Let Me Win You (Seven Horny Sins #2)

Chapter 7

7

Invi

T hey took her from me.

I never trusted my mother or sisters much, but I didn’t expect such a betrayal even from them. They took my Nicole, locked her away, and put wards all around the teahouse, so I couldn’t see or speak with her again.

“Ugrrh!” I roared, fisting my hands in my hair.

The sting at the roots did little to distract me from the inferno of rage and pain that burned through my insides as I restlessly moved in circles under the willow tree by my house.

I couldn’t stay here. But I had nowhere to go for help. Ever since we had grown, Mother held little power over us. But she gained the upper hand in one thing that mattered the most to me—she took my Nicole away from me. And now I had no chance to clear things between us.

All I wanted was to spend a peaceful day with Nic, for us to get to know each other a little better. As she snored softly, snuggled warmly against my chest, I realized I had no strength and no desire to part from her ever again.

Then that pathetic human man knocked on the door of her hotel room, and I panicked that he might be a man who meant something to Nicole. That I might be too late. That she couldn’t be mine.

So, I brought her here, where I thought she’d be safe.

“Fuck!” I pressed my feverish forehead to the willow’s cool trunk, leaving indentation of my horns in its soft bark.

“You have always been so restless, even as a child,” suddenly came from behind me.

“Mother.” I pivoted around to face the woman who gave me birth and had mostly been the bane of my existence ever since. “Did you come here to gloat?”

I gripped the willow trunk, digging my nails into the bark, lest I punch my own mother for what she’d done.

“How little you think of me.” Lifting her multi-colored skirts, she gingerly stepped over my tail that stretched between us. “So, this is how you live?” She turned around, taking in the outside of my dwelling.

I built my house without walls because I enjoyed seeing the greenery of the wetlands and hearing the birds’ songs in the morning. Dragonflies and butterflies fluttered under my roof freely. The patches of the fragrant lilies stretched all the way to my threshold, filling my place with their sweet scent.

I’d hoped Nicole would love it here, but she’d run away in horror…

The memory of that morning brought nothing but rage and heartache.

“What do you want?” I snapped at Mother, grinding my teeth.

She ignored my harsh tone, sliding her gaze over the chairs and table that I had set up in anticipation of having breakfast with Nicole. The basket from the teahouse still lay by the creek where I had dropped it, but the ducks had long eaten the pastries that were in it.

“The chairs are a cute touch.” Mother pulled one away from the table and took a seat, uninvited. “Considering that you don’t sit in chairs.” She waved a hand at my tail.

I coiled the lower part of my body, positioning myself at the table across from her. She was right. Normally, I didn’t need a chair. But I’d planned to shift into a more familiar shape for Nicole—into a man of a human size, with legs. I never intended for her to see me in my natural form as a horned, slithering monster.

My mistake was taking the creek from the teahouse where I got the pastries for our breakfast. I had no time to bake any myself, especially after a brief but intense conversation with Avar about the stolen ring. He’d found me shortly after my return to Purgatory, and our conversation ended with a few solid punches exchanged between us after he’d run out of all the strong words he had for me.

With my tail, I could move much faster through the water than walking on legs, and I didn’t want to leave Nicole alone for too long. I had planned to take the more human form before coming up to the bedroom to see her. Unfortunately, she woke up before I reached the house, and she saw me at my worst.

And now… I had no idea how to fix this mess.

“All right, Mother.” I placed my hands on the table. “In the many centuries that I’ve been living here, this is the first time you’ve ever visited. And you couldn’t have chosen a worse time. I have no patience and no desire to entertain someone who keeps my woman away from me, even if they’re related to me.”

Anger boiled in me. I fisted my hands on the table, struggling to contain it.

“No need to be so curt, my son.” She tossed her long, wavy hair over her shoulder and covered my right fist with her hand, matching my shade of green.

The urge to tell her to leave burned through me.

“How is Nic?” I asked instead, starving for any crumbs of news about her.

Was she angry with me? She must be. Was she disgusted by my monstrous appearance? By the way she screamed and ran, she most likely was.

“Has she…” I swallowed around the hard lump of worry lodged in my throat. “Is she alright? Has she calmed down?”

“Oh, Invi,” Mother signed. “You’ve been around for thousands of years and still have no idea how to woo a woman.”

I thought I knew. I thought I had it all under control, but it all had exploded in the most spectacular and devastating fashion.

“Fuck.” I dropped my head into my hands.

“You don’t know shit about human women, do you?” Mother poked right into my open wound of shame and regret.

“Language, Mother,” I scolded, mechanically.

“Oh, don’t be a prude.” She waved me off. “You’re not your sisters.” She patted my hand again. “And there is no need to beat yourself up over a mistake. We all make them. Even the highest of the deities aren’t perfect. You obviously care about that girl, and I didn’t come here to gloat about your misery. I came to offer a solution.”

“A solution?”

That spiked my attention but raised some doubts too. Mother wasn’t exactly known for solving problems. She was, however, infamous for creating them.

“You see, some of your brothers have expressed an interest in acquiring a human, too, now.”

“Who?” I snarled. The thought of any of my brothers coming anywhere near Nicole made me sick to my stomach. At the same time, my fists itched to punch something.

“Does it matter who?” Mother shrugged nonchalantly. “The important thing is that you want to have her all to yourself, don’t you?”

“I thought I made it clear,” I gritted through my teeth. “Nicole is mine and only mine.”

“Why do you like her so much?”

I didn’t need to think long to answer that.

“She makes me happy. I like what I feel when I’m with her. If Avar can have a woman like that, then why can’t I have one too?”

“Oh, Invi. In so many ways, you’re still a little boy, always trying to one up your brothers. Well, you can have a chance to do so and claim your woman too.”

“What do you mean? How?”

It sounded tempting, so tempting. Anticipation ran down my body, making the rattle on the tip of my tail vibrate.

Mother smiled at the faint rattling sound.

“Why don’t we do a little race?” she murmured. “The winner will get the girl. Just think about it. You can win her fair and square. Then no one would question your right to be with her.”

“ Win her? Like a prize in the race?”

A rush of thrill rippled through my entire being.

To win Nicole, in front of everyone.

To prove to the entire world that we belonged together.

To claim her as mine, fully and completely, so that no one could ever take her away from me.

It’d be fantastic, except that…

“Nicole would never agree to that,” I said.

“Why not? Throughout human history, women have often been won, bought, sold, and traded as one of humanity’s biggest treasures or…” Mother wagged her hand in the air, “not so big ones too. Anyway, wouldn’t she find it flattering that the mighty mortal sins want to compete for her?”

Unease crawled up my back. Would Nicole feel that way? Sadly, I didn’t know her well enough to adamantly deny the notion.

“But she is so much more than just a prize to be won,” I replied.

Mother shrugged with a sigh of regret. “What a pity. It seems like a win-win solution to me.”

Hope was slipping through my fingers like water between the rocks in the creek. I leaned forward in the desperate attempt to hold on to it.

“Please, Mother, let me speak to her. Lift the wards. Let me see her.”

“What for? Do you think you can talk her into agreeing to become the prize in our little competition?”

I exhaled a humorless laugh. “First, I’m afraid, I’d have to find a way to convince her that being with me is the prize worth winning.”

“Sadly, it’d be of no use. The girl doesn’t want to speak with you. She’s terrified of you.” Mother shook her head with a mournful expression. “How could you have fucked it up so badly, sweetie? Despite your hermit ways and gloomy disposition, I always believed there was a charming streak in you, an ability to handle delicate matters with forethought and finesse. What were you thinking, bringing her here, then spooking her away like that?”

The problem was that at some point while being with Nicole, I had stopped thinking. I simply felt . And it was marvelous.

I missed that feeling so badly. I missed having her close again.

“Well,” Mother said. “I should go. Gul is coming for tea this afternoon.”

“Gul is coming to the teahouse?” I leaned on the table so hard, one of its legs cracked.

“Oops.” Mother jumped to her feet and away from the broken table as it collapsed. “You need sturdier furniture, Invi.” She brushed down her skirts that slowly turned turquoise as she finally snapped out of her prolonged green phase. “I’ll say hi to Gul from you, since you can’t be there yourself, with the wards and the human girl staying at the teahouse now. I hope she’ll like the cannelloni that Gul is bringing to tea. I don’t care much for food, but humans love those things. And I mean, you know your brother. Everybody loves Gul.”

As I watched Mother leave through my forest and toward Gul’s sunflower fields, I couldn’t help my concerns.

Mother was right about one thing for sure.

Everybody loved Gul.

All my brothers got along well with him. Every single soul that had ever passed through Purgatory enjoyed his company. Even my sisters tolerated him better than any one of us. Though he had some friction with Temperance every now and then.

And now Gul, my most insufferably lovable brother, was spending this afternoon with my Nicole.

My Nicole , who wished nothing to do with me.

And all I could do about it was just to circle the teahouse from the closest distance that Mother’s wards would allow me to approach.

A tortured groan erupted from my chest. Enraged, I whipped with my tail so hard, it tossed the broken table against the long- suffering willow tree. I wished I could slam it against Gul’s thick skull graced with a pair of ram horns.

I had planned my trip to Nicole’s world for weeks. I’d snatched a cupful of transcendence potion on one rare occasion when Avar forgot to lock it up. I’d swiped his magical moonstone ring at the first opportunity, fully prepared to face his wrath upon my return to Purgatory.

Against all odds, I managed to find the woman I could see myself happily spending the centuries to come.

And it felt like I’d lost her already.

No amount of rage or self-loathing would bring Nicole back into my arms now. No matter how many of my brothers I punched or how many tables I broke, it won’t help me win her over.

Only this wasn’t about my brothers and not even about my feelings. It was about Nicole and what she felt for me. And right now, she hated me. For a very good reason too.

But maybe, just maybe I could try and change that?

This was a delicate matter, like Mother had said. I’d fucked it up badly already. If there was any chance to fix it, I had to handle it with forethought and finesse from now on.