Chapter 31
“Will you keep your beard trimmed, Leyl?” Hanna asked.
The scruffy man seated alone on the opposite side of the dining table continued to gape at me.
I hid my smile by slurping some tea.
Beside me, Hanna tapped her fingers on the table. “It’s a simple question.”
“Y-yes.” Leyl’s vigorous nodding wobbled his cheeks, which had lost their color as soon as he’d been escorted into the room. He finally tore his eyes off me. “Of course I shall keep it trimmed.”
Hanna moved on to her next question. “You say that you handle stress well, but can you handle working for two of the most self-centered vampires this palace has ever seen?”
Nearly choking on my tea, I set the cup in the saucer with a loud clink.
“This isle, really,” amended Hanna.
Brey lowered the latest Nightly Newsprint to the table. “Not only is that a disgraceful exaggeration, it’s also a highly unnecessary question.”
“It is necessary,” Hanna said without removing her narrowed gaze from the human she was interrogating. “Because it is not an exaggeration.”
“So we can be a little bit messy,” I said. “It’s not as if we’re hiring this creature to clean.” I paused. “Though, we probably should.” I peered over at the ghost seated on Hanna’s other side. “Given someone’s evident lack of care.”
Groth straightened like a pin. “I’ll have you know, my queen, that I happen to be a steward and I—”
Hanna spoke over him. “We’re talking about your personalities, not your laziness.”
“One could argue that’s part of one’s personality,” Brey drawled.
I smirked. “One could.”
Brey took my hand and brought it to his mouth. With thinning pupils, he eyed our guest as he rubbed my hand across his lips. “What say you, Leyl?” A dark brow rose. “Do you think we’re too self-centered for you?”
“Absolutely not.” Shaking his head, Leyl grimaced. “I mean, you do not seem self-centered at all, my king.”
“Lies will get you nowhere, Leyl,” Hanna warned.
“Indeed.” Brey kissed my hand before saying, “Be as candid as you wish, Leyl.”
I nodded. “Go on, Leyl.”
Hanna groaned.
Leyl’s skin turned a strange shade of gray. Hands shaking, he patted his plaid dress coat. “I fear I have forgotten something. References,” he said. “You must want references.” He stood with such haste that his chair fell back and clattered to the floor. “Excuse me.”
Halfway across the room, Leyl stopped. He jerked his plaid-bedecked body toward us twice in what I surmised was a quick attempt at bowing. Then he hurried toward the doors.
And halted.
Ovan crossed his arms and raised a brow. “Leaving so soon?”
“I’ll return shortly.”
“I’m sure.” The captain stepped aside, but gnashed his teeth at Leyl as he passed.
Poor Leyl jumped and shouted in fright, falling into the hall. Ovan chuckled as the man stumbled while trying to get to his feet.
Yet Hanna had the gall to look at me and Brey and say, “You two are truly awful.”
“Us?” I guffawed. “Please.” I stroked Brey’s chin before taking my hand back. “You didn’t like him anyway.”
“In fact,” Brey said. “You haven’t liked any of the twenty souls you’ve interrogated.”
Exactly.
This was the second time Hanna had conducted what she called interviews. After the first round, I’d thought she’d leave us out of her quest to find help in the kitchen. Apparently, since we would be the ones paying them, we should at least pretend to care.
“Interrogated?” When Brey and I just shrugged, Hanna looked at Groth and Ovan. “I haven’t interrogated them.” She frowned. “Have I?”
“Not at all,” Groth said.
At the same time, Ovan said, “You have.”
I pressed my lips between my teeth to keep from laughing. Hanna noticed, and she intentionally knocked my arm as I reached for my tea. My hand bumped the cup, tea splashing my fingers.
I scowled and flicked them at her. “Petulant pest.”
Wiping tea from her cheek, she muttered, “Self-absorbed interrogation ruiner.”
Brey huffed.
I shot him a glare that made him lift the Nightly Newsprint over his face.
Hanna pushed to her feet. “I officially give up.”
“Thank goddess.” I stood, too. “It was getting tiresome.”
“Really?” Hanna placed her hands on her hips. “You think this is tiresome?”
Brey warned, “I wouldn’t answer that, darling.”
But of course I did. “It’s so boring, I could die.” Collecting some of Hanna’s brown hair, I twirled it around my finger. “Besides, you don’t need someone right now. So take a break for a moon.” I released her hair and smiled. “Or two.”
Her ire wavered, and she blew out a breath. “I refuse to do another event alone. The very thought makes me feel ill.”
“We don’t have any planned,” I said.
“That can change at a moment’s notice with you two.”
“If it does, then we will help you.”
Hanna’s eyes bulged, then narrowed. “You’re the queen, Ethel.”
“That never stops you from being grotesquely rude to me.” I lifted my brows. “Why should it stop you from accepting my help?”
“Perhaps we can all help,” Groth said, and looked at Brey with a hopeful smile. “Majesty?”
Brey realized he was being spoken to and lowered the newsprint. Brows furrowed, he asked, “Help with what, exactly?”
The ghost visibly deflated.
“Preparing for events,” I told him.
“Oh.” Appearing to ponder it, Brey pursed his lips. Then he raised the newsprint again. “I’d rather not.”
Hanna sighed.
I walked behind my husband’s chair and slid my hands down his chest until my mouth met his jaw. I kissed it, then whispered, “Just tell them you will so we can go do something that’s far from boring.”
Instantly, Brey set the newsprint down and said, “I will.” He stood and took my hand.
As we headed toward the doors, Hanna asked, “Will what?”
“Help, I assume,” Groth said.
Ovan marched out of the dining room ahead of us, armor clanking and muttering something about another colossal waste of his time.
I yanked Brey to a stop to carefully straighten a crooked portrait. Satisfied, I smiled and let him tug me down the hall adorned with plenty more of them. Ensuring every painting of me in this palace remained straight and dust-free was a tedious task.
But one I was happy to do.
Brey crossed the sitting room with a decanter of wine and one glass. “Hanna feels guilty for wasting half of our evening again.”
“She does not.” I gave my best impression of Hanna’s voice as I said, “We are vampires.”
Brey’s chuckle distracted as I tried to refocus on my book, and he settled beside the divan before the painting he’d yet to finish.
Pouring wine into the glass, he said, “She’s making lemon cakes.”
That made me lower the book to my stomach. “No.”
“Yes.”
Maybe she did feel guilty. Hanna rarely made us treats. Certainly not our favorite—unless Brey spent ten minutes charming her to pieces. Time he could spend making them himself, he’d explained, when I’d asked why he didn’t.
I sat up to accept the glass of wine he offered. Before my fingers could touch it, he took it away. “Allow me.”
“That might be a little difficult when you’re sitting on the floor.”
He gestured to the paint-spotted carpet with the wine, then sipped it. “So join me.”
I sighed as if put out. But rather than sit beside him, I slid from the velvet seat straight onto his lap. Smirking, I ran my hands down his silk shirt. “This is what you meant, yes?”
“Precisely what I meant.” He shifted until we were both comfortable, my legs around his waist, then brought the wineglass to my lips. “Now drink.”
I did, and let some leak from my mouth.
Brey’s eyes tracked the wine’s journey over my chin and down my neck. “Clumsy thing. Here.” He set the glass down, then moved my hair out of the way—only to wrap it around his hand and tug. “Let me help you with that.”
My head was tilted back by my hair.
He buried his face in my cleavage. He groaned, then his tongue followed the sticky trail of wine up my throat to my mouth. “There,” he murmured, “much better.”
“Much,” I concurred, my eyes catching his when he loosened his grip on my hair.
“Mm.” He nipped my upper lip before kissing it. “I think it’s time we had a little chat.”
My brows rose. “What sort of chat?”
“Well, you see…” With feigned seriousness, he said, “It’s become abundantly clear that you’ve been keeping something from me. Something very important.”
“I have?” I asked, intentionally breathy.
“You have.”
“Are you upset?”
“Immensely.”
Nerves and excitement tightened my stomach. “Are we fighting?” I looped my arms around his neck. “Please tell me we’re finally fighting.”
He understood why I wouldn’t mind it, and his gaze turned dark and drowsy. “I think we are.” Anticipation flooded me with heady warmth when he swept his lips over my cheek to murmur near my ear, “And I think you know why.”
I did know why.
After we’d returned from my mother’s estate, he’d lasted a week before I began to see it—the hope in his eyes whenever he told me he loved me.
“I was going to make you wait.”
“Oh?” Easing back to meet my eyes, he asked, “How long, exactly?”
Pretending to ponder it, I toyed with a piece of his silken hair and tilted my head. “About two more moons.”
He tensed. “Revenge.”
I smiled. “The sweetest.”
“Wicked woman.”
I kissed him softly, and whispered, “I believe you mean insidious.”
“Insidiously perfect.”
Smiling, I poked his nose. “I rather like that, actually.”
“Do you know what I will like?” he drawled quietly. “What I will love, actually?”
I laughed.
He was quick to smother it with his mouth—kissing me so hard, my breath caught, and I moaned. His mouth left mine to adorn my cheeks and chin and neck in kisses. Winding my hair tight around his hand, he used it to turn and tilt my head.
His other hand lifted my skirts, and a low groan warmed my collarbone when he discovered I was still bare. I moved back to give him room, and he wasted no time. His finger slid through me and straight into my body.
I gasped.
Again, he groaned and withdrew his finger. “You make me insatiably ravenous.” Briefly, he sucked his finger. He then released my hair to free himself from his pants. “Get on my cock this instant.”
“Gladly.” I rose to my knees and stroked his cock before placing it at my entrance. I sank down, my legs curling around his waist to push him deliriously deep.
Brey’s hands snuck beneath my skirts to grip my ass and grind me against him. Pleasure swarmed. My hips rocked, chasing it, and my head tipped. His hold on my ass turned bruising, then he stilled me.
Teeth grazed my neck with his throaty command. “Say it.”
Desperate to move, to alleviate the ache that gathered force, I whined, “Brey.”
He dragged his mouth over my jaw and cheek. At my ear, he gritted, “Say it, lethal.”
Swallowing thickly, I fought a smile as I asked, “Say what?”
He leaned back to see my eyes. His own darkened as his pupils spread. A sinister smile hitched one side of his lips. Then he lowered his head to my throat. He licked it once before plunging his fangs into my flesh. At the same time, he finally moved me over him.
Rapture barreled through my body, my very veins, to pulse between my legs. It shortened my breath. My nails scraped his shoulder and his nape. My legs shook.
I rocked and gasped.
But right before I unraveled, Brey used my ass to force me to still again. Save for the throbbing pleasure, everything stilled.
He licked the punctures in my throat. A purr thickened his voice. “Say it.”
My moan was almost a growl as I tried ceaselessly to move. “Brey, please.”
Clasping the side of my neck, he pressed his forehead to mine. The words were pushed through his teeth. “Say it.”
Beyond frustrated, I did.
I let what he already knew escape in a rush between my panted breaths. “I love you.”
His features fell lax.
With a tormented groan, his head dropped to my shoulder.
Chest heaving, I frowned.
But when he didn’t resume, nor lift his head, that love had me holding him close and stroking his hair until he expelled a rough exhale.
Then I made him look at me.
My chest pinched as I swept his hair from his cheeks and cupped them. As he looked at me with a soft smile. I kissed that smile. Once, twice. Before I could do it a third time, he grabbed my face and kissed me while I moved atop him.
When my orgasm tore through me, his nose brushed mine. “Again.”
“I love you,” I rasped.
He smiled against my mouth. “I love you too, lethal.”