Total pages in book: 70
Estimated words: 65151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 326(@200wpm)___ 261(@250wpm)___ 217(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 65151 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 326(@200wpm)___ 261(@250wpm)___ 217(@300wpm)
“Everyone native to this Dome believes you are Queen Svana, and you will be addressed as such for the rest of your life. Including tonight. In public, when you go to dinner in the city. Your first public appearance since the death of your son.”
The remembrance of female fingers inside her, then the gut punch of what the Alphas had done to her in the Undercroft. As if they were doing it all over again… as if Shepherd condoned it.
Her scream was from the deepest part of her guts, pain and shame and the remembrance of Shepherd’s betrayal when Claire had been forced to listen to his mate fuck that woman in the other room. “How could you do this to me?”
It wasn’t her who hit him. It was something else that had crept inside her skin. Something that grabbed that vase of red poppies and threw it to the floor to shatter. Who screamed as hard as she could and tore at her hair.
And died a little inside.
Wailing, vicious, as if he were the enemy he had been when they’d first met. She made Shepherd bleed. Not much, but enough.
Seeing the trickle of blood, it broke her already bruised heart. Her mate in pain because she had hurt him.
Because he was killing her… all over again.
And she fell to her knees before him, sobbing as her forehead landed on his shoe, as she gagged and hiccupped and fought for air and loved and hated the man in equal measure.
His hand came to her head, petting her with such care. Purr booming, loud, forcing a calm she might not find, Shepherd said, “I know you’re upset and that you think this is a betrayal, but let it be the legacy you should have been born into. You are a queen. My queen. Allow that protection to cover our children… they will be royal, little one. They will be beloved by the entire Dome from the moment they are conceived. I will make it so. You are beloved by the Dome—the savior queen who ended gang violence on the streets, rebuilt the slums, assured education to the poorest, and equality to the unrepresented. These things I did in your honor, as you would have wanted them done. You are the only version of Queen Svana they have ever known: compassionate, gentle, kind. Take the name; let me carry the rest of it. If you don’t, if you deny it publicly, it will cause unrest and endanger the lives of everyone. Not just my men and their mates. There will always be those who grasp for power. Do not give them actionable cause to create zealots.”
“I want you to leave, and I don’t want you to come back until you have to.” It was all she could manage to brokenly mutter as he helped her stand, careful of the shards of glass.
Because he would have to come back. Her body would need him. Crave him. Demand her treacherous mate. But not for a day or two.
“If you think I would leave you when you are this upset, then you really don’t understand how much I love you, little one.”
There was no room left to worry over Maryanne, no room to fret about forced friendships or worry over Jules. He’d gutted those concerns right out of her. Carved her to pieces with a few simple words.
And carried her to the nest to knot her as she shut her eyes to him and wept.
A tender, diligent, careful mate, who purred and pet and made her come until she forgot her name… so he could force her to take a new one.
Shepherd relieved this issue had finally been broached, his calm clear in the pair-bond, his resolve rigid that this was best unshaken by her despair.
7
Bernard Dome
Bright. Too bright. The Red Room’s windows caught afternoon sun at an angle that turned every surface into fire. Pupils contracting hard enough to hurt, Brenya’s eyes struggled to adjust, pattern-driven mind unable to resist cataloguing each beam cutting through glittering dust motes. Seven distinct shafts. Three hit the lacquered floor directly. Four bounced off the walls to create secondary illumination patterns. The mathematics so beautiful she could not look away even as her retinas burned.
But there were other discomforts pinging to be recognized by a disoriented brain.
A deep, delicious ache seated in her core. Not pain… no.
The throb of something well used. Something still tender.
A moment of recognition sparked, Brenya slowly awakening from her fixation to a world that had metamorphosed into blinding brightness while she’d dreamed. To a body that had been reborn. The blood-red austerity of the room too vivid, crimson blazing with an almost unnatural intensity. Shining to the point her eyes watered, and she had to turn her face into the chest of the male she slept upon.