2
My cat?
A tomcat ?
With a steeling breath, I turn to DK, who looks almost as put-out as I do. “Since abortion isn’t an option,” I say, teeth gritted, “what exactly are you here for?”
“Call it child support.” DK pushes his foot into the carrier, sliding it gently closer to me. “According to the vet, she’s bound to pop by next week. Since the crypt isn’t exactly a place for a litter of kittens, I’ll come back to claim her in ten weeks. When she’s done,” his face pinches into pure, dripping disdain, “creating.”
He turns to leave her there, but Remy’s voice rings out, “Hey, Kemp.” When DK spins, his eerie eyes void of emotion, Remy plants his feet, pinning him with a long look. “No matter what you call him, he’ll never be your father.”
DK doesn’t even flinch. “I know exactly what my King is, Remy.”
Sy’s mouth forms an unhappy line. “A psychopath?”
“Oh,” DK gives a slow, creeping smirk, “he’s something much worse than that.”
When DK fails to elaborate—to no one’s surprise—Remy nods. “You could have a place here, though.”
This, at least, seems to spur some emotion on DK’s face. Consternation. “Come again?”
Remy jerks his chin toward the back. “I’m building a tattoo studio. We could use a piercer.” His green eyes gleam malevolently in the low light. “No one in Forsyth is as skilled as you are at stabbing things with needles.”
Nick and Sy are both staring at Remy like he’s gone absolutely mental.
DK presses a palm to his chest, offering a fake grin. “As touching as that compliment is, I’ve already been told I’m unwelcome. Good luck with this shitpile, though.”
And then he’s gone, sweeping through the doors just as quietly as he’d entered them.
“I bet she’s gonna have like eight of them,” Verity says, grinning. “Your cat’s got some real spunk, Lav. Look at this girl—she’s huge!”
I shoot a glare toward Archie, who’s perched on the back of the sofa and currently throwing his own glares to the mother of his children.
“You fucking dick,” I growl, not for the first time. “Don’t you dare be mean to her! This is all your fault!”
The black cat—nameless, so far—is just as DK described her. Suspicious and feral. But she’s also clearly terrified, refusing to come out of the cage.
I still leave the door to the carrier open. “I’m not sure we can handle eight kittens,” I whine.
But Verity climbs to her feet, insisting, “Sure you can! You just need to find her a good nesting spot.” Humming, she wanders around the loft apartment like it’s familiar territory—which it is. When she was staying here, it was a lot more sparsely furnished, but she navigates the living area like it’s a second home. She was the first person I called regarding the pregnant cat situation—for obvious reasons. She’s never been a cat, but she has been pregnant.
The four men sitting around the dining room table with varying levels of grumpy eyebrows certainly won’t be any help.
“Are you stupid?” Wicker says, face twisting. “Why the hell would you invite a Baron to be a business partner?” The only downside to having Verity over is that one of her Princes always escorts her. Lex isn’t so bad, and Pace mostly keeps to himself, but Wicker is a brat.
“Excellent question,” Nick replies, turning a slow, threatening look Remy’s way. “I’m all ears.”
Remy rolls his eyes, undeterred as he tips his chair back. “You guys don’t get it. Timothy Maddox has never been your father.”
Sy scoffs. “So it’s some sort of solidarity thing? Because news flash: Timothy Maddox has never been DK’s father.”
To my surprise, it’s Wicker who jumps in, squirming uncomfortably. “It’s a Baron thing. Leadership in Beta Rho isn’t about having a commander. It’s all… paternal and shit.”
“It’s devotion,” Remy corrects, tipping his head back to look at Sy. “You’re a King, but you’re still one of us. To brN, my father—his position as King—it’s like being the Pope. They don’t just follow him. They worship him.”
Nick scoffs. “I’m not seeing how having a Maddox worshipper downstairs is working to anyone’s benefit. Your father will just use him to keep tabs on—” Abruptly, he goes silent, and I glance over to find him eying Remy thoughtfully. “Huh.”
Wicker and Sy both look confused. “What?”
Remy laces his fingers behind his head, lounging back in his seat. “Forcing his shadows to work in the light. An enemy is always better when you can see them.”
A low hum escapes Nick’s lips. “When you can schedule them.”
Remy’s white hair sways with a nod. “Plus, I wasn’t lying before. We could use someone skilled in body mod, and Kemp and I go back far enough that I think he might actually give it a second thought if my father ordered him to dick me over.” He gives Wicker a long, significant look. “And that’s more than we can say about anyone else on the wicked path.”
It’s still strange to think of them as brothers. Remy on one side of the table, all tattooed and wily, while Wicker sits before him, pressed, groomed, and gleaming. But sometimes, if I squint really hard, I can almost see it.
They both share that same glint of wild, cutting sharpness in their gemstone eyes.
Just then, Verity walks back into the room, gathering her hair up into a ponytail. “Alright,” she announces, looking all business. “I’ve got three premium nesting places for her, all picked out. We just have to see which one she chooses.”
Sy pushes off the wall with a glower. “Take her to the gym. We’re not letting that mangy cat give birth in our home.”
Climbing to my feet, I square my shoulders. “Yes, we are.”
His eyes tighten. “No, we’re not.”
“Yes,” I grind out, “we are.”
He steps closer, planting his feet. “No.”
I cross my arms. “Yes.”
“No.”
“ Yes .”
Wicker groans. “This is exactly how you sound when you’re fucking, isn’t it?” But then me and Sy both turn our fiery glares toward him, and Wicker raises both hands, palms-out. “Hey, I’ve got no cat in this fight.”
“Ignore them,” Nick says, voice exasperated. “Fighting is their foreplay. They’ll be fucking like jackrabbits in five hours.”
Not fucking likely .
Wicker goes on, “I don’t see what the big deal is. So your boy got himself a little rough trade. To create is to reign.” He raises his beer toward where Archie is still crouched on the sofa. “Welcome to fatherhood, you handsome slut.”
Everyone else in the room makes a unison disgusted sound.
“ Don’t throw your house motto around here,” I warn. When Sy fights with me, it’s sexy, but when he fights with other guys…
Ugh.
It’s still sexy.
“That cat,” Sy says, voice low and full of threat as he descends on me, “is not giving birth in this building. End of story.” He comes to a stop a hair’s breadth away from me, the vein in his temple popping. “Period.”
The next morning, I find her in our bathroom cabinet, all tuckered out on the pile of towels I’d laid down for her.
A squirming pile of freshly newborn kittens is nestled into her belly.
I crouch down to look in on her, still groggy and pussy-sore from Sy’s cock, and can’t help my smirk. “We sure showed him, didn’t we?”
But a voice makes me jump. “Eight.”
When I spin, Remy’s got both arms raised, hands gripping the door jamb. His long, lithe body is on full display, tattoos flexing with his lazy movements. Unable to help myself, I touch his abdomen—that warm patch of skin right above his low-slung boxers. “Eight? Head check?”
He gives me a soft little grin. “Nah, eight kittens. I counted them earlier.”
“ Wow . Verity was spot-on.” A startled laugh escapes me, and he grins at the sound.
It kills me how good he looks these days. When his whirling dervish of focus narrows down to me, I’m always amazed at how clear his eyes are. How sweet his touches can be. How the heat of his touch can burn, but not singe. I strain up for his slow, searing kiss, indulging in his little sigh when he presses his forehead to mine. “A couple are white like Archie, and a couple are black like her, but the other four are all patchy and spotted. Eight tiny, bright souls.” As he says this, his finger is drawing an unhurried loop on my stomach, swooping around in a big circle.
My breath catches in my throat. “Are you trying to tell me you want something?” The amusement mingles with a bone-deep fear. I’ll never forget the look on his face when he held Verity’s baby for the first time. The way he seemed to shine with excitement and emotion, cradling his new nephew. But although the thought of seeing him holding our own child gives me an undeniable frisson of want, I can’t pretend I’m ready for that.
But Remy just chuckles. “As much as I’d love to put a baby into you, Vinny, I think we both know I’d make a terrible father.”
Frowning, I pull back to search his eyes. “Hey,” I say, unreasonably angry as I cup his cheek, “that’s not true.”
His eyes soften. “Right now, it is. But that’s okay. I’d rather do it right than do it quick. I just meant…” His eyes zero in on my mouth, teeth raking against my lower lip. “Sy might be.”
Without even thinking about it, my face spreads into a smile. “God, could you imagine that? He’d join all the mommy groups.”
Remy adds, “Bully all the baby’s doctors.”
“Teach it how to hit people.”
Remy laughs with me, all quiet and secret, but that softness never leaves his eyes. “I can imagine it, Vinny. That’s what I’m saying. All that bullshit with Archie and wanting to keep his balls…” He brushes my hair away from my cheek. “I know it pisses you off, but it’s not really about Archie.”
Blinking, I try to follow his meaning. “Oh.” Now that I think about it, spring was around the time Verity began coming to stay here, her belly growing with the baby.
“He’s a King.” This gravelly voice belongs to Nick, who suddenly fills the doorway beside Remy. He’s not like either of his brothers, who both wake up sleepy-soft and pliant. Nick always wakes up with a plan and his finger on a trigger. “And being a King means needing an heir. Because as much as the East End motto grosses out our poor West End sensibilities, they kind of have a point.”
Grimacing, Remy agrees, “That last little soul makes his rein complete.”
My stomach swoops dangerously. “Did he say something to you two?”
Remy shakes his head. “I just wanted to make sure you got it. That you weren’t blindsided when he does say something.”
“Because someday he will.” Nick reaches up to scratch his jaw, his bitten-off fingernails rasping against stubble. “Not now, but maybe in the next couple years.”
“You and me,” Remy pins me with a stony stare, “we aren’t like Nicky and Sy. We don’t know what good parents look like, and we need… more.”
“More time,” I agree, biting on my lip, “to figure out what we want.”
“Yeah.”
Giving Nick a dubious look, I wonder, “Have you figured out what you want?” I ask this because I can’t imagine Nick being okay with another man’s baby inside me.
But to my shock, Nick just smirks, tugging me into the warm breadth of his chest. “Half my genetic material, Little Bird.” His words are delivered in a husky breath, right into the patch of skin below my ear. “I’ll give you the other half later.”
I shiver violently, turning to brush my lips against the scar on his throat. It wasn’t too long ago that the four of us were faced with the possibility of losing a soul. The memory of Nick’s limp, bleeding body on that table has sunk into my bones like an agonized etch. Some nights, when he and I are laying in bed—when I can hold him down and make him be still—I stare at him like a woman obsessed, wanting to take every part of him into me. To hold it. Keep it safe and whole.
Maybe that’s just a glimpse of how he feels about me.
Who would want to bring a child into that storm?
The whole discussion is ridiculous. I still have two more years of college, and then I have to decide if this pre-med thing is going to grow into something more. Sy needs to secure his place with the Forsyth elite. Nick needs to find out where he can fit in that, professionally. Remy needs to finish Royal Ink, grow it like a seed.
But on this long path to us becoming a family—giving Sy an heir—there’s one very crucial first step.
“Excuse me,” I say, raising my chin in defiance. “I have a point to make.”
Nick and Remy share a look. “That can’t be good.”
But I’m already marching to our bed, big and wide and mussed from a long night of taking first Nick, and then Remy, and then Sy, who’d laid me flat on my stomach to fuck me from behind. The memory of his large body pinning me down as he surged into me, spreading me wide, stretching and filling, still sends a quiver to my thighs.
And when I jump on him, straddling his warm, naked hips, I’m rewarded with his sleepy ‘ oof !’. “We’re going to have a bout,” I announce.
His blue eyes flutter open and immediately lock with mine, a divot forming between his brows. “Yeah?” he hums, a large, warm palm coming to rest on my outer thigh. Eyes darkening, he bucks into me, the hardness beneath the sheets obscenely obvious. “Yeah. Just give me a second to?—”
“I’m not talking about sex.” Well, I sort of am. But mostly not. “I’m talking about you and me on Screw Years Eve. A fury and her fist. To the victor go the spoils.” Sy’s mouth parts, the argument gathering on an inhale, but I press my palm over it. “You’re not going to throw the fight because that’d be insulting to me. And yes, you’re going to have to hit me, but you know I can take it.” Bending down, I slide my palm away to brush a kiss against the tense seam of his mouth. “When you lose—and you will—you won’t take it personally or sulk around about it. You’ll be happy, because I’ll be your Queen in more than just name.”
When I pull back, he’s watching me, searching my eyes. “Why is this so important to you?”
“Because it’s important to you ,” I answer, delighting in the slow, warm circuit his hand is making on my thigh. “You were never expecting to be voted King, but you love it. I see how seriously you take the responsibility. I watch you out there every day, determined to build this town into something worth calling yours.” I push his hair back, willing him to see the truth in my eyes. “I want to do that—and not just behind you, or beside you. I want to do it with you.”
My fingers card through his hair, and he exhales, eyes softening. “Baby, I don’t want to hurt you.”
I snort. “Yes, you do.”
His expression grows stern. “Not like that.”
Nestling down against his chest, I assure, “It’s just first blood, Big Bear.”
There’s a pause, and then, “Is that in the book?”
“No, but…” Shrugging, I make a confession. “I talked to Mrs. Crane last night. She’s the only person who’s ever seen a Queenmaker match. One,” I stress, holding up a finger, “back in the forties or something. Anyway, she said it was first blood. Easy peasy.”
His hand wanders higher, grazing the outside of my ass cheek. “You think that’s easy?”
“I’ve decided,” I begin, pushing up to meet his gaze, “that we’re going to use the event to adopt out all of Archie’s little love children to good, safe Forsyth homes.” I drag my finger down the center of his chest, fixing him with a firm look. “They’ll only be three weeks old then, so you and the frat get to come up with a grueling application process, after which, you’ll personally hand-select the eight approved adoptees.”
Sy always looks great when he first wakes up—warm and rumpled, miles of bare skin and a softness around his eyes. Right now, however, he mostly looks bemused. “And I’d be doing this why ?”
I shrug. “Because it’ll be one of my spoils of victory.”
“One of them?” With an incredulous laugh, he tucks an arm behind his head, nestling down into the blankets. He’s still rock-hard beneath me, and when his blue eyes dip down to drink in the scooping neckline of my tight tank top, I can feel it twitch against my panties. “You’re acting awfully cocky for a girl I can lift with one arm.”
Unbidden, the memory of last night comes to me. The way he’d lifted me over his shoulder and marched me to bed. Swallowing, it’s a physical battle not to grind down into his hardness. “My second spoils of victory,” I go on, ignoring the cocky look on his face, “is that you’re going to take the Archduke to get neutered. All forty-three of you, in fact.” Rocking back, I flatten my hands over each of his tight pecs, enjoying his gaping expression. “Once I’ve won, you and the frat can consider it a lesson on disobeying your Queen.”
He snorts, but I can already see it happening. That spark of challenge in his eyes. The way his jaw firms. The flex of his abdomen as he situates himself against the headboard, like he’s wanting me to size him up.
Sy can’t resist the allure of a win. “And what do I get if I win?”
“You can fuck me,” I say, having already thought this out.
The tilt of his mouth is unimpressed. “Look at you,” he says, grabbing my hips. He doesn’t even drag me against his cock. Just the way he grips me, so strong and assured, sends a shiver right down to my thighs. “You’re all flushed down your neck. Your eyes are dilated. You’ve been staring at my chest for most of this conversation, Lavinia. I bet your panties are already soaked because I made you horny without moving a muscle. I can fuck you, win or lose.”
Guiltily, my eyes jerk up from his chest, only to find him staring back at me with a wry grin. It disappears the minute I add, “You can fuck me in the ass .”
Beneath me, his cock gives a series of strong twitches. “Bullshit.”
“No bullshit,” I promise.
Almost as if he can’t help it, the hands on my hips glide around me, each gripping a writhing handful of my ass. “I’d tear you open like a pinata,” he says, eyes glazing over as he gropes me.
He was right before.
My panties are drenched . “I’d request one week for Nick and Remy to train me—get me ready for you.”