42 #2
Oona glances up at him—very far up, since he’s about two feet taller than she is—and her cheeks flush.
Her voice comes out biting as she snatches his hand and yanks him toward her.
He staggers a step, completely caught off guard when she says, “Oh, very well then. But not near the queens. I don’t want to disrespect them. ”
“Of course.” He nods once, a flush deepening his own skin too.
“I wouldn’t dream of them—I mean, I wouldn’t dream of it .
” He shuffles after her as she leads him into the revelry, and he doesn’t ever look away from her.
In fact, I don’t think he noticed me at all.
Oona glances back, and I blow her a kiss.
Another voice—masculine, husky, and rough—startles me.
“You’re too lovely to stand here on your own. You deserve to be admired.”
I don’t need to look behind me to know who speaks. Heat scalds my back, and he steps closer, until our bodies meld together like the last two pieces of a puzzle. I’m so tempted to lean into him. To let the daydream of our time together carry me away. But—
“You shouldn’t be here,” I say without turning.
Sin sweeps a hand across my nape, brushing aside my curls, and the touch lingers on my bare skin.
Oh god. He feels so good. He always feels so good.
He splays his other hand on the statue beside me, and I glimpse the veins running along his wrist, his dexterous fingers.
An icy chill blows through me—suspiciously akin to longing.
“It is torture to watch you tonight,” he murmurs at my ear.
“We haven’t spoken in weeks. I’ve been miserable. ”
“We agreed,” I argue. “One night, remember?”
And it’s not fair. It’s not fair that I’m the one who has to remind him of this when I want nothing more than to kiss him.
I’ve had weeks to think of that night. Of his hands, his lips, his tongue.
Weeks to remember his darkened words of worship, the soapy bubbles on our skin, the soft, adoring way he cared for me. I love him.
I love him, and it’s ruining my life.
“I’m feeling petulant,” he says, as though that’s explanation enough.
“How fitting for a prince.”
“Oh, very,” he agrees with a soft laugh. The sound of it burrows into my core, and I shiver. “I have to give the people what they want, after all.”
The word want lands hard between us, and I stiffen against his tautening muscles.
“What if I asked you to dance?” he whispers, and I imagine his burgundy gaze growing hotter, brighter, in the darkness. Thank goodness we’re standing on the outskirts of the forest. Thank goodness no one else can see us. “Hypothetically, of course.”
“I’d say no.” My voice cracks as his hand travels down my spine. “Hypothetically.”
“What if I told you no one has ever looked this beautiful in the history of our world, and I might die if I never touched you again?”
“I’d tell you that you’re touching me right now.”
Sin clicks his tongue. “This is entirely hypothetical, darling.” His hand cups my bottom, and his fingers dig into my flesh. It’s excruciating, and my legs tremble with need. I want to turn. I want to kiss him. I want to touch him.
I can’t.
“You’re wrecking this party,” I mutter. “I was having a perfectly pleasant time before you and your petulance came along.”
“Don’t lie to me.”
“As if you could tell.”
A pause. A breath. “I can always tell, Vanessa. It’s you.”
It’s you.
The statement—the sentiment behind it—splinters inside my chest. I whirl around. Stupidly. Foolishly. Sin’s breath catches in his throat, and I force him farther into the cover of the trees.
“For a prince you are so…”
“Handsome?” he asks. “Dashing? Debonair?”
“Dumb.” I press a hand to his chest, and he seizes my wrist, holding me there. Our pulses pound brutally in unison. I back him into the firm trunk of an oak, and he smirks wickedly.
“If this is my punishment”—he hooks an arm around my waist and draws me against him—“so be it.”
He looks down at me then.
I look up at him.
I can hardly breathe. Magic and stardust swirl around us; the trees flutter their leaves in a gentle rasp.
Music crescendos in the distance, and I know the others still exist. The court.
The queens. But I’ve been miserable without him.
I hardly have anything left here. Sin tucks a lock of hair behind my ear and leans close, his lips just barely brushing mine.
“You… you had a cherry tartlet,” I whisper against his mouth. “You’re drunk on lust.”
“Yes,” he says—a lie that incinerates me on the spot. “None of this is real.” Lie. “I haven’t been dreaming about you nightly.” Lie. He kisses me, and my belly tightens. “I haven’t been picturing that gorgeous mouth of yours wrapped around—”
“Sin,” I breathe.
His eyes burn. “Ask me.”
“For what?”
“For anything, Vanessa. For the fucking world.” He drags a hand up my hip, over my waist, past the curve of my breast. “Ask me. Let me be selfish.” His tongue sweeps along my lower lip, and he groans. “Let me have you.”
The music crashes to a halt. The ending of a song.
The ending of this moment. I break away from Sin, stumbling backward as I remember it all—Celeste, Oona, Evie, Queen Sybil, being humiliated in front of the court—remember the stakes of losing the ones I love.
I glance behind us, and the werewolves continue eating, drinking, kissing, dancing.
Even Oona and Instructor Shepherd twirl around to a sudden, slow melody.
“We can’t,” I say.
“I know,” Sin says.
And we stare at each other—the prince and the outcast—like two characters in a Greek tragedy.
“Y-you should go,” I manage, rubbing my arms from the chill of losing that nearness to him. “I’m sure you and Evie are expected to dance.”
He curses under his breath, his gaze never once leaving mine. And—it looks as if he is going to give me the world. Here. Now. He looks as if he might steal a lantern from the tree and ignite the whole forest. I love you , I think.
In another life, one where Celeste is alive and I am just a girl, we’re together. I know it. A life where Sin isn’t prince, and he is just a boy, our souls would still fit. They would still match.
I would love him forever.
“Ah, my darling son,” Queen Sybil says, approaching us on knife-sharp heels that impale the petals at our feet, “I wondered where you ran off to. How unsurprising that you ended up here.”
I jolt with surprise at her appearance—at the way, yet again, she has somehow hidden her scent. My spine straightens, and I wish so desperately to cast my gaze to the ground, but… I can’t.
The queen’s shoulder-length black hair has been braided into a tight chignon, emphasizing the severe set of her jaw. Her gaze is black fury, narrowed on us, and she waves a hand behind her. “Perhaps you plan on dancing with your fiancée? Some of our guests don’t believe in patience being a virtue.”
“Your guests believe in upholding bargains—gifted or otherwise,” a woman says, stepping out from behind the queen. Another scent suddenly blows around us—so much like Evie’s. Vanilla and soft. My stomach knots. I step back instinctively.
Queen Jae is inches taller than Queen Sybil, with long hair hanging past her waist in intricate braids woven with ebony stars. Their black eyes, however, are the exact same. Queen Jae inclines her head at Sin, refusing to turn that regal gaze onto me.
“Prince Sinclair Severi, should we worry that you’ve yet to seek out our daughter?” Queen Jae sneers, and the hairs rise on my arms. “Forsaking our princess for a… purple-eyed Bitten.”
“She is nothing,” Sin lies quickly, wedging himself between me and the queens.
I retreat into the forest, but Queen Jae snaps her fingers and two of her soldiers appear from the blackness, the crests on their chests of a tiger devouring a wolf glinting gold.
They shove me out of the trees and back toward the party.
Queen Jae snags the skirt of my dress with a claw as I trip to a halt, and my heart leaps into my throat.
My fear smothers the pretty scents of this realm.
She’s going to kill me , I think suddenly.
Bile washes over my tongue. But before she can harm me, or even speak, Queen Sybil plucks Queen Jae’s hand from me.
“She is nothing, Jae. Certainly not worth your time. The engagement stands. It will happen tomorrow.” Then, harsher, she says, “I do not break my bargains.”
My feet grow roots in the earth. Queen Sybil only lies about the first two statements, but the rest…
She does plan on Sin and Evie becoming betrothed.
Becoming mated . Sin’s expression hardens, though he refuses to show any true signs of displeasure.
“I shall go and find the princess,” he says, and he lowers into a respectful bow.
“But if you don’t mind, I was actually bringing Vanessa to my cousin. ”
What?
I whirl to face Sin, but he won’t look at me.
“Calix is shy,” he says, smiling that charming, roguish grin even as he lies through his teeth. “My poor cousin cannot yet fetch his own dance partner, you see. He is terribly dim-witted and unromantic. He sent me in his stead.”
“The bastard of the blood traitor?” Queen Jae’s lip curls, and a low snarl builds in her throat.
She watches Sin, the way he takes my arm stiffly, as if we’ve never touched before, and nods once.
“Fine, then. She can have him.” She slices a hand through the air, and her soldiers vanish back into the shadows as Sin forces me onto the mossy carpet.
“What the hell are you thinking?” I hiss, surrounded now by a dozen classmates who think I’m either a traitor or a pathological liar. They avoid me. Even Portia won’t look at me. I glare up at Sin.
“That I don’t want you to end up fucking dead,” he growls. We reach Calix, who has stationed himself beside a table of sweets, though he appears to have touched none of them. My heart beats painfully as Calix glances at us with furrowed brows.