Chapter 3
Chapter
Three
Ichecked my watch as I marched away from Audrina’s quarters.
There was time for a quick breakfast. I wandered into my beautiful farmhouse-luxe kitchen and sat at the table, feeling fabulous in a sharply tailored navy pantsuit and pumps.
Cecil was right; the outfit did go a long way in making me feel more confident about keeping my job.
Donovan, freshly showered, with his raven-colored hair swept back off his perfect, brutally handsome face, made my resolve wobble. Instead of going to work, I could stay here with him.
Argh, no. I still wanted to go to work.
“Coffee, Chosen?” Cecil busied himself in the kitchen, stirring five pots on burners.
“Do you even have to ask?” I slid into the seat next to Donovan. He reached out and took my hand, pressing it to his lips, his tongue flicking between my knuckles for a fraction of a second.
My belly burst into flames. Instantly, my eyes glazed. His, too, were hooded with lust, but in his stare, I saw a command. Feel the connection.
Right. Practice. Okay, I can do this. I focused on the heat that pooled in my sacral chakra.
Donovan leaned a little closer. “Imagine what it looks like,” he murmured. “It will help you focus.”
I obeyed. My mind’s eye drew a picture for me immediately. The bond looked like a solid cord, dazzling and new, the color of both gold and blood flames, with the texture of snakeskin. It felt strong and sure, confident and sensual—all at the same time.
Cecil put a coffee cup in front of me, breaking my concentration, and the visual disappeared. I exhaled shakily and licked my lips. “I can feel it. I saw it in my mind, just for a brief second.”
“That’s good. Now that you can sense your bonds, you will be able to learn to tug on them to alert the one who holds that connection to your emotions.”
I hid my smile behind my coffee cup and sent a pulse of heat through the bond.
His eyes glazed again. “You learn quickly.”
“Well… your lessons are so interesting.”
The corners of his lips pricked up, another hint of a smile. “What did it look like?”
“Unbreakable.” I grinned back. “Like blood-red and gold titanium scales. I can’t see how Connor could ever sever it.”
A shadow passed over his face, sweeping away the dreamy lust. “All bonds can be broken.” Donovan’s voice deepened, almost growling. “And I know my brother. He will not stop trying.”
“I agree with you there. I don’t think he will stop trying.” I took a sip of coffee. “He still thinks he can make me bond to him instead, then the prophecy will come true with him in the center of it.”
“Yes. That is one reason why he will keep trying to take you—it would make his life easier if he could bend the prophecy to favor him. And, although there are endless variations and translations of the prophecy, the one thing the scholars agree on completely is that the Chosen will bond to one of the Twin Stars of the house of Tyrnn and become Ruler of All the Worlds.”
“The only other thing the scholars mostly agree on is that the Devourer will become the Devoured,” Cecil chipped in, flipping a pancake.
“We just don’t know for sure if that’s a good thing or a bad thing.
A noun or a verb. Some scholars think that it means he’ll devour all the spark stones, eventually.
Others say it just means that he’ll get a blow?—”
“Thank you, Cecil,” I sang, cutting him off. “You’ve told me that theory before. I don’t need to hear it again.” I turned back to Donovan. “You said that the prophecy is one reason why he’ll keep trying to cut our bond so he can force a bond with me instead. What’s the other reason?”
Donovan’s expression darkened, so much so that I shivered when I saw it. When he spoke, a hint of violence vibrated through his tone—a deep, savage growl. “Because you are mine.”
I felt breathless; his words literally stole the air from my lungs. A thousand responses jumped to my lips, and the ghosts of a million suffragettes wailed in my ears. You don’t belong to any man.
I ignored them all. “Yes,” I whispered. “I’m yours.”
Some of the savagery dimmed in his eyes, but the intensity remained.
That was Donovan in a nutshell. Intense.
“That is the other reason why,” he said quietly.
“Connor has devoted his life to taking the things that are mine. Most of those things were gifted to me by chance of birth, and they are things I know I am not entitled to for any other reason than good fortune. The heirdom, my education, my arranged betrothed… they were all things I would have given up for Connor to ease his pain. But you.” His emerald eyes glowed.
“He will not take you from me. I will fight to my last breath.”
The last thing I wanted was for him to die for me, but I understood what he was saying. I hesitated for a second. “Have you, uh, do you remember the Under? When you were buried under your nightmares?”
He nodded.
“When I found you, you were being haunted by Connor as a little boy.”
Donovan made a gruff noise. “I was. Like Lady Bronwyn says, I need to forgive myself for not doing more to help him when we were younger. We were so close when we were boys. Then, we were separated, and my education began. I was the heir, and he was the spare, and his heart was broken.”
“And it began to rot.”
He nodded slowly. “Rationally, I understand that I was only a child, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. Emotionally, I have not forgiven myself.”
“The ghost of Connor that I saw… that was only real for you, wasn’t it?”
“Mostly, yes. The apparition would not exist for him. Why, what are you thinking of?”
I gnawed on my lip for a second, trying to get my thoughts together. “We’ve been on the back foot in this fight the whole time. Connor acts, we respond. We escaped by the skin of our teeth last time, and we might have already missed our window to catch him, so I want to start thinking ahead.”
“That is wise.”
I paused to take a gulp of coffee. “So, in the worst-case scenario, he’s given your mother the slip, run away from your kingdom, and disappeared into another realm. We know he can’t leave the Upper World, because the planets aren’t aligned enough for the gateways to open right now. Correct?”
He nodded. “We cannot get there, so he cannot leave. The misalignment never lasts for long, but it’s a fairly common event.”
“So, just in case your mother’s guards haven’t detained Connor and he’s still loose, it’s time to be more proactive and start thinking more like him. He used our greatest fears against us. What is his greatest fear?”
“It is obvious. His greatest fear is to be what he was born to be—the spare. To watch another be showered in glory. It is the only reason he spills blood. He fears being unimportant. Unworshipped. To have nothing and be nobody.”
I nodded. It was obvious, but it wasn’t really going to help us right now. Connor’s worst fears were only going to come true if we beat him. “Back to the drawing board, then.” Idly, I flipped through a stack of mail lying on the table.
I picked out one envelope—it looked like a bill, and I always preferred to get unpleasant things out of the way first, so I turned it over and tried to open it.
But the glue on the flap of the envelope was too strong. Irritated, I peeled away a strip of the flap, then another, then another, until I’d opened it wide enough to wrestle out the flimsy, cheap folded card inside. Damn, there was glitter. Lots of it.
By the time I got it out, I had gritty bright-orange glitter all over me and two stingy papercuts right on the tips of both index fingers. I didn’t even have to open the card to know who it was from.
I opened it anyway. Thanks for everything!!! Love, Hashleigh!!! And the rest of the gang!!!
Despite my irritation, I smiled. The brethren were annoying, but they had hearts of gold.
I turned back to my pile of mail. Two thick envelopes stood out. I picked up the first one, ripped it open, read the card, and tossed it away as if it would give me an STD if I handled it for too long.
Donovan raised an eyebrow.
“It’s from Juliette,” I explained, wrinkling my nose.
“Her annual charity ball is tomorrow night. She’s sent out reminders to tell us to bring lots of money with us.
I didn’t RSVP, but apparently, I’m on the guest list anyway.
” I blew out a breath. “We have to come up with a plan to deal with her, too, since Connor is manipulating her to do his bidding. She’s not magically powerful, but she’s still powerful.
In a strictly mundane sense, she’s still a danger. ”
“It may not be necessary.”
I arched an eyebrow. “Why?”
“Mundane problems require mundane solutions.” His eyes twinkled.
“I had Martina hire a human private investigator to shadow Juliette as soon as we came to realize my brother had corrupted her. The investigator has already overheard a very interesting conversation between Juliette and her sister, Havana, just yesterday.”
I knew Havana. She lived in New York and was married to a billionaire tech mogul. Juliette and Havana were cut from the same cloth—anything they said to each other was likely to be mean and nasty but entirely truthful. I leaned forward eagerly. “Go on.”
“Juliette is apparently inconsolable. She told her sister that she had done a favor for a man she desired—a man who she assumed would become her lover—but when it came time for her to claim him, he turned her down. Not only that, but he also ordered her to perform more tasks for him. Juliette screamed to her sister about the audacity of this man, and how he could dare to try and manipulate her, for several long minutes.”
There was a lot to unpack there. I thought for a moment. “Juliette is a bitch, but she’s no fool. She plays those games herself, so she’d recognize when someone is using her.” I bit my lip. “Why would Connor turn Juliette down?”
The humor in Donovan’s eyes vanished. “Probably because she was so willing.”
“Oh.” My stomach churned.