Total pages in book: 109
Estimated words: 104842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 524(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 349(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 104842 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 524(@200wpm)___ 419(@250wpm)___ 349(@300wpm)
Cirillo nodded, his gaze sweeping over Varic like he’d never seen him before. I wondered how much he’d changed in the time they’d been apart.
“Decimus may feel that Leda was taken from him unjustly, but first of all, she was never his mate, as she was not from a noble house and could not be elevated to that station. Second, Leda was never truly his, as she was my mother’s courtier, and therefore my father was not within his rights to grant her service to another.”
“Yes,” Isabella agreed.
“Third, Leda, as far as I know, never assented in all her years in Ophir, to becoming a courtesan.”
“No, she did not,” Isabella said softly.
“I have to wonder,” Varic began, “why Decimus mistreated someone he claimed to have been so enamored with, but honestly, it’s not my concern. My grandfather promising his brother a mate is not a debt I will honor, as it was never within his right to give. Mating is completely dependent on another person’s will and agreement. That such a ridiculous debt was ever put into place, and then honored, is beyond reason.”
Phrased like that, I had to wonder why Messina didn’t stop the madness even before Decimus demanded Isabella of him.
“Ødger believes that as Lord of Ophir, he can not only expect payment from my father, but demand my consort as well.” He glanced around the room. “It’s madness, and now, of course, he will reap the reward of asking for such a gift as my consort.”
No one said a word. We were all waiting for what he was going to say next.
“I am now going to go to Ophir, with my consort, my rekkr, and my rajan, with all my guard, and we’re going to bring that holding into my realm. I expect the support of the council in this endeavor,” he finished, glancing at his aunt.
“Of course,” Sabira affirmed. “We’ve all thought it was madness that Ophir was beyond the laws of Ascalon. Decimus himself is the man’s son, after all.”
“Many have been jealous of Decimus, I know,” Varic told her. “When he was at court, our granduncle would regale Cassius and me with stories of the debauchery he allowed in his home. He was always surprised when we both declined his invitations to visit.”
“I was never surprised,” Isabella said, smiling at him. “I know my sons.”
Varic chuckled. “You might be too softhearted to be the consort of a king.”
She tipped her head at him. “Perhaps.”
Everyone left us then, Isabella taking Cirillo’s arm, telling him she would find him a room in her wing. I didn’t miss that he turned at the rolling door and glanced back at Varic, before Hadrian rolled it shut after him.
“I think he liked the new you,” I told Varic as he stepped in close and caught my chin in his hand.
“If you left me in the middle of the night, I would hunt you to the ends of the earth,” he said gruffly. “There is the difference between you and Lord Cirillo.”
“You love me,” I said before kissing him, smiling against his mouth.
“You are my very heart,” he murmured when he eased back, turning my head, exposing my neck. I felt his warm breath there before his fangs. “There will never be another.”
“I know,” I whispered, my hands on his chest, clutching his dress shirt. “Varic. Please. I missed you.”
No more words needed, his mouth closed over my skin, and he bit down. Hard.
There was a jolt of pain because we’d been separated for so long and the bite wasn’t tender, as it normally was. He was ravenous for me, and I knew that as soon as he took the first swallow.
When he drank my blood, I could almost read his mind. I could feel his hunger for me, for my heart, soul, and body. It was my blood running into him, and all of his that he’d given me over the course of me becoming his consort, that gave me an insight into him no one else could claim to have. It happened because all the blood in my veins belonged to him.
The arousal was instant, heat building like a brushfire rushing through me, and I could feel it in the pounding of my heart, my jumping pulse, and the goose bumps covering me from head to toe. I was hot, inside and out, and couldn’t control the catch and release of my breath.
He drank deeply, one hand moving over my chest and down across my abdomen, then under my T-shirt, the other on my ass, groping. When he squeezed, I bucked forward against him as he pressed his thigh between my parted legs.
My moan sounded strangled to my own ears, up from my gut, and I husked out his name like a prayer.
His tongue licked decadently, lewdly over the bite, once, then again, before he frantically found my lips, the mauling kiss exactly what I craved.