

Malik Ward wanted to throw up, even though he didn’t have a thing in his stomach. Or maybe yell at someone until he was so red in the face he couldn’t speak. Perhaps hit someone so he could feel bone smash against bone. Or maybe, just maybe, go down to his knees in front of the woman who carried his child and beg for forgiveness.

As Malik was in line for the lion throne and a Ward, the latter wouldn’t be happening.

Ever.

If he were anything less than the lion he was, he’d have tucked his tail between his legs and walked out of the bar as quickly as he’d come in. But he wasn’t that kind of man, and now he had to face the consequences of his decisions.

And what consequences they were.

He’d been in his realm, trying to calm the rising storm and failing at everything he tried when he’d finally heard the full story of what had happened to Amara, Tristan, and Seth. If his head hadn’t been so far up his ass, he’d have known why his friend had wanted to save his mates the way he had. Instead, Malik had been focused on his family and the realm that would soon be his because he hadn’t had a choice in the matter.

He hadn’t known Amara was lightning-struck—not until word had eventually spread that she was now the queen of the siren realm.

He hadn’t known that Amara’s friends were also lightning-struck. Therefore, he hadn’t known that if those particular women found their mates, they would become the paranormal that held the most dominant strain in their DNA.

He hadn’t known that the one woman he’d thought he could love—the one woman, if he let himself believe, he did love—was lightning-struck.