Total pages in book: 141
Estimated words: 132138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 661(@200wpm)___ 529(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 132138 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 661(@200wpm)___ 529(@250wpm)___ 440(@300wpm)
She didn’t seem happy about the idea. And we didn’t even tell her about her brothers. Guilt eats at me. We were far too busy fucking her to see to her welfare.
“We should have talked to her.” Lach seems to easily pick up on my thoughts.
Though the full, deep bond wasn’t performed yet, I’m finding it so much easier to know what my brother is thinking now that Bronwyn is near.
“We will. Let’s feed her and let her clean up and then we’ll talk to her about our plans. And no dictating. Your ‘I’m the dominant one and you will obey me’ bit is going to get both of us in trouble. Let me handle her.”
Lach frowns. “It should be easier than this.”
“Women are never easy.” Dellacourt smiles. “They have all these feelings and shit. Of course they also have boobs. Gods, I love boobs. Kaj has the most sensitive breasts. Really, I can get her to orgasm just by tweaking her nipples the right way. Where did my consort go? Damn it, she’s shielding again.”
I send out my own plea, a pulse of comfort for Bron. There’s a flare of panic from her, and then it’s like a wall comes down between us.
“What was that?” Lach asks.
“I think our wife just learned how to put up shields of her own.”
Roan starts folding up his maps and locking down his tablet. “Well, deal with her. We’re going to have to take another route back to Aoibhneas. We ran into some of Torin’s men. They were tipped off to some odd behavior in the forest. Two men and a phooka.”
I’m not going to be made to feel guilty about that. It saved Bron. “Tell us when and we’ll be ready to go. Just know that Bron is our main responsibility.”
“And your sister is mine.”
There’s an odd comfort to the fact that the vampire will protect our sister. I’m just worried about who will protect Roan from Gillian.
I hurry my preparations. Lach and I find some cheese and soft bread and fruit. The owner of the house seems more than happy to provide for us. She speaks about how kind Isolde was to her and all the villagers. And how they will all follow her now that her true identity is revealed.
I’m grateful, but the woman’s words also frighten me. I don’t want Bronwyn caught up in this fight. I want her safe.
“The sooner we get her out of here, the better,” Lach says under his breath as we mount the stairs.
“Her brothers can handle this fight.” It’s their crown, after all. Bron’s crown waits on another plane.
Duffy’s eyes are closed when we reach the door. Lach chuckles and pokes at our adopted brother.
“I weren’t sleeping. I was just resting.” Duffy looks up at us. “I need me rest. I think I might have a vampire to kill.”
I sigh. Fuck all. Duffy can’t be pleased about the engagement. “Brother, you knew you couldn’t marry her.”
He shrugs and closes his eyes once more. “Always knew. Don’t mean I won’t protect her.”
“Well, rest up. We move out tonight.” I open the door and realize Bron isn’t waiting.
Bron is gone.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Bronwyn
I promise myself that when I make it to the tower, I’ll change into good old peasant clothes. My second-best dress is hardly making it easy to run through the fields. It seems to catch on everything as though invisible hands are trying to reach out and grasp me and pull me back.
I feel the tug of Lach and Shim. By now they know I’m gone. The phooka stayed behind to create some chaos, but before he left me, he taught me how to throw up some mental shields. According to the phooka, I’m wide open to the men I dreamed about most of my life.
I pull my skirt free of a branch. It tears. Like everything else in my life right now.
And I didn’t even know they were real. They spent their whole lives understanding that I am a real, actual living creature, but I walked around thinking I was insane. And everyone else thought I was crazy, too. And now Lach and Shim think they can just walk in and take my virginity and my blood and cart me off to goddess only knows where.
And that damn dog won’t stop following me. It started trotting after me as I left the village, and it hasn’t given up yet.
“I don’t have anything to feed you.” I stare back at the animal. It’s a pretty thing. She. For some reason I’m pretty sure the dog is female. There’s something delicate about its features. The dog—who might also be a wolf—sits back on her haunches as I find myself snarled in a bramble bush. “You don’t want to go where I’m going. So shoo. Shoo, dog.”
The dog snorts, her muzzle lifting in a fashion that makes me think she’s laughing. And it doesn’t move until I do, then the dog simply trots along behind me.