“Um, there’s been a mistake,” I said as I peeked my head out of the dressing room.
Xerxes had taken us to the “shopping district” of the city, which was one massive skyscraper.
The central part of the building was hollowed out, and a glass elevator went up and down continuously.
On all sides, going 120 floors into the sky, were shops for clothes, the home, and everything else a person could think of.
It was a far cry from the small businesses in the shifter realm.
I didn’t even know it was possible for so much stuff to exist.
“No, there hasn’t,” Aran said tiredly as she tapped her foot outside the changing room.
After the flyer got delivered yesterday, she’d sat in the corner of the room, in the dark, with a pipe in her mouth.
She wouldn’t come to bed or talk to me.
I’d forced her to come along on the trip, knowing she loved shopping.
She’d pointed out that I was risking getting executed and she was risking being forced to rule a bloodthirsty realm, all so we could pick out clothes for a BDSM club.
I’d told her it was worth the risk.
I was pretty sure she’d only agreed to the trip because she was low-key hoping we’d be attacked and she’d have a reason to fight people.
Sadly for her, she was still enchanted as a boy and the High Court had released a picture of her looking very girly and different with pin-straight hair.
But she still wore a baseball cap and sunglasses to hide her curly blue hair and bright-blue eyes.
Odds were basically zero that she’d be recognized.
As long as her disguise held, we were safe.
I called out from the changing room, “No, there definitely has been a mistake. I don’t understand how they made it so the straps cover everything but my boobs and vagina. How does that make any sense?”
I quickly pulled back the curtain to flash her my outfit.
The black material crisscrossed in straps starting at my ankles and climbing up to cover my throat.
Aran was in the throes of a deep depression, but my getup still made her jolt with surprise.
Cobra, who was walking past at that exact moment, tripped and slammed his face into the wall.
“Buy that. Immediately,” he croaked.
Aran rolled her eyes and pulled her other choices off the hanger. “Try this.” It was a gossamer white fabric that had fluffy feathers and sparkles across the boobs and sleeves.
I pulled it on and gasped.
The white contrasted with my gold skin and made my hair shine like pearls.
The feathers were fluffy and feminine, and the fabric showed my body when I moved, but I didn’t feel completely naked like in the other outfit.
“You’re a genius,” I said to Aran as I opened up the curtain.
“I know, I’m a great shopper,” Aran said, but her voice was strained and her smile didn’t reach her eyes.
What was a surprise was that all four of the men, who were supposed to be finding their own clothes, stood behind Aran.
“Princess.” Ascher groaned and shoved his tattooed fist into his mouth.
“Oh fuck, baby girl,” Xerxes muttered.
“Love,” Jax breathed out roughly, eyes wide as he admired me.
“I told you guys,” Cobra said to the men as his eyes darkened. “Although, Kitten, I personally prefer the last one.”
“Noted.” I tapped my mouth like I was considering it. “Don’t care.”
I shut the curtain with a snap.
When I’d settled on getting the nightie in white, I walked to check out.
However, I glanced at the tag and nearly passed out.
It was ten thousand credits, and the symbol next to it was the same money symbol used in the shifter realm.
Ten thousand credits was the cost of a large house, and about what Jax said they had paid us for each battle in the shifter realm.
“Aran, did you see the price?” I showed her the tag.
She shrugged. “So?”
“Wow, very royal of you.”
The despondent expression was still pasted on her face as she explained, “Sadie, the mannequins in the store are all covered in jewels, and there are real crystals in those feathers. The material is butterfly silk, which is the most expensive fabric in the realms. What did you expect?”
“I’d set my budget at fifty credits,” I said sadly as the butterfly silk sparkled in between my fingers.
“I don’t know if you want me to act like I relate to you right now, but I don’t speak poor-unfashionable-person language. Sorry.”
My spirits lifted. If Aran was feeling well enough to joke, then maybe she was back to her old self.
I chuckled, but Aran’s face didn’t twitch.
“Oh my sun god, you’re not joking.”
She grabbed a leather strip off the wall that was covered in skulls and started to wrap it aggressively around her throat.
It dawned on me what she was doing, and I slapped her hands, pulling it off her. “Really, in a public store?”
“Better than being queen of the fucking fae,” she snarled and pouted as I held the leather strap away from her.
“Shut up,” I whispered furiously. “Someone will hear you and take you back.”
“Kinky, Sadie.” Ascher walked by and grabbed the strap. “Didn’t know you were into props.”
Before I could explain the situation, Aran chimed in, “She also wanted that ball gag,” and pointed to the most terrifying-looking device I’d ever seen in my life.
Ascher smirked and added it to his pile of toys. “I like the way you think.”
“I’m going to stab you,” I whispered aggressively at Aran as two very tall beta women, with hair down to the floor, sashayed by.
They had black whips in their hands and an assortment of revealing clothes.
“Why haven’t you come up to check out?” Xerxes asked as he walked over.
He must have found clothes, because he had a sparkly black bag on his arm.
Xerxes wore a baseball cap and had sprayed some type of enchanted mist that temporarily masked his cinnamon scent.
“I need to find new clothes. Can you believe this?” I shook my head and showed him the price tags.
His purple eyes crinkled with confusion. “Do you need a different size? I can ask.”
“Yeah, it’s not gonna fit her muscles,” Aran said sarcastically.
“Now you’re just being mean. See if I stop you from strangling yourself next time.”
Xerxes looked back and forth between us with confusion.
Aran rolled her eyes like she didn’t care and chewed at her fingernails.
“No, the price, Xerxes. Can you believe this? It’s robbery!” I showed him again.
Xerxes shifted back and forth awkwardly. “I don’t get it.”
“See, Sadie, you’re just being dramatic. Stop being poor,” Aran said as she looked around warily, like she’d just noticed that she was exposed in a public place.
I had a sick realization. “If you ever rule, you’re going to be a bloody dictator, aren’t you.”
“One could fucking hope.” Aran itched at her back and walked away like she was bored with the conversation.
Xerxes cleared his throat and said softly, “Baby girl, you’re not buying this.” He took the hanger out of my hand and gave me an intense expression that made my stomach flip.
“I know. I just need to find a different store.”
He stared at me for a long moment.
Ever since the “heat incident,” where I’d accidentally come on his vibrating dick a dozen times, Xerxes had been looking at me with a dark expression.
I love you hung in the air between us like a tangible weight.
I breathed shakily, unsure how he could make me feel so on edge just by staring at me.
Xerxes turned around, but instead of handing the items back to the lady who worked for the store—she was modeling one of outfits that had cutouts around the boobs and lady bits, which was truly inspirational—he walked to the counter.
“You’re back, Sir Xerxes. Did you find everything you wanted today?” the beta sales lady asked sweetly, leaning forward to showcase her exposed boobs.
“No,” I said quickly and lunged for the overly expensive nightie in his hand.
Xerxes shoved me aside with one hand and sent me sprawling across the floor.
“What she meant is I’d also like to buy this in the emerald-green color,” Xerxes said.
Why would he get two of them?
We only had one day to complete the third trial.
“Of course, sir. You have great taste.” She giggled, completely ignoring the fact that he’d just manhandled me. “Do you want to pay again by fingerprint?”
I launched myself at him, but he expected my move and grabbed me by my ponytail.
Xerxes yanked my head back till I yelped.
“Be good, baby girl,” he murmured into my ear as he restrained me.
Then he turned back to the worker and nodded casually, like he wasn’t manhandling me, and pressed his hand on the shimmering black stone.
Apparently, the payment system worked throughout all the realms and was enchanted to connect a person to the amount of credits to their name.
Jax had explained that money in the shifter realm worked in the beast realm through this credit system.
My mind was still blown.
Seemed suspect.
“Oh, look, sir, since you’ve spent seventy thousand credits today, you qualify for a free toy.”
I choked. “Wow, what a bargain.”
“I’ll take the sex knife.” Xerxes smirked and picked up a small, glittering blade that was encrusted in rhinestones and glowing with a blue enchantment.
My mind had stalled at the words sex knife, so I almost didn’t process that the cashier was writing down her address on the receipt.
“I’d love to play with you, sir.” She gave him a coy look and walked around the counter.
She swiveled her hips suggestively, showcasing her crotchless panties.
My stomach twisted with an unnamed emotion, and I suddenly had the urge to shift into a saber-toothed tiger and pop her head like a grape.
Xerxes arched his brow down at me, and I realized I’d been making a low growling noise.
He didn’t stop staring at me as he said, “No, I’m taken. I already have an alpha.”
Then he took his bags and dragged me by the ponytail out of the store as I glared back at the lady and told her with my narrowed eyes that I would destroy her if she ever came near Xerxes again.
We all piled into the massive glass elevator, and it dropped with a whiz. Our feet lifted off the floor.
“So, are you going to visit her?” I asked casually, knowing he’d said no, but still needing to be reassured.
Xerxes, with his hand wrapped around my ponytail, gave it another yank. “Hm, maybe.”
A growl ripped from my throat. “Do it and it will be the last thing you do.”
We came to a stop, everyone’s feet slamming back onto the ground, and Xerxes released my ponytail only to grab my throat in a choke hold.
Cobra chuckled. “Oooh, Kitten pissed off the omega.”
Xerxes pushed me forward aggressively, so I had to walk backward not to fall over.
Shifters walked around us and didn’t pay us any attention.
What kind of sick place was this realm, where a woman being yanked around by her hair didn’t even merit a second glance?
Xerxes walked me backward until I slammed against a pillar.
“Stop shoving me against things.” I kicked at his shins as hard as I could.
“I thought you didn’t want to commit to our pack?” Xerxes arched his eyebrows, purple eyes blazing. “Was I wrong?”
“That’s not exactly what happened.” I kicked harder, but he didn’t release me. His muscles didn’t budge, so I turned to the other men. “You’re seriously going to just stand there as he chokes me in public?”
I made my lower lip tremble and widened my eyes like I was sad.
Cobra sniffed the air and smirked down at me. “I’m tempted to touch your cunt to see if you’re as wet as you smell.”
Ugh. I rolled my eyes. “Why’re you actually a pervert?”
“Kitten, I’d fuck you right here in front of everyone, and I wouldn’t even blink. I’d take you so hard you screamed my name.”
I ignored the way my core heated at his words.
Cobra was a lost cause, so I turned away from him and focused on looking pitifully at Ascher and Jax.
Xerxes’s fingers tightened like he couldn’t help himself.
Ascher ran his tattooed fingers across his horns and sighed. “I’m sorry, Princess, but I have to agree with him. You were the one who said you wouldn’t join the pack. What’s your answer? Either you want us or you don’t.”
Of all the times for the men to decide for us to have this conversation.
Cobra inched closer and flicked his finger over my nipple, and I jackknifed my foot into his balls as hard as I could.
He smiled like I’d kissed him.
My breath caught as worry flashed through me when he leaned into my personal space. Was he really going to touch me in a public place?
Hundreds of shifters milled around us.
Jax pulled Cobra back and put him in a headlock. “Not in public.” He growled at him.
“Why not?” Cobra stared at me and licked his lips.
Xerxes’s fingers tightened until I could barely breathe. Was he trying to kill me or turn me on?
I couldn’t tell. And weirdly, I didn’t want to know.
“Jax, save me,” I said desperately as I clawed at Xerxes’s hand.
“Xerxes, let her go.” Jax reached forward and used his massive size to constrain both Ascher and Xerxes.
I sighed with relief as oxygen flooded back into my brain.
Ascher wrapped his arm around me in support, and I slapped him away.
He was still a traitor.
“Well, that was exhilarating.” Aran stood to the side, hunched over as she itched aggressively at her back.
“You didn’t do anything to help me!” I said.
“First, you act all embarrassing and poor, and now this. Don’t be a drama queen,” she mumbled but didn’t look at me. She was too busy itching at her back.
Her obvious distress freaked me out.
“We’re not leaving until we find some type of healing ointment for…” I trailed off because Aran was miming stabbing me in my peripheral vision. “For me. Sometimes my bruises itch.”
“Kitten is hurt.” Cobra’s eyes blazed.
“Baby girl, why didn’t you say something?” Xerxes growled.
Thus began a small excursion, where the men panicked that I was falling apart and they hadn’t noticed.
Which was highly ironic because they’d just been publicly choking me.
Their irrational concern over my well-being had its benefits.
Case in point, we finally left the mall with five different creams for itchiness.
One of which was labeled a miracle cure, with a price tag that I was pretty sure was over one hundred thousand credits, but Xerxes had taken it out of my hand and bought it before I could say anything.
Ascher was the only one who wasn’t completely brain-dead.
He kept looking between Aran and me like he knew exactly what we were doing.
At one point, he pulled Aran aside and asked if she was okay, his handsome face twisted with guilt and concern.
Since Aran had responded by hunching lower and biting her nails more aggressively, the worry hadn’t left his face.
It made me feel better to know I wasn’t the only one concerned about her.
When we finally returned to the mansion, we still had a few hours until nightfall.
I followed Aran up the stairs, looking forward to a long nap.
But stopped with surprise.
The girls had made a makeshift track out of toilet paper down the length of the hall and were screaming as Noodle raced against a hamster.
I decided it was not my business where the hamster had come from.
When Lucinda yelled something about Jinx owing her ten credits because Noodle ran off the course and the hamster won, I ignored it.
Frankly, the girls developing a gambling problem was the least of my concerns.
However, my nap plans were interrupted by the scent of warm chestnuts, and a sheepish-looking Jax tapping me on my shoulder. “We need to come up with a plan.”
Aran took her ridiculously expensive creams out of my hand and closed the door.
I opened the door and pulled her back out. “This is a battle, and we only have one day to get it right. You’re a battle strategizer. You’re coming with me.”
Aran bit harder at her nails but allowed me to pull her along as she said, “If you’re too scared to face the men alone, just say that.”
“Really?” I said with conviction, “I thought you knew me better than that. I’m not a coward.”
She rolled her eyes but didn’t comment. She didn’t need to.
We both knew I was full of shit.
