Chapter 30
CHAPTER THIRTY
QUINN
I watch as Abby abruptly halts her dance with Merrick. I can’t hear what they’re saying from here, but neither of them looks entirely happy. For his sake, I hope whatever he said doesn’t have her reaching for the dagger I’m certain she’s tucked away somewhere in that dress of hers.
Gods, that dress.
It’s green, just as many of the other dresses worn tonight. I suspect the fabric is dyed using the same algae that gave the Jade Coast its name.
And speaking of Jade, he’s yet to make an appearance tonight. He must still be sulking that I didn’t immediately thank him for his gift . I’ve been trying to keep the thought of that Guardian from the forefront of my mind, but he has a way of crawling back into my thoughts. To even suggest that I bite him is—
“Hi,” Abby says when she reaches me, and the thought slips from my mind.
I answer her with a low bow. “Hi.”
She laughs and takes my outstretched hand. “Charming as ever, Prince .” She would never call me that, but this dance is far too similar to the one we’d shared a lifetime ago. When I was still nothing but a prince to her.
“Beautiful as always, Princess .” Her smile widens, and it might just be the only time she’s never minded being referred to by her title. I pull her against me and follow the same steps of the dance we’d shared in Rosewood. It doesn’t entirely match this music, but I don’t care. This is our dance. I lower my head so I can whisper directly into her ear. “How many knives do you have tucked away in your skirt this time?”
“Nine,” she says, as if it were the most casual of all numbers.
If that were true, I wouldn’t have taken a misstep at the sound of it. “That belt I gave you only holds eight. Where’s the ninth?”
Now it’s her turn to whisper in my ear. “It’s more fun if you find it.”
I swallow. “Don’t you remember what happened the last time we danced like this?”
She pauses, pretending to think it over. “You may have to remind me.”
Her teasing pushes me over the edge, and all at once, the bond between us ignites. One moment we’re talking, and the next my lips are pressed against hers, my fingers weaving through her hair and pressing her deeper into me.
And then we’re moving. Dancing through the crowd towards the edge of the dance floor.
If I remember correctly, the nearest building should be empty. My fingers fumble for the door handle. We nearly stumble when the door swings wind, and there’s almost not enough time to shut it behind us before Abby’s hands find their way to my belt.
The room we ended up in is small and as dark as a moonless night, but fuck it, this will have to do. I catch both of Abby’s wrists in one hand and spin her so that she’s the one pressed up against the wall. “Someone’s eager,” I tease, before bringing her hands up and kissing the back of one of them.
“When am I not?”
She has a point, and Gods, how I love that about her.
“Your belt first,” I say, reaching under her skirt. I let my hand run slowly up to her hip until my fingers find the familiar leather I once wore around my own waist. It takes no time to find the buckle, and when I unclasp it, the knives clatter to the floor around her ankles. “Now, where’s the last one?” My voice is rough with the need to be inside her, but I swallow back the arousal in an effort to control myself.
I will find that knife first.
“I guess you’ll have to check everywhere.” The desperation in her voice matches my own.
I let my hand wander to her inner thigh, only to find the area barren. “You never make it easy, do you?”
“And I never will.” She says, standing on her toes so she can press her lips against mine again. Her mouth is wet and hungry, and I welcome her tongue as the tantalizing distraction she means it to be.
I slide my hand upwards until my fingers find the warmest place between her legs. She groans into me, and fuck, if I don’t find this knife soon, I might actually burst.
I don’t bother with her legs because she wouldn’t have put the blade somewhere out of my reach. But where? The only other place I can think is somewhere on her chest or back. The fabric is tight around her chest so I would have seen the outline of a weapon if she had one there, but the train of her dress starts higher up and might mask the existence of a small weapon.
I begrudgingly remove my hand from her skirt and reach around her back, letting my hand slide along the delicate material until…
I stiffen before breaking our kiss. “You can’t even reach this.” How is it that she managed to pick the absolute worst place to hide a weapon? Unless… “This is just for me.”
I don’t need my enhanced vision to know that she’s grinning wildly. She knew I would have checked the practical places first. Suspected I would have run my hands all along her body before settling here, but she underestimated my need to have my mouth against hers.
And now that I’ve found it, there’s no reason to prolong this.
I finish what Abby started and unclasp my pants with one hand and pull up her skirt with the other. And then I’m inside her. There’s no need to wind her up because we’re both already there.
The music should be loud enough to mask our moans, but I lay a hand over her mouth just in case. Abby, apparently, takes that as permission to be loud. Of course, the one time I’m trying to keep her quiet is the time she willingly lets my name erupt from her lips over and over.
I can feel her pleasure building. Racing with mine to see which peak is reached first.
She’s tight around my cock, and each rock of her hips sends shockwaves through me. I slip my free hand around her waist and lift her higher so that I can drive myself deeper and the spike in her pleasure mirrors my own.
Gods, I don’t even know how sex felt good before we could mingle our emotions, our sensations, every bit of ourselves with each other.
Even the sting of her nails driving into the skin of my back is enough to drive me wild, but when I feel the pressure of my own fingers pressing against hers through our bond, it’s exhilarating. It’s mind-bending, do-anything-to-never-give-this-up kind of wild.
She says something else, but I can’t hear it over the pulsing of blood in my ears. I remove my hand from her mouth in case I was hurting her, but I would have felt it if I were. ‘Say that again.’ I have to force the thought through the bond because there’s no way I can trust my mouth right now.
“I’ll marry you.”
“What?” The word comes sputtering through my lips just as my release slams into me like a bolt of lightning. There’s no way I heard her right. Not between the ragged breaths and thundering of my heart.
Her release comes mere seconds after mine and I feel every bit of it as push deeper inside her, needing her to feel all of me in this moment. “I’ll marry you,” she says again with the expelling of breath.
She said she’d marry me, and then the sun set.
There was only time for one more dance before I had to return to this form. We should be celebrating this night together. Not just for Teagan and Petra, but for ourselves and the future we’re going to build together.
I’m in absolute awe of this woman and can’t believe that one day soon, she’ll grant me the honour of becoming her husband. Her partner in everything the fates have in store for us. If I wasn’t in this body of fur and claw, I’d shout it to the distant mountains. But instead, I’m left here on the sidelines while she shares a dance with Rhett.
She didn’t want to leave me, but I want her to enjoy every moment of this night, even if it means that a minuscule part of it is spent away from me. She should get to dance and laugh with our friends— our family . Because that’s what we’ve found here.
There’s nothing I want more right now than to hold her against me, but, in the distance, the wraiths are screaming.
I hear them, even if no one else does. I always hear them.
“Well, you look like you’re enjoying the party.” A sarcastic remark like that could only have come from a dragon, but it’s the dragon that surprises me. I turn my head to find Petra, arms crossed and striding in my direction. “Shouldn’t you be with your mate?” I don’t like her tone or the question.
I can’t answer her, so I spin in a circle as if to say, ‘I’m a fucking wolf, in case you didn’t notice.’
“Yeah, yeah,” she says, clearly getting the point. “And Teagan has a tail. You’re not special.”
Ouch. If I could speak, I’d ask her why she isn’t with her mate instead of bothering me.
She sighs. “Look, Teagan wants to talk to you. I don’t care for her reasoning, so I’m taking it out on you. Sorry.”
That’s the second time she’s apologized to me. Maybe we are getting somewhere. I move towards her so she knows I’ll follow, but can’t imagine what either of them would have to talk to me about. I’ve been watching Abby since Kaylee and Rhett swept her back onto the dance floor, so she hasn’t had time to tell Teagan our news. If I’m not about to get the ‘you better look after my best friend and not tear out her throat like you tore out mine’ speech, then what is this?
Petra leads me to the water’s edge where a Teagan waits. Her face is serious, despite the small smile that complements the light that never seems to leave her eyes.
Except for when she was catatonic, of course.
Petra makes a should have exasperation, so Teagan must have said something through their bond that she didn’t like. “Teagan wants me to repeat everything she says. Word for word.”
I nod once and turn my gaze to Teagan. Even if Petra is conveying her words, it’s Teagan I’m speaking with. I don’t think communication between two people has ever been so inconvenient.
“I know this isn’t usually how things are done, but I’m asking you for a wedding gift.”
A wedding gift? What could she possibly want from me?
“That man—the Guardian you’re all tying so hard to keep secret. Have you tried to change him yet?”
I wouldn’t say we’re trying to keep him a secret. Enough people saw what happened on the beach that word would spread, but the reason we ushered him away is that most of these people have reason to want him dead. So yes, he’s tucked away somewhere relatively safe, but he’s not a secret.
Either way, I don’t like where this is going.
I shake my head.
Teagan nods a fraction, and then Petra speaks for her again. “If it works, I’d like you to change me.”
What the fuck?
I don’t even want to bite him , and now she wants me to bite her ? No. Absolutely the fuck not.
I almost killed her. I ripped out her throat with a single swipe of my claws. I took away her ability to speak; to sing. I stole her siren song. I caused the fever that nearly stole her life. Triggered the change that grips her now and keeps her bound to the sea. Prevented her from dancing at her own wedding because she can’t leave the water for more than a few minutes at a time.
I shake my head again, more vehemently this time, and feel the panic rising in my chest. The panic I’ve been trying so fucking hard to keep locked away until this was done. Until I’d never have to take this form again. Until the monster was truly dead.
“There’s no telling how many years I will be tied to the sea. Some of your people are sirens and none of them have needed to change—and none have changed since being here—despite stepping into the waters. I believe that what you call a curse will be my salvation.”
No, no, no. This is all wrong.
My head is spinning and I can’t even blame the alcohol because I haven’t had a drop tonight. I haven’t had a drop since that damned witch told me I had to spend my nights as a wolf. I won’t risk losing control. I can’t become the monster again.
I open my mouth to say no—to say anything—but all that comes out is a mournful howl that drowns out the music and the joyous laughter.
And then I’m running.