Chapter 7 – Bellamy
BELLAMY
Irace down the hall as fast as my feet can go when I hear yet another scream from the girls.
Adrenaline courses through my veins, my heart hammering in my chest, and I round the corner and shoot straight for their door.
Without hesitation I plow through it, practically slamming straight into Phaedra.
“Girls! Are you okay? What’s going on?” My head whips around the room, but other than a bit of a mess and a knocked-over desk chair, I don’t see anyone or anything that’s a visible threat.
“Yes,” Sabrina says quickly, almost too quickly. “We’re absolutely fine. We were…um. Fighting.”
“Fighting?” I question incredulously, the word almost foreign on my tongue. These girls rarely, if ever, fight. “No, no way. I heard screaming.”
“Yes. Uh…Sabrina was being mean.”
“I was not!” she shrieks, only Phaedra is giving her a meaningful look that makes her blanch. “Oh. Right. I was being mean. Everything is better now. Can you go see if Papa is home yet? When’s dinner? I’m starving.”
They start to push me—actually, physically push me—toward the door. I twist away from them and hold up my hand. “Nuh-uh. What’s going on? You’ve been acting strange since the festival.”
That’s when I hear a loud chattering sound and my eyes bulge out of my head.
“What the fu—heck is that?” I quickly correct my near f-bomb slip, but yeah, what the fuck is that? Both girls are staring at me with wide, innocent eyes.
“What? I didn’t hear anything.”
I glare at Sabrina. “Do not play me for a fool. What was that noise?”
Two sets of fingers point toward Sabrina’s bed. “It’s under there.”
“It?! What is it?”
“He’s just a little afraid,” Phaedra promises. “But he’s very sweet and we want to keep him.”
Oh, shit.
“What is it? Please tell me now because my mind is going in all kinds of directions.”
They each shift their weight, staring at one another as they deliberate, and I decide I can’t wait for them to tell me. Lowering myself to my hands and knees, I tilt my head and peer under Sabrina’s bed only to be met by two glowing eyes.
“Tell me that’s not a cat or a squirrel.” Because I’m allergic as fuck to cat dander. Do squirrels’ eyes glow? No clue. It’s too big to be a rat, I hope. A possum? A fucking raccoon? “What is it?”
“It’s a ferret,” Sabrina admits.
I turn my head and peer dubiously at the girls.
“A ferret?” The words shred sharply past my lips.
“Where on God’s green earth did you find a ferret?
And how did you get it in this palace without anyone knowing?
” I might in fact be the worst mother and guardian on earth for not discovering this sooner. Sebastian is going to be piiiissed.
I turn back to the poor, scared little thing cowering against the wall in the darkest corner beneath the bed.
“We found him—or her, we’re not sure which yet—sleeping all alone on a pile of pine leaves on the edge of the fence line of the festival.”
“So you took it?” I question shrilly.
“It was shivering!” Phaedra cries out in defense. “It would have died if we hadn’t saved it. It’s only a baby.”
“How do you know that? It’s not like it can tell you how old it is.”
Both girls immediately start bawling. And what the fuck do I do with that?
“He’s so small!” Sabrina wails. “We love him. Please don’t tell Papa.”
“Don’t tell your papa? Are you kidding me? Of course, I have to tell him.” And he’s going to be supersonically furious. He already didn’t want us to go to that festival and now they brought home a freaking ferret without my even knowing it.
“We want a pet.”
“Sabrina, don’t you think that’s a conversation you have with us before you actually bring one home? How do you know this rodent doesn’t have diseases?”
More tears, and I sit back on my haunches, feeling a little bad, but hell, this is going to be a mess and a battle for sure. And right on cue, the door bursts open, and in walks Sebastian, his glacial eyes all over the place before they soften when he sees his daughters.
“I heard crying. Que s’est-il passé? What happened?” Large hands cup both their faces, wiping their tears. Only now neither girl is speaking. Their pleading eyes are both on me.
Great. Nothing like being the messenger to this.
“The girls brought home a…pet from the festival.”
“A pet?” he parrots, his brow dancing. “What sort of…pet are we talking about?” There is no mistaking the displeasure in his voice as he utters the word pet.
I’m with him on this one, but honestly not enough to break the girls’ hearts over it.
I’ll admit, I know nothing of ferrets, but they are pets in America, so how much trouble can they be?
I sigh. “Come see for yourself. He’s under Sabrina’s bed, and before you start in on me, I’m just discovering the thing myself.”
“And how did they sneak in a pet without you knowing about it?”
“No clue. And that’s no lie.”
“You obviously missed something.”
“Obviously,” I toss back at him mockingly.
He rolls his eyes at me, which for some reason makes me smirk. That’s so my move.
“He was sleeping,” Phaedra informs us. “I placed him in my backpack.”
Sebastian’s scorn at all of this is palpable, even as he crouches down on the floor beside me and peers under the bed.
“What in the fu—udge is that?”
“Yeah. That was almost my exact reaction. Same near word drop and all.”
“I’m not amused.”
I give him a look, my eyebrows shooting up. “And you think I am?”
“I don’t know. Perhaps. You are smiling.”
“It’s just how I react to things,” I snap defensively. “I mean, the girls smuggled an animal into the palace and now the poor, scared thing is hiding under the bed. It’s not funny, it’s just, you know, off, I guess.”
“Off? It’s certainly that. What is it?”
“A ferret,” the girls and I say in unison.
“Girls, we need to set it free.”
“No!” they cry out as if their worst fears have just been realized, and the tears start all over again. “Please, Papa. We want to keep it.” Sabrina wipes under her leaking nose with her arm. “He has no home. We adopted him.”
“Yes! He was shivering when we found him. Please, Papa. Don’t make us set him out in the cold. He’ll die.”
“Oh, Phaedra.” Sebastian curses in Latin while running a weary hand across his forehead.
Sensing an opening, she immediately continues. “We’ll take good care of him. We promise. Don’t we?”
“Yes!” Sabrina exults. “We love him already.”
Oh, boy. Way to lay it on thick. Sebastian doesn’t stand a chance with them double-teaming him like this. I sure as hell don’t, but wisely I’m keeping my mouth shut right now.
“We’ll walk him and clean up his poop and read to him because he’s smart like we are. We read on our tablets that ferrets make excellent pets and are very intelligent creatures.”
“Phaedra…” Only Sebastian is already running out of ammunition.
“Please, Papa. Pretty, pretty please.” Both girls hug him. It’s a nice touch with their big green eyes all watery and round. “We want a pet. We spend so much time in this palace away from everyone else.”
That was the kill shot. He’s got no chance now.
A point he proves with a groan and yet another curse in Latin.
“Fine. But I swear it, girls, if I see it or smell it or it causes destruction or messes, he’s gone.
And he has to see a vet immediately to make sure he’s safe and healthy to be here.
Bellamy is pregnant and I know you already know that we cannot risk her safety or the safety of the growing babies. ”
“Yes, Papa,” they both agree solemnly. “We understand.” Only the not-so-covert high five they give each other isn’t selling anything.
With a grunt, he gets himself up off the ground and extends his hand to me. “If you think I punished you last night, you haven’t seen anything yet.”
I do my best to suffocate my smirk, but it hits my lips anyway. “I’ll attempt to be remorseful, but I think we both already know how that goes.”
We exit the girls’ bedroom and in a heartbeat, he has me pinned against the wall, his hands in my hair, his hard body pressed against my own, his mouth hovering a centimeter over mine.
“What the fuck did I just agree to?”
I smile because it’s just so ridiculous, it’s funny. “A ferret.”
“A ferret. A goddamn rodent is now living in my palace.”
“Technically I think they’re mustelids, not rodents, and the girls are right about them being smart and excellent pets. It’ll be cute.”
“Cute?” he snarls incredulously. “How did you miss that?”
“Seriously good question. They snuck the sleeping thing in their backpack, and I fell asleep on the ride home. Althea missed it too.”
“Marvelous.” A sigh. “Everything is all fucked up.”
I rub against his hardening cock straining through his slacks. “Care to share with me, Your Majesty? Or not, since you don’t seem to like to do that.”
His mouth finds my neck, and his weight falls against me. “I didn’t want to trouble you when you’re already troubled.”
“And if I had pulled something like that with you?”
He groans as I continue to rub him, only now I give him a firm squeeze to let him know I mean business.
“Fine. I’m sorry I didn’t tell you. You’re right, that wasn’t respectful of me, and it won’t happen again.
I never had to be so…communicative with Nora, so this is a bit new for me.
Anyway, the tiara, since I know Althea told you about that, is missing from the tower along with a few other pieces our mother swears she had no part in. ”
I bite into my lip as I regretfully ask, “Do you believe that?”