Chapter 42
Dessert
E
Dessert is served.
The rich taste of venison still lingers on my tongue, chased away by wine and too many questions. Lanterns burn brightly overhead, their bluish glow powered by something other than combustible oil. Max is tense beside me, her fingers curled tightly around the stem of her dessert wine glass.
“Those lanterns are so beautiful,” she remarks, her eyes angled toward the ceiling. “What are they made of?”
The King of Light follows her gaze, and a serene smile curls his lips. “Souls.”
Max chokes on a mouthful of wine. “Pardon me?”
“Those lanterns contain the souls of those who were not fit to meet the gods,” Ethan explains.
Max raises a brow, her bottom lip wet and shiny from her drink. “Because they were too damaged, you mean?”
He nods, but the hollow space beneath my breastbone squirms.
Damaged. Broken. Impure.
My instincts tell me those terms become subjective very quickly in a place like this.
My mind flashes back to the lantern I smashed over Luther’s head.
I always thought I was attuned to it somehow, that it contained my spirit, but it never gleamed with that otherworldly blue. Never betrayed the presence of a soul inside.
And I left it behind without issue.
My heart gives a forlorn squeeze, and for the first time, I finally believe that maybe, maybe, I'm not dead.
They've told me numerous times now, but a part of me kept holding back. Something in me shifts the same way my wings did—slow, insistent, impossible to ignore. It isn’t a clear memory, but a current stirring beneath the surface.
A whole life lived and forgotten swirls in the black waters of my subconscious, splashes of recognition pulling at my gut in ways I can’t explain.
My father jolts me out of my thoughts, bracing a hand on my shoulder. “You could have it all back, son. Your name, your crown—” He stops abruptly and smiles. “Welcome home.”
Then he rises, leaving his chocolate mousse untouched. “We can pick this up tomorrow morning. I will make arrangements for the vow dissolution spell to be held at once, and afterwards, we will petition the Red Queen for your friend’s return, Miss Lorntre. Good night.”
Welcome home…
I have this intuition that, whenever I came home, there were rules I obeyed without question. Truths that governed my life.
I can’t remember what they were.
I hate that my elusive past still has a hold over me. It keeps reaching into my present, shaping my instincts, pulling me in directions I don’t understand, making me feel like a puppet, its strings being toyed with by a stranger.
The intrusive feeling that I’ve forgotten something that changes everything lingers as though it’s waiting for me to catch up to it, whether I want to or not.
Max tears her gaze away from the lanterns and drops her silk napkin over her untouched dessert plate.
Her chair screeches as she stands.
“This is…macabre. Your father betrayed my mother, and yet he talks about her like he merely lost touch with an old lover and tried to take in her orphaned child. He’s dangerous,” she breathes.
Her warning echoes the unease inside me, and I nod.
“And we’ll get to the bottom of it, but he promised to save Nick. That’s a good start.”
She paces the dining room back and forth. “Only if I agree to dissolve your link to Willow. What if the old you wouldn’t want me to do it? You agreed to marry her, after all.”
I catch her in my arms and caress her bare shoulders. “Max. I married a gay woman who only agreed to link our fates to appease her family. I'd say that, out of all the scenarios we could have imagined, that one lets me completely off the hook.”
“You’re only saying that because you want us to be together. It’s too convenient.”
She folds her arms, luring my gaze down to her cleavage.
Her white dress molds her curves and flows all the way to the floor.
Gold ropes trace the length of her bare back, crossing between her shoulder blades and cinching at her waist before falling over her backside, weighed down by heavy pearls.
Her movements turn the white translucent and the gold molten.
It should make her look fragile and delicate.
Instead, it only draws attention to everything stubborn and untamable about her. To the freckles dusting her shoulders and the wild red braid falling to her waist.
Max carries herself like she's wearing armor rather than one of the most see-through dresses I've ever seen.
“It’s too convenient,” she says, shaking her head.
“You think he’s lying?”
“Fae can’t lie. But you were probably fine with this marriage. It probably suited you to fuck whoever you wanted on the side.”
She walks away from me, and I press my lips together.
“That was before you,” I say. “If Willow is the one who destroyed the Eternal Chalice and plunged Faerie into war, isn’t she dangerous? Our priority should be to save Nick, at any cost. Breaking some old, dishonest wedding vows I can’t remember isn’t such an imposition, is it?”
“I need to think.”
She heads out of the dining room, and my selfish heart bleeds at the sight of her retreating.
She sees straight through me.
I’m cheering for my so-called wedding vows to be broken because I’m tired of our relationship carrying an expiration date neither of us can read. I want to marry Max and give her everything she deserves, not spend eternity linked to someone else.
I’m a bastard, but I can’t help chasing after her.
I need her to know our story is far from over.
I catch up to her at a run and drag a hand down the golden ropes hanging at her back.
“Let me come with you,” I say. “If only just to hold you.”
“No.” She picks up the pace, walking briskly toward the throne room, but her steps falter as we enter.
The four walls are made entirely of mirrors, and a myriad of reflections stare back at us. Her in her sinful dress. Me in my matching ivory jacket and trousers.
“Oh my gods.” Her mouth falls open, and she covers her eyes with her hand, flushing scarlet.
I peel it off with a smile. “Are you timid now, little fox?”
She spins around and rests an open palm against my chest, her fingers tangling in my buttoned jacket. “Look. We both know what will happen if you come to my room.”
I peck her cheek mischievously. “All the more reason.”
Her eyes close for a beat, and that tiny crack in her resolve is my undoing.
The kiss is soft at first, easing the burden of finding out I have a wife. A father. A kingdom. Then it deepens, and every thought in my head scatters.
Max fills my blood. The way she tilts toward me without realizing it. The way she sighs as though she thinks I’m an ass, yet somehow thinks the same of herself for being this close to giving in. How her chin tilts upward, as though she can bluff her way into falling out of love with me.
My need for her only grows. Every touch feeds it. Every stolen second leaves me plotting for more.
Always more.
There is no amount of her that feels like enough.
I want mornings.
I want years.
I want every version of her that exists across every possible future.
I crave things I was never meant to have, and a dark shard twists inside me.
Max tears herself away. “Stop kissing me like that,” she cries out, pleading.
“Like what?” I ask innocently.
“Like you don’t mind burning the world down to have me.”
I run my thumb down her lips. “You are my world, Max. Everything else can burn.”
The sight of us panting hard in the mirror fills me with heat and destroys what little remains of my good intentions. The pressure in my groin increases, taunting my demon out to play.
Our second kiss lasts longer.
Her breasts peak beneath the airy Fae dress, and I bend down to taste them through the fabric. She makes a strangled sound somewhere between a laugh and a groan and presses both hands flat against my chest.
“Stop.”
I stop, but she doesn’t move to leave, her gaze glued to our reflection.
“You shouldn’t have kissed me,” she scolds.
I tilt her chin up and peck her jaw.
“You kissed me back,” I tease.
Her eyes narrow. She runs a hand through my hair, tugging on it, then studies the result in the mirror. “You just had to look like fucking Prince Charming.”
“Look who’s talking. Have you seen your dress?”
I spin her around and run my hands up and down her sides. She feasts on the sight of me as I cup her breasts, kneading them through the pliable fabric, the weight of them fucking glorious. “Don’t you like it when I kiss you?”
I meet her gaze in the mirror.
“I love it.”
Her admission is breathy and winded.
“Then what’s the problem? Are you afraid of that dream-stalker showing up? Because I won’t let him touch you again. Shadows perish in the light, Max.”
She doesn't answer. Instead, her gaze drops to the floor, and her bottom lip disappears between her teeth.
I know that look.
It's the look she gets whenever she's about to tell me something I won't like.
“There’s no one else,” she admits softly. “That shadow—it’s you.”
My nose wrinkles unhappily. “Me?”
“The you…from before. The one who grew up in this place.”
My chest heaves, my spine burning with both envy and pride.
“Don’t you dream of him almost every night?” I croak.
It’s not really a question, but a reminder. For both of us.
Lips pressed together, she nods. I bend down and devour her neck, nibbling and biting, the taste of burnt vanilla beans filling my senses.
“Remind me again how many times you let Ezra Lightbringer touch you?” I ask darkly.
The name is poison on my tongue.
I’m jealous of the man I used to be. Jealous and terrified.
The bastard doesn’t even exist anymore, and somehow he's still winning. Max dreams about him.
Not me.
Him.
I lift up her skirts, bunching the fabric at her navel, and strum her clit through the lace.
“Oh, fuck,” she gasps, her mouth parting beautifully.
“Here. Look how needy you are for me.”
My cock stiffens past the point of pain as she lets her head fall against my shoulder, abandoning herself, and her soft whimpers drive me right past the point of madness into pure, selfish hunger.
“I’m going to fuck you right here. And I want you to look me in the eye as I do.”