Desire in His Blood

The soft raspiness of his voice was growing more pronounced every day. I wanted him to give up his post. I wanted him to relax, but he had refused. I knew that Zaale wouldn’t know what to do with himself if he stepped down at head keeper.

The deed.

“Good,” I grunted. “Mr. Cross has his uses, it seems.”

“Does the Kylaira know?” Zaale asked.

“No,” I said, turning from the window. “She doesn’t.”

He inclined his head in an affirmative nod, his horns, streaked with silver tendrils, glimmering with the high afternoon sun.

“Do you plan to inform her?”

Having the Hara’s estate under my control had always been a part of the plan. Gemma likely hadn’t known that Rye Hara had already lost it. Over a year ago. He’d given the deed to a collector as collateral for a gambling debt.

When he’d first heard of my proposal, the first thing he’d had Mr. Cross amend to the marriage contract was a stipulation for the recovery of the deed. To pay off yet another collector—a toothy Binshay who also dabbled in vessel scrapping—to reclaim it.

But I’d had an amendment of my own, one Rye Hara hadn’t liked.

In the end, it had come down to whether he wished for his deed to be owned by the Binshay…or to be owned by the Kylorr who married his eldest daughter.

As of yesterday, the Hara estate in the Collis of New Everton was mine.

After I’d originally brokered the deal, I’d had malicious thoughts of selling the deed to whatever greedy-palmed, beady-eyed, salivating dealer I could find. The Haras would be kicked out of their own home with nowhere to turn. The estate would be overrun by leeches looking to profit off their belongings. All of New Earth would know their shame because I would ensure that it would be plastered on every inter-Quadrant database and news com network I could find.

And then I would turn the video feed over to War Crimes. Rye Hara would be tried and imprisoned. He’d rot away on a prison planet for the rest of his life, and thinking about that had made venom leak over my tongue, delicious and sweet.

Now there was only one problem.

My wife.

“No,” I finally answered Zaale. “She doesn’t need to know.”

“What should I do with the deed?”

“Put it with the others,” I told him. In our family’s secure network on our Halo. “And have a parchment copy placed in our vault.”

“I will,” Zaale said.

When I returned to my desk, however, I saw him hesitate on the threshold of the room.

“Anything else?” I asked, peering at him closely.

“The alerts you had Setlan set up,” Zaale started.

Setlan was our family’s private ambassador and advisor. If we needed anything done off planet, he would take care of it. It had been him who’d approached Mr. Cross with my proposal, after all.

I straightened as Zaale let out a mighty huff.

“It seems Rye Hara opened up a credits line with a collector on Vrano.”

“Vaan,” I cursed under my breath, dragging a hand over my horn. As if on cue, I heard Gemma’s laugh echo up from the terrace. I had the windows propped open, allowing a warm breeze to blow through my private offices. Every now and again, I’d catch a spare word of my wife and sister’s conversation. A laugh or two, even from my sister, which made a strange tightness in my chest snap and pull. “When?”

“This morning.”

Gemma would be devastated by the news.

When I’d first married her, I would have delighted in that misery. I would have fed on it like blood, lapping it up and feeling it warm me from the inside out. Rye Hara’s desperation—which I now knew was mingled with an addiction—would have felt sublime. Better than sex and more satisfying than a long drink from a blood giver after flying all night.

Now?

Now the a

He will never stop, I thought.

I’d told her as much four nights ago. In the quiet of the records room. Though I’d fed from her every night since—just thinking about her shuddering and gasping last night as I’d fed from her neck, feeling her squirm against me, filled me with sudden and alarming need—we hadn’t returned to the subject of her family. Or her father.

She seemed to believe he could stop.

Or at least a hopeful, optimistic part of her did.

I believed differently.

“Have Setlan stop the deal,” I growled to Zaale. “Immediately. Make sure whoever it is on Vrano knows the Haras’ co

That would be enough to warn any collectors away.

“I’ll alert him now,” Zaale said, studying me with an expression I wasn’t used to. One he often used with Kalia, however, because while he loved her, he could never quite figure her out.

“Send word to Rye Hara too,” I rasped, my fists clenching on the surface of my desk. “Tell him that if he approaches another collector, it will be a breach of his agreement with us. And with his daughter.”

The only piece of the Collis estate that Rye Hara refused to give up was a lake. A disgusting, slime-ridden little lake in the back of the house. But any breach of contract would ensure that I would own that too. My words would be a warning. A reminder that there was still much, much more that I could take.

If I had insinuated that I’d also take out my aggressions and frustrations on his daughter should he anger me?

Well…I’d let him continue to think that.

Fear was a powerful motivator.

There was a buzzing starting up underneath my skin. I took in a deep breath after Zaale departed with a sharp nod. I clenched the edges of my desk, but the frustration wouldn’t leave and there was venom dripping on my tongue.

Now I was restless. Thinking of that useless sack of bones who had ruined himself and his family. Who had torn mine apart.

Raazos.

With a muted curse, I rose and went to the balcony. I opened the wide gate and launched myself into the air, flaring my wings wide, circling down to the terrace. My eyes were locked on Gemma. Another dress today, this one beige in color. Hideous. Again. Even so, each day, the punishing fantasy of slipping whatever ugly dress up around her waist and drinking from her cunt was becoming more and more distracting.

Kalia caught sight of me before my wife did. She narrowed her gaze on me, and I landed with a loud thump behind Gemma. Who gasped and turned, her hand pressed to her chest.

When she saw me, she stilled. Her tongue darted out to swipe at her plump lips, tightening my belly with need. Did she realize that her neck had begun to flush red whenever she saw me? Blood rushing. Preparing. Like her body knew who it belonged to and it was doing whatever it could to please its master.

“Leave us,” I growled at Kalia.

My sister didn’t like that. Even still, she grumbled and rose to her feet. “Just because you’re the Kyzaire, doesn’t mean you can order me around, brother.”

“Kalia,” I bit out, though my eyes had never left Gemma’s. The need for my kyrana’s blood was like an addiction. I needed my next fix. And I needed it now. Yesterday had been the first time I’d drunk from her twice in one day. Today would likely be the same. It was only afternoon.

It would only get worse.

Kalia rolled her eyes. Another human reaction she’d probably picked up in the village, likely from Neela…or even from Gemma.

“You’re even worse than Kythel,” she grumbled, stomping off before she eventually took to the sky, flying around the front of the keep, out of sight.

“Who’s Kythel?” Gemma asked, her voice soft and measured.