PARTY
Belamour (noun): one who is loved.
DAY 9, HOUR 21
Aran was pressed flush against me, and I inhaled her wintry scent, dry ice exploding across my senses.
Music boomed from enchanted speakers and the room glowed with bright scarlet light.
The crush of bodies rocked around us.
We trapped her between us; John pressed flush against her back as I claimed her front.
My skin buzzed, but this time, the compulsion wasn’t telling me to keep her close and protect her. It was telling me to own her.
Mark her as mine.
Consume her.
Do depraved things to her.
Corrupt her.
Show her just what it meant to be the fiancée of an antisocial man with an attachment disorder.
I wanted Aran’s skin to tingle with pleasure like mine crawled with need. I wanted her to know my torment and understand what it meant that we owned each other.
When she’d accepted our betrothal jewelry, she’d agreed to tie her souls to ours.
Irrevocably.
Aran gazed up at me in the dark, her hooded eyes rimmed with dark bruises. My girl was tired and struggling with handling the weight of the war.
I wanted to shield her from all suffering.
I wanted to help her forget.
Cupping her face tenderly, I traced my thumb across her scar. The half crescent adorned the top of her cheek and enhanced her fragile beauty.
Warm breath tingled across my wrist as she leaned into my hand.
Melted against me.
She was an island of softness and trust in a harsh, jagged room of killers.
Loud music and gyrating hips. The scent of sweat and sex. Drugs consumed with desperation. Soldiers tried to forget.
She was different from all the men and women in this cursed castle.
I’d recognized her uniqueness the first day I’d met her, when she’d broken through my barriers. She wore it in her eyes, clear as day.
Aran was empathetic.
Terribly so.
In realms full of immortal beings where ruthlessness and cunning were admired above all else, she defied the norms.
Aran broke the equation of an individual’s power directly correlating with their callousness.
Case in point, I didn’t care about anyone but my twin, and the kings only cared about one another. The demons were consumed with themselves, and the angels thought they were the superior race. The shifters kept a close familial circle and distrusted outsiders.
We were all perfect soldiers because we killed others easily.
Slaughter or survive because immortality was a long time to live under another’s thumb.
Yet despite it all, Aran Alis Egan was compassionate and struggled to hurt others even though she was born with a crown and power in her veins.
How could one woman be so fierce, yet so caring?
The duality of man incarnate.
I stroked her chilled skin, and sooty eyelashes fluttered against the pad of my thumb.
Need burned in my lower gut.
Everything narrowed until all I could see was hooded dark blue eyes, wild blue curls, smoke curling from plush pink lips as Aran stared up at me like I was her savior.
Awareness exploded across my skin.
Because I wanted nothing more than to be her champion.
A tortured woman like her needed a tortured man like me; like Sisyphus, we were bound to suffer. Together.
Diamonds sparkled on her wrist, and the jewel of death hung heavy across her chest.
I was touching her.
She was at my mercy.
At last.
Since the party had started hours ago, John and I had stood against the wall, watching as she flirted with Sadie.
And even though I didn’t have an issue with the woman like my twin did—since she made Aran happy, that was all that mattered to me—it had still been frustrating to watch without touching. Claiming. Defiling.
Alas, she smiled differently when Sadie was around, so we’d stayed back in the shadows. Watched with amusement as they’d flung themselves through the crowd like battering rams.
They’d danced wantonly and drunk heavily. Taken random drugs from strangers with mischievous grins.
She’d been carefree.
Different.
She’d only sunk once into the darkness, but Cobra had slapped her and brought her back to reality. By the time John and I had realized what had happened, the snake shifter had disappeared into the crowd and the kings had arrived.
We would punish him later.
For now, I held her in my arms.
I pressed a soft kiss to her forehead, and her icy scent was like adrenaline straight to the veins.
My lips tingled from the innocent touch.
Electricity sparked between us.
Aran’s mouth curled up into a smirk, and she whispered huskily, “Fuck me in front of the kings, pretty please.” She batted her eyelashes.
Blood rushed south at the thought of taking her so publicly.
The idea of Orion watching was an added bonus.
Lately, I’d noticed how his dark eyes were always fixated on my Aran. He’d bite his pouty lips like he was dreaming of devouring her. I understood exactly how he felt.
It was intriguing to see someone else fixate on her with the same obsession.
The strangest part of it all was that I’d noticed he existed.
Now his long lashes fluttered as he stared at Aran with undisguised hunger. His gaze flitted in the space between our lips.
I liked knowing he watched.
I liked knowing he was just as obsessed, but she was mine.
I smirked with male satisfaction and cupped her precious face with both my hands, trailing my thumbs across her cheekbones as I cradled her before me.
“You don’t have to beg, love,” I said softly.
She inhaled sharply and relaxed into my touch. She let me hold her up. Own her.
I whispered into her halo of curls, “But I like the way you melt for me.”
A soft moan escaped her lush lips, and it was the sweetest ambrosia after a lifetime of starvation.
“This is your only warning.” My voice was rough as I pushed myself flush against her. “I’m not going to hold back because we’re in public.”
Navy eyes widened as her lips made an o of surprise, then she smiled shyly and mumbled, “That’s fine.”
I couldn’t stop my smirk.
It was time to show her just how attached I could be.
