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How I hadn’t, unless I hadn’t been able to when I was the one emitting a silent threat, I didn’t know.
Dade set down his glass, already just a long sip from being emptied. “I suppose the visit to Olivia
I guffawed, lifting my glass to gulp two much-needed mouthfuls, and nearly moaned. “Shit,” I breathed, lowering it and staring at what remained. “This is delicious.”
“I thought you might like it.”
“And you can bed whomever you like,” I blurted, unsure why but knowing I didn’t want him thinking I cared more than I was willing to let on. “Most kings do.”
Dade’s upper lip curled, fingers clenching around the stem of his glass. “You dare insult me?”
“How have I insulted you?”
“Honest answer?” he said to which I nodded. “By suggesting that I would bed someone else, especially when we both know what we know…” He let his words trail off, and I was tempted to put voice to what he hadn’t said, so that perhaps others could know the king wasn’t the bed-hopping animal most believed him to be.
Of course, I couldn’t. A better, more cu
A better princess would have stuck an iron-infused knife through his heart and ended this insanity already.
“Why?” I finally asked what I’d longed to, still not entirely sure I believed him. The way he’d touched me, kissed me, tortured me all said it couldn’t be true. Yet the rational part of my brain said otherwise. That it was instinctual, a desire so wild, our inexperience in matters of lust and sex had no room to breathe. To exist at all.
Knowing exactly what I was referring to, Dade tortured me some more with a knowing gleam in his eyes, seeming to mull over my question. Noting my growing impatience, he rubbed his lips between his teeth, then exhaled a loaded breath. “It’s a distraction, swan.” He swallowed, his lashes dipping with his simmering eyes to my mouth. “I know that now more than ever.”
Something began to fizz inside my chest, my blood, at hearing that clipped admission. That I was a distraction, yet here he was, this almighty king, just allowing it…
I coughed, asking low with my words lumping together, “So you mean to tell me that you refused any offers?”
“Offers?” he said, humor soaking the word. “Most are too terrified to so much as try, and those who dared were only interested in my”—his nose scrunched a little—“many titles, I suppose.”
“Oh,” I exhaled, slouching in the chair. “Okay then.”
He stared, unblinking and still quietly bristling.
I bit my lip to keep from smiling. “If you’re waiting for an apology, you will be waiting for all eternity.”
He snorted, draining his wine and thumping the glass onto the table. He leaned forward, voice soft and eyes hard. “What I’m still waiting for is that kiss.”
I raised a brow. “Why don’t you skip around the corner to Olivia
“I do not skip.” Dade’s brow furrowed, and he sat back, studying me for a moment. His eyes swept up and down my frame, and I looked away as he said, “Our friendship truly bothers you.”
I stared out the window, watching a flock of birds fly below the moon. My bones itched with the desire to do the same. “If that’s what you wish to call it.”
Dade was quiet a moment, then he hummed. “She is extremely pleasant on the eyes, and she curses like no warrior I’ve ever battled with.”
My hands fisted. I brought them under the table. “That’s lovely.”
He said thoughtfully, “She is lovely, yes. Though I do wish she hadn’t cut her hair. It was much better before. You see, she could bend down before me and undo my pants without one of those ringlets bouncing up—
“Shut up,” I hissed, standing so quickly the chair screeched across the floor.
Dade gazed up at me, one arm slung over the back of the chair, a finger lazily rubbing at the bristle beneath his bottom lip. “Something the matter, swan?”
“You,” I whispered heatedly. “You’re the fucking matter. I ca
He gri
I growled, and he laughed, raising his hands. “But of course, your majesty. Lead the way.”
My teeth glued together as I did my best not to stomp down the stairs, rage a fire burning each breath as I ignored the few patrons brave enough to remain and hurried outside to the carriage.
“Insufferable beast,” I muttered, letting myself inside before he could manhandle me.
“Beast?” he asked, climbing in after me and making sure his giant body nearly squashed mine as he stuffed himself on the other side. “I thought you golden ones were the creative type.”
“You could’ve gotten in on the other side,” I huffed, snatching back the skirts of my dress he’d sat upon. I gave up when I thought it would tear and stuck my nose to the window, pleading for the night air to cool me down before I did something foolish, like smack the king of wolves across his smugly handsome face.
“Where’s the fun in that?”
I swallowed a myriad of colorful curses. My a
The savage laughed, sudden and sharp enough to still the air in my lungs. “Fuck, stop it.” I glared at him, then squeaked as I was hefted into his lap, the carriage jostled. “I was only messing around. I meant none of it.”
My glare was erased by a blink. “None?”
The humor faded from his face. Those taut cheekbones lowered with his softening smile, his touch cruel in the way it so gently curled a thick tendril of hair behind my ear.
His gaze followed, his finger then falling down my arm with deliberate slowness as his eyes met mine. “None at all. Olivia
She was young then, as suspected, but not so young that she would take advantage of a king to better her life when she knew the bargain she’d struck was already more than she’d have ever dared hope for.
The same could never be said for myself, and for that, I almost envied her. Not only for her freedom to create for a living, to live a life of her own and on her own, but because I felt like half the female she was, knowing I was every inch the opportunist I had almost believed her to be.
I hated it, wanted to hate everyone so that I could quit hating myself whenever he touched me, looked at me, so much as came near me, though surely, I couldn’t hate it forever.
I had to have faith that maybe one day, I would be okay with taking advantage of this mateship, of this beast king and his desire for me. The salvation of so many was worth the ruination of one soul.
“What are you thinking?” Dade murmured, his hand framing my face to keep my eyes upon his. They were searching, patient and impatient at the same time. I had a feeling that feat was not common for this male.
“Why would you do that?” I whispered. “Say all of that? Especially when you’d just insisted you had never done anything of the sort.”
Dade hummed, his thumb rubbing over my cheek, eyes trailing as it landed upon my lips. “You should know by now that I love to watch things squirm,” he purred, and my lips parted instinctually, the hardness I’d tried to ignore but now could not twitching beneath me. “I love to watch you squirm the most, especially when it’s over me.”