Four-Letter Words by Evans, Gabrielle (top 10 books of all time .txt) 📗

“Right, and how do you propose we do that?”

“How should I know?” Thane snapped. Reeling in his temper, he took a deep breath and let it out slowly as he pinched the bridge of his nose between thumb and forefinger. “Okay. Let’s just keep going. Maybe we’ll find something when we get there.”

“Don’t be stupid.”

“You’re stupid,” Thane shot back.

“Kieran took my flashlight, and he won’t give it back,” Raith whined.

“Well, it was mine anyway.” Lynk snatched the flashlight from Kieran’s hand, jerking it out of reach when Thane reached for it. “Don’t be such a baby.”

“You’re the baby,” Thane mumbled, but he kept his voice quiet. He might be bigger, but Lynk did have more magic than him—which totally wasn’t fair.

“Uh, maybe we should rest here for a few minutes,” Zasha suggested.

“No,” Lynk, Torren, Raith, and Thane answered together. “I’m not tired.” Even as he said it, Thane yawned and rubbed at his itchy eyes. “I’m bored. Why can’t we go home?”

“Yeah,” Torren agreed. “I wanna go home, too.”

Since this sounded like a wonderful idea to Thane, he spun around and began walking back the way they’d come. Unfortunately, Zasha caught him around the elbow and jerked him to a stop. That guy always did suck the fun out of everything. “Fun sucker.”

“What the hell are you doing?” the vampire demanded.

“Hey!” Raith yelled. “You can’t talk to my brother that way!”

“Oh, for the love of the gods, what is going on? Are you five?” Zasha demanded with a disgusted huff.

Thane didn’t know what the man was so upset about, though. Thane was the one being insulted. “No, I’m not five,” he replied with a sarcastic shake of his head. “I’m not some baby, ya know. I’m almost ten.”

Chapter Eleven

“He’s joking, right?” Zasha didn’t find it very humorous, but it was the only thing that even remotely made sense as to why four grown men were acting like a bunch of preteens. Turning to his leader, he jerked his thumb at Thane. “Tell me he’s joking.”

October looked just as puzzled by the behavior. “Actually, I don’t think he is.”

A loud grunt and sounds of a scuffle drew Zasha’s attention just in time for him to see Raith tackle Thane to the ground. They yelled the most ridiculous names at each other as they rolled across the rocks and sand, both throwing punches that weren’t extremely coordinated.

“You bit me!” Kieran shouted, jerking his hand away from Lynk. “What the fuck?”

“Don’t touch me!” Lynk yelled right back. “You’re gross!”

Zasha didn’t know what to do, so he just stood there like an idiot with his mouth hanging open. “I don’t understand.”

“If I had to say, I’d guess magical repellent charms.” October shrugged when Zasha continued to gape. “You didn’t think this would be easy, did you?”

“Well, no, but c’mon! What are we even supposed to do with them like this?” He also wondered why it was only the Braddocks. No one else in their group appeared to be affected.

“Raith,” October called, “come over here, love.”

“You can’t boss me around,” Raith answered immediately.

Thane, however, used the distraction to escape his brother’s hold. He didn’t waste a minute of his freedom, either. Stopping right in front of Zasha, he pointed a finger at Raith. “He pulled my hair.” His fingers tangled in his short locks and tugged. “Just like that. Tell him to leave me alone.”

“I…uh…well…” Oh, for fuck’s sake. Words failed him. Somehow, he didn’t remember being quite so obnoxious when he was ten. If they didn’t find a way to undo the spell soon, he might end up strangling his mate.

“If I hit him,” Kieran groaned as he kicked his leg out to the side, trying to dislodge the hold Torren had on his shin, “it’s not really child abuse, is it? I mean, he’s not really ten.”

“Yeah huh,” Torren argued, but he did release the werewolf and jump to his feet. “You can’t hit a kid.”

“I’m willing to make an exception,” Zasha muttered under his breath. This was insane. The men meant to find the witches and essentially save the day were beyond useless as they were.

“Raith said something like this could happen,” October informed him. “Honestly, I expected we’d all forget why we were here or something of that sort. Still, I think the principles are the same. We just have to get them out of the area.”

It would have been nice if his mate had given him the same warning, but there was nothing to be done about it now. Watching the Braddock brothers chase each other around while yelling imaginative insults, he also wasn’t sure how they were going to get them to do anything. “How do we do that? They don’t exactly seem willing to follow directions.”

“Boys!” Raven yelled, speaking for the first time since the incident had started. “Listen up! Who wants to play Simon Says? The winner gets to give everyone else atomic wedgies.”

“Yeah!” Raith yelled.

“I’m in,” Thane agreed.

“You’re all going down,” Torren taunted.

Lynk was the only one who didn’t look enthusiastic. “I suck at this game,” he grumbled. “I always lose.” He still stepped forward to take his place in the lineup, however.

“Simon says take three giant steps forward,” Raven called, walking backward from the group as he spoke.

As a unit, the men stretched their legs out like cartoon parodies as each one attempted a larger stride than his brother. Zasha was grateful for the quick thinking of his friend, and he was a little amazed that Raven had been the one to solve their dilemma.

Crossing to the vampire, Zasha stopped beside him and folded his arms over his chest. “Thank you,” he said out of the side of his mouth after Raven had issued the next task in the game.

“It’s kind of creepy seeing them this way, but if you imagine them about three feet shorter, it’s a piece of cake.”

“If you say so.” There