"Here's my boy!" He almost sounded like a proud, loving father. Almost.
I turned just in time to see the Shifter King slap Lupe on the back. Lupe,
however, was focused entirely on Axel, eyes predatory.
Axel released my hand quickly, eyes flickering between me and Lupe
with something akin to understanding.
"Lupe, I was just introducing Z to Axel. You remember Axel, correct?
Don't you think they would make a good team?" There was no missing the
sexual innuendo behind that last word. Team.
Lupe's growl grew louder.
"Father!" Killian said easily, finally arriving with Devlin and Bash at his
heels. "This party is wonderful."
His stutter, I noticed, was more pronounced than usual. I wondered if it
was the presence of so many people or one in particular. One that wore a
golden crown and wielded his sex-appeal like a weapon.
I flickered my gaze from face to face. My mates now surrounding me,
vibrating with unconcealed tension. The mocking grins on the Kings' faces.
They knew, I realized in numb disbelief. The Kings knew about the mate
bonds between me and their sons.
And they were fucking playing with us.
They were turning this into a game, a game none of us understood nor
knew how to play. Expertly, they were moving us over the board, and we
were dumb enough to play right into their hands.
My eyes narrowed at the realization.
To them, we were nothing more than pawns in a game of chess. Each
move had a reason. The goal? To checkmate.
If I was the pawn, I would completely demolish their game board.
I would play their game, at least for now, until I could figure out what
they would win from all of this. Would they use me as a pawn to control their
sons? Kill me to cripple them?
Or something else entirely?
I kept a smile in place when the Genie King appeared with a wine glass,
handing it to me with a fake smile.
Yes, I would play their game.
And I would win.
I always fucking won.
FIFTEEN
BASH
She looked...so fucking perfect and beautiful that I wanted to both hate
her and fuck her. The contradicting emotions were giving me a
headache.
The dress clung to her chest like liquid silk, a light blue color that made
her blond hair shine like molten gold.
And I hated it. I hated that she made me think in terms of "molten gold"
and "liquid silk".
My cock was already hard in my trousers, almost to the point of pain, as I
watched her descend the staircase like some motherfucking angel of the past.
Yup. Hard. I couldn't get hard to save my life, but the second my mate
showed up, I was ready to squirt a gasket. So unfuckingfair. I would rather be
hard all my life, like Killian, instead of the limp noodle I currently was most
of the time because of her.
"She's beautiful," Killian whispered in a daze from beside me. I merely
muttered something indecipherable in response. She was beautiful, even I
could admit that. She looked like something plucked straight out of a fairytale
book, something carved into stained-glass windows, someone to be revered
and worshiped.
My heart picked up speed, slamming against my ribcage. All I wanted to
do was grab her, kiss those chiseled cheekbones of hers, lick every pale swath
of skin visible in her dress, tangle my hand in her blond hair...
And who the fuck was that kissing her hand?
Before I could stop myself, I was charging forward, body thrumming with
an almost incandescent fury. Anger burned in my veins, a flame seconds
from turning into a full-blown fire.
Dimly, I was aware of Devlin and Killian following behind me. I
wondered if they saw the same red sheen that I did? Killian smoothly stepped
in front of me, flashing a smile at his father. Anyone who didn't know him as
well as I did would've thought he was the epitome of calm. Serene. Only we
could see the tension in his shoulders, the pronounced stutter, the way his
eyes flickered from his father to the asshat named "Axel" who dared put his
lips on our mate.
...and why the fuck was I bothered so much?
I didn't like the woman, I reminded myself. I didn't like anyone besides
my family. I tried to put on a mask of indifference - as if I didn't want to
conjure up a spell that would permanently castrate the last assassin - while
watching the scene.
My eyes, unbidden, flickered towards Z once more. They seemed to
always go to her, like she was a magnet or something I couldn't ignore. She
propelled me towards her. A moth to her flame.
Motherfucking shit.
I was whipped, wasn't I?
"Excuse me, your highnesses," Z said in her musical voice, effectively
pulling my attention back towards the conversation at hand. She curtseyed to
the three kings present before flashing a singularly beautiful smile at Axel.
Lupe, on the other side of the semi-circle we had created, growled low in his
throat. The damn mate bond was even making him turn into a neanderthal.
She reverted us back to our basic, primal instincts where everything was
either fuck, kill, or eat. And with her? We wanted to fuck. It was a sort of
carnal hunger, a predatory hunger, that left me speechless.
I have had my fair share of females, but never anyone like her. Never any
female that I wanted to cuddle with afterwards, wanted to hear laugh, wanted
to know every damn thing she was willing to give me.
Shit. Shit. Shit.
I hated the direction of my thoughts, hated the way they always seemed to
lead back to her. I wasn't purposefully trying to be stubborn, but there was no
secret that the mate bond was preordained by fate itself. What happened to
free-will? What happened to choice?
And I wanted my relationship with Z to be a choice - both hers and mine.
"I promised Bash here a dance," Z continued lightly. I blinked stupidly at
her.
Dance?
Did she get dropped on her gorgeous head or something? Because there
was no motherfucking way I was going to dance...
She proffered a creamy white hand, and my heart thudded in my chest.
Before I could stop myself, before I could think things through, I placed my
hand in hers.
Her smile was smug as I led her to the dance floor, away from the Kings'
curious, amused gazes and the wistful ones of my brothers.
"I don't fucking dance, blondie," I said, pulling her body towards me. She
placed her hands on my shoulders as I settled my own on her waist. Around
us, the partygoers were participating in an elaborate dance that included dips,
twirls, and some random guy doing the splits. I would rather chop my own
balls off than do any of that.
Oh wait. I had no balls. The female before me had taken them.
"Suck it up, Bash-hole," she retorted, and my lips quirked instinctively at
the nickname. That was new, I would give her that.
"So why dance with me? I'm sure any other guy - not just including your
mates - would love to dance with you." I couldn't hide the slight bitterness in
my voice, but I kept my face impassive. S
till, she saw right through me, smile
widening.
"Are you jealous?" she asked lightly.
I snorted out a laugh.
"Never. Take all the guys for all the shits I give," I said with feigned
nonchalance.
That smirk remained firmly etched in place, the damn temptress.
"So I'm allowed to dance with Axel?" She batted her eyelashes at me
innocently, but his name had my hands tightening slightly, almost
imperceptibly, around her thin waist. I took a deep breath and closed my
eyes.
"Do what you want to do," I replied.
She immediately removed her hands from my shoulders, but I tugged her
back to me.
"Oh hell no," I muttered before I could stop myself.
She laughed, a pure, jovial sound that made my cock twitch. It was the
first time I had ever heard her laugh, I realized. Genuinely laugh. A full-on
belly laugh.
And god, did I like that sound.
It was music, spun gold, and elicited goosebumps up and down my arms.
"Why are you laughing?" I asked hoarsely. I didn't want her to know what
effect she had on me. Hopefully, she attributed my raspy voice to irritation,
not lust.
"Because you're so transparent, Bash, no matter how hard you try not to
be."
I quirked a brow at her, confused by those words, but she continued on
before I could question her further. "Anyway, I picked you for a reason. I
need to talk to you."
"About?" I asked. The live orchestra was playing a chilling melody that
spoke of love and loss. I didn't know why music spoke to me the way it did,
but I could get lost in the noise. It reverberated through every pore in my
body, intricate stories being woven together with each slash of the bow
against string. Each pluck of the guitar. Each pound on the keyboard.
What we were doing couldn't be considered dancing - more like
awkwardly swaying - but it felt right. It felt like us. Her tiny body melted
against my own as if she was made for me, and I, her.
Did I hate it?
Or did I love it?
Her warm breath puffed against my neck as she spoke; each turn of her
head had her silky blond hair brushing against my sensitive, pebbled skin.
Fucking hell. Love and hate were so close together. I couldn't tell the
difference between the two terms anymore.
"They know," she said breathlessly. Those words caused her lips to brush
the hollow of my throat, and my breath hitched.
Don't cum in your pants, Bash. Don't you dare fucking cum in your pants.
That was a motto I never thought I would use in my life.
The mate bond made it so I couldn't get hard around anyone but my mate.
Not that I would ever dream of sleeping with anyone that wasn't Z, but it
could get damn irritating when I was trying to jerk one off. Instead, I had to
fall asleep and allow my dreams to assault me until I was rock-hard and
desperate to sheath myself in her delicious cunt.
Because apparently, I had dreams of the future.
And in those dreams, I was always with Z.
Happy. In love. Happy.
But was it real? Or was it the mate bond forcing us to feel that way about
one another?
I couldn't discern, and I didn't want to look at it too closely.
"Bash," Z hissed irritatedly, oblivious to the direction my thoughts had
headed. "Did you hear me? They know."
"Who knows?" I asked. Driven purely by instinct, I brought my nose to
the crown of her head and inhaled deeply. Her newest shampoo, a gift from
Lupe, smelled sweet - an ironic feat considering who the smell was coming
from. I couldn't pinpoint the exact scent, only that it did things for me. Things
that shouldn't be possible through a mere smell.
"Your parents. They know about the mate bond."
Her words smothered me - an avalanche I couldn't escape from. The rocks
settled heavily on my chest, pressing down and cutting off my breathing. I
pulled away from her slightly so I could see her face. Surely, she was playing
some cruel, practical joke on me.
They couldn't know. Not them. My brothers and I had survived this long
because we had no attachments besides each other. There was nothing we
cared about, no one we loved, that could be used as bait. And the Kings
weren't stupid enough to use the other princes as leverage, in fear of starting a
full-on war.
"You're wrong," I said snidely before realizing how much like an ass I
sounded. I blanched when her eyes narrowed, hands leaving my shoulders to
rest on her waist. She canted her head to the side.
"I'm wrong?"
Okay, when a woman repeated your words back to you as a question, you
knew you were in deep shit.
Scrambling to think of something to say, something that wouldn't bring
about Z's wrath, I tacked on, "My father doesn't notice anything besides
where his bed is in the room. I doubt he would've noticed."
Her puffy lips parted, a rush of air escaping.
"That may be true, but the rest know. Of that, I am certain."
"Did they say something?" I asked anxiously.
The Kings knowing...
That was the equivalent of standing in a battle field, a double-edged
sword hanging over all of our heads. We were just waiting for the sword to
drop and kill us all.
"That's where you come in," Z continued. Her voice was still icy, but she
had once more placed her hands on my shoulders. Progress, though small.
I couldn't stop thinking of the implications behind the Kings knowing. If
what she said was true, the seven most powerful men in the kingdom now
had something they could use against us, the princes destined to either save
the world or destroy it.
And if Z's life was hanging in the balance?
Well...we were sins for a reason, after all. Not one of us would hesitate to
watch the world burn to ensure her safety. The Kings would know this and
would use it to their advantage.
"I remember Diego..." Her voice choked over his name before she
continued on. "I remember that he created a spell that could latch onto a
mundane object, such as a flowerpot or a teacup, and you could hear
everything from the room that item was in. Could you make something like
that? Or more than one of something like that?"
I eyed the crazy girl warily.
"You want us to spy on the Kings?" The disbelief was evident in my
voice. And the fear. Because what she was suggesting...it went beyond crazy.
It was fucking suicidal.
"That's the only way to know what they're up to," she insisted. From the
determined set to her chin and the steel glint in her eyes, I knew there was no
talking her out of this. She would either do this with or without my help.
As much as it pained me, I knew what my answer would be. I would
follow her through the fire if that was what she so desired. I had been burned
before, after all. What was one more inferno?
"You stupid, crazy, reckless girl," I muttered beneath my breath. I rapidly
shook my head from side to side, almost as if I could un-hear all the crazy
nonsense she had just spouted. At this point, I wondered if she was trying to
get herself killed.
Was it to teach me a lesson?
To show me how shitty of a mate I was?
"Will you help me?" she asked.
"Fucking hell," I cursed, piercing her with a glare. "You're crazy and
psychotic, you know that, right?"
Her smile was luminescent, splitting her face in half.
"And I think you're crazy too. Maybe that's why the universe made us
mates?"
God help me, the world was going to burn because of this damn girl.
SIXTEEN
Z
There were two things that the ladies of the ball liked to do: gossip and
drink wine. While I wasn't the biggest fan of the first facet, I was a
huge proponent of the latter one.
Smiling coyly at the women before me, I took a tentative sip from the
glass. It had a strange, bitter tang to it, but it wasn't horrible. The bitterness
was immediately soothed away by something sweet. Berries, if I remembered
correctly.
Devlin had given me the drink himself, so I knew it hadn't been poisoned.
Poisoned. I scoffed at the word. Zack had claimed to have poisoned me at
the fatal dinner, but I was beginning to believe it was the ramblings of an
insane man. At the beginning, I had felt slightly light-headed and had
coughed up blood, but the pain had long since diminished. I felt fine.
Poisoned. Zack had been full of shit all the way to his death.
Or had he?
Denial was a funny thing. You could bury the truth beneath layers upon
layers of sand, but like with any treasure, it would always be uncovered. I,
however, chose to stick my head in the sand, ignoring anything and
everything that might have been contrary to what I believed.
I didn't want to think about Zack or poisons, choosing instead to take
another sip of the sweet liquid.
I wouldn't have put it past the Kings to attempt to off me during this
grand ball in my honor. Poetic justice. Even as I chatted, I kept one eye on
the seven men converged in the center of the room. The Mermaid King had
his arms wrapped around two petite females. One, I recognized as his wife, or
at least one of them, but the second I knew to only be a noble lady. At least
for the time being. There was no question that the Mermaid King coveted her.
The Incubus King was sucking face with an unknown man, and the Shifter,
Vampire, and Genie Kings were deep in conversation. I recognized the thick