9. Lex
9
Lex
W ithin two hours, Ivy and I had rented a charter to Dublin International. This time of night and this late in the game, the only thing available was the most expensive option. The fucking thing had once belonged to the emperor of some small shithole country with a GDP less than my trust fund. Housing four bedrooms, a kitchen, and a main cabin fit to host a goddamned ball, it had obviously cost a small fortune, but what’s an inheritance compared to saving the world, am I right?
We strategized the entire ride to the airport, trying to figure out a countermove to anything we could encounter. Finn and Donnelly were masterminds, and with Siobhan and Carter’s added gut feelings, we had a pretty good plan. It wasn’t a great plan, but what the fuck did I know about bringing down a fairy king?
I’d tried and I’d failed, and I didn’t know what I was talking about anymore.
Sometime around 2 a.m., everyone had gone to their rooms in the back of the plane, determined to get some rest before the final showdown. But I sat on a sofa in the luxurious main cabin, chain-smoking while I stared out at the stars in the vast darkness of space. They twinkled in the clear night sky, almost mocking me.
You thought you could have it all, they said. What a selfish prick.
I kept imagining the scream Ivy’s sister, Abigail, let out when she realized Jon and Kit were gone. I replayed the sound of the king’s smoky tendrils ticking against the glass windows at Mount Vernon, sending shivers through each of my nerve endings. I saw Miri’s tearful gaze when she showed up on our doorstep, frail and broken and terrified. Whatever he’d done to her, it was the last straw.
He’d used our love against us, and for that, I would tear his heart out of his chest while he watched. I didn’t care if the lore said he was immortal. I didn’t care if it would kill the queen. This was the last time he’d fuck with any human whatsoever, and I’d find a way to make sure he knew it. Ivy and I alone had been able to force him out of Mount Vernon. She was right—what could we do when it was the four of us?
I didn’t buy Siobhan’s insistence that there would be a sacrifice. Like the prophecy about Poppy, Siobhan’s banshee instincts were subjective, which meant they couldn’t be trusted. I didn’t believe in divination. I was in charge of my own life, and if I didn’t want there to be a sacrifice, I would make sure there wasn’t. We would all make it out of this, and I would get to have that fantasy future I’d been envisioning since Midsummer four years ago.
Inhaling deeply on my cigarette, I leaned my head back on my shoulders and let out the smoke on a sigh, wishing sleep could claim me as easily as it had my spouses. Things were awkward between us, even if we’d all made our apologies. I guessed that was my fault.
I knew Miri’s separation would cause something terrible to happen. Lo and fucking behold, I was right. Again. Being that far away from us had created a vulnerability for Alberich to sneak through, and not that I blamed her for what he’d done to her, but I was furious she’d put herself in the position for it to happen.
If she’d just come home…if she’d just been with us…
But between me and these four walls, I understood that, too. I took another long drag on the smoke and recalled a younger version of myself, traumatized by a father that wished I’d died instead of my brother. It was easy to push people away because it meant they’d never hurt me. It took me a long time to realize I wasn’t the problem. I imagined it might take Miri just as long.
But wishing for it never changed the past, did it? Not with Miri, and not with Marcus.
An enormous hole opened in my chest where my brother’s memory had scarred over. I thought time traveling with Poppy to see him again was bad enough, but to learn it was Alberich’s fault he’d died in the first place twisted agony through my gut and into my chest. I nearly doubled over from it.
If we hadn’t gone to Killwater, if we hadn’t built the wall of thistles, Marcus might still be alive.
His death is my fault, too.
“Hey,” came a soft voice behind me before a warm palm settled between my shoulder blades. Miri’s springtime scent hit me next, morning frost and daffodils. She sat next to me, pressing her silk-covered chest along my arm so she could snatch my box of cigarettes from my lap and light one for herself.
“Hey.” I turned to face her, tracing the way the moonlight reflected off her cheekbones and forehead. She’d always been so beautiful, one of the loveliest people I’d ever seen.
“I couldn’t sleep either,” she said, wrapping her arms tight around herself. “I close my eyes and I just…” She pressed her lids together, squinting against the monster on the other side. “We need to defeat him, Lex.”
“I know.” I wrapped an arm over her shoulders and pulled her closer, pressing my lips to her temple. “We will.”
“I’m sorry I stayed away so long. You were right.”
“I’m sorry I was angry when you got here.” I shook my head. “I’m sorry for the things I said. I missed you so much. We need you.”
“You were right to be upset.” She stuffed her face into my chest, reminding me of the girl I’d met so many years ago—heartbroken and vulnerable and delicate. “I was an idiot. I knew what would happen if I stayed away. I can’t be surprised that it did.”
“Enough now,” I said, tilting her chin up so she had to look me in the eye. “Can we put the past behind us?”
She nodded and smiled, pushing up so she could kiss me, and I melted into the contact like a starved man. Christ, I didn’t realize how much I’d craved her until she was back in my arms. Carter and I had a yearning that went back nearly a decade, and Ivy and I had only just discovered the burning thing between us. But Miri always felt like home. She was the safe place that remained constant all these years, somewhere to put the most tender side of me, the side no one else knew existed.
Miri brought it out. She made me want to protect her, to shield her from everything else in this world save for my own worst impulses. In a polycule that, admittedly, revolved around my former archnemesis, Miri was the first thing I’d ever claimed as mine. Maybe it made me a ravenous asshole, but part of me still felt that way. Carter got to have his Weeds, and Ivy adored Miri unconditionally, but she and I had seen the worst side of each other and embraced that darkness with no judgment.
“I love you, my prince,” she said against my mouth, running her fingers up my neck and into my hair.
“I love you, my princess.” I nearly groaned when she dragged her nails against my scalp, slamming all my fuck-yeah buttons. Without a second thought, I grabbed the back of her legs and shifted us so I was between them, laying her on the couch. Her ankles twisted behind my lower back, her heels digging into the waistband of my pants to shuck them down. God, how I wanted to give in to her impatience, to shove myself deep inside her and refuel the intimacy between us.
But I didn’t. I cupped her jaw and devoured her mouth, relishing the way our tongues danced together. Her soft little moans had my dick jerking between us, and when I bit my way down her throat to her shoulder, she rocked her hips, brushing her beautiful, warm cunt up against me. I groaned and wilted, licking between her breasts while I stared up at her. I teased the hemline of her nightie, brushing my fingers over the tops of her thighs while I continued my descent.
Her deep honey-brown gaze held me the whole way, her bruised lips parted in that adorable O-shape. I couldn’t help myself; I brushed my hands over her chest and up her neck, tracing one finger over her bottom lip. She sucked it into her warm, wet mouth, rolling her tongue around it the way she used to do to my dick.
Fuck.
“Tell me I can touch you.” My balls clenched and I couldn’t restrain myself anymore, tracing soft circles over her thighs with my thumbs. Even if all we did was kiss, that would be enough for me. I just wanted her, any way she’d let me have her.
She nodded, but her eyes shifted away, so I grabbed her chin, forcing her to look back at me.
“Tell me.” I gave her a slow kiss. “Use your words, Princess. You know I love to hear how much you want me.”
A soft chuckle greeted me before she smiled and darted her tongue out to brush against my mouth, reigniting that old flame in my heart. “Touch me, Lex. Please. I’ve missed you so much.”
Fuck. Yeah.
I pushed her silk dress up and clamped my fingers on her knees, coaxing her legs farther apart. But then we both froze as my gaze dropped to the violet lines on the insides of her thighs, scars she’d carved into herself as a way to cope with the mental barrier in her memories. She tried to put a hand over them, but I shoved that away, taking my time to run my fingertips over each one.
My beautiful princess had survived, no matter what that monster had put her through. She was here, in front of me, and I’d been so ravenous for her all this time that I wouldn’t let her hide anything from me, not anymore.
We couldn’t go on like we had, all solitary schemes and plots. We needed to be open from here on out. And I wanted to make sure she really understood that.