“Donovan wasn’t a fool, but I treated him like one,” Cassidy said. “I’m a dominant female, which means I have the instinct to protect, even when another doesn’t want to be protected.”

“Cassidy,” Diego said, choosing his words carefully, “what he did wasn’t your fault. It was Donovan’s fault for being an idiot. I’m sorry, I know you loved him, but why the hell did he go out running around when he knew it was so dangerous? Alone? What, he was thumbing his nose at you? What an ass**le.”

“Diego.”

Her tone held rage. Well, too bad that he pissed her off. Diego wished Donovan Grady was here right now so he could punch him.

“Let me tell you a story,” he said. “When I was fifteen, Xavier started running with gangs. Small stuff at first, just being a lookout, then the next thing I know, he has guns in his dresser drawers and he’s learning how to make explosives for Enrique. I lit into him, thought I could force him to get out of it by yelling at him. No, Xav keeps on, because he’s got a lot of rage about how my dad was killed, and his plan was to go up against the gang whose members shot our dad in the robbery and kill them.

“I went to Enrique and told him to keeps his claws off Xavier, to help me keep him from doing something stupid. Enrique’s sister had just run away, and I thought he’d understand my need to protect my brother. But Enrique, he’s happy to have Xavier work for him, because he wanted kids all fired up to kill members of other gangs. So, what does he do? Instead of just telling me no, Enrique grabs Xav and holds him hostage. The only way he’ll let Xavier go is if I let Xav stay in the gang. If I say no, Enrique will have his goons beat up Xav. These were big men. They’d have killed him.”

Cassidy listened, stricken. “What did you do?”

“I told them if they let Xavier go, I’d let Enrique’s boys beat me up instead. Enrique was all for it. He hated me. He even let me fight back. I gave pretty good, but I went down. Then they tied me to a chair, tortured me, and tried to get me to beg for my life. In the end, they let me go and Xav too, because they said I had balls. But Xavier hated me for it. He said I’d made him look weak, that I shouldn’t have interfered.”

“But you couldn’t have done nothing.”

Diego looked over at her. Her eyes glittered in the darkness.

“I know. What I’m trying to explain is those who need the most protecting are the ones who resist it the most. Xavier was stupid about it, and so was Donovan. Xav has an excuse—he was thirteen. Donovan was an adult, should have known better.”

Cassidy sat up straight. “Should have known better, should he? And who was the fully grown human male who attacked a fortress full of feral Shifters by himself?”

“I had Shane and Marlo for backup. You deliberately got yourself captured by the ferals so you could protect Xavier.”

“You’d have preferred me to stand and watch them drag him away? They’d have killed him.”

“I know that. You have the instinct to protect. So do I. If I get myself killed because of it, it has nothing to do with you.”

Cassidy glared at him. “This is your argument for why we should stay together?”

“I’m saying you can’t break up with me because you think you caused the death of your mate. You didn’t. Those hunters did by breaking the law and shooting him. You’re not responsible for absolutely every damned thing that goes on in other people’s lives.”

“I’m Eric’s second. Yes, I am.”

“Yeah? Then maybe Donovan was right. You’re too tied to being second to Eric and not enough to being first to yourself.”

Her anger was palpable. “And this is how you plan to convince me that a relationship between us will work?”

“I’m trying to convince you to give me time to convince you. Later. We’re here.”

The dirt road had narrowed. Xavier stopped his truck ahead of them, and Diego pulled in behind. Cassidy didn’t say anything or even look at him as they got out of the car.

Diego’s heart beat faster as Reid found the path and started leading them to the rock outcropping. Cassidy was pretty stubborn, but like hell Diego was going to let her win. He’d convince her they should be together if he had to argue with her until they were both too hoarse and too tired to talk. Then he’d teach her exactly how he felt about her, in all ways.

Court her, his mother would call it. Chase her ass was Xavier’s term.

Diego watched Cassidy walking a little ahead of him, her legs slim in jeans, her loose sweatshirt in no way disguising the delectable body beneath. He thought of the way she’d slid onto him in his backseat last night, wearing nothing under her tight dress.

If Cassidy thought this human would run away with his tail between his legs, she didn’t know humans. Or at least Latino cops who didn’t take shit from anyone.

After twenty minutes of climbing, they came to the clearing and the buildup of rocks within it.

“This is a magical place,” Peigi said as she looked around. Cassidy looked around as well, her arms folded hard across her chest.

“How do you know that?” Xav asked.

Peigi touched one of the boulders. “I was raised on the Scottish west coast, where the Fae presence is strong. I learned the feel of it. It’s faint here, but Fae magic has touched it.”

Diego knew it only as a place where he’d been shot at, and where he’d found Cassidy ready to be butchered by Reid.

Eric walked through the cave with his flashlight, examining walls, floor, ceiling. Shane came behind him, the big bear man sniffing. Diego trained his own light on them but found nothing unusual, only gray and darker gray limestone of the mountains and a coating of dust.

“The gate won’t open for me,” Reid said. “I’ve tried.”

“What is the ritual?” Peigi asked.

“It involves candles and a big, long knife,” Cassidy said.

“And Tasers, apparently,” Shane said. “Though I’m thinking they weren’t in the original spell.”

“A spell I won’t try to work again,” Reid said. “I don’t fit in here, but I won’t kill to get back home.” Diego heard the dead note in Reid’s voice.

Eric pressed his hands on the wall at the end of the shallow cave. “According to my Fae source, the gates on the ley lines go to different places in Faerie. You can walk through two gates right next to each other in the human world and end up thousands of miles apart in Faerie. So this gate might not lead to anywhere near Fionn’s territory.”