For fuck’s sake.
I followed the sounds of panting to a set of double doors with what appeared to be a very…diverse orgy carved into it. Wood cracked and splintered as I planted my boot in the center of it, breaking the lock as I kicked it open.
A pale-haired woman twisted at the waist, her dark eyes glinting in the low light. Who I assumed was Lord Hawley was still beneath her as blood-red lips peeled back in a hiss, revealing slightly elongated canines.
“You sound like a strangled barrat when you come,” I said. “That is if you weren’t faking it.”
“Who the fuck are you?” Lady Hawley snarled.
“Your worst nightmare.” I paused. “Clichéd, but true.”
“How dare you?” Lord Hawley huffed from beneath his wife.
“Because I can.”
The Lord sputtered as he gripped his half-dressed wife’s hips and lifted—well, more like tossed—her aside. She landed with a shriek and bounced, nearly tumbling off the bed.
Lord Hawley jerked upright, his pale chest looking like he’d gotten into a fight with a feral cat and lost. “I don’t know who you think you are, but you will not speak to me like that. I will have your tongue, you filthy—”
“He will speak to you however he pleases.” Poppy’s voice was like a scorching wind, silencing him as both Ascended’s gazes darted behind me. “Get out of that bed before I drag you both from it.”
“You have five seconds.” I took a step back. “And you’d better use one of them to put your dick away.”
“And your breasts,” Poppy added before pivoting on her heel.
They scrambled from the bed, the Lady tugging the front of her dressing gown together. I wasn’t sure why she bothered when the white fabric was little more than gauze. I didn’t take my eyes off them as the Lord fumbled with his breeches. Stillhaving no idea who I was with my features hidden, the Lady breezed by me with a flick of her tangled blond hair. Lord Hawley sniffed as he passed as if smelling something rotten. I rolled my eyes and followed the male out to the drawing chamber.
“Prince Malik.” Lady Hawley’s black gaze gleamed with hunger as she swept his body with a long glance. Stopping in front of him, the bodice of her gown hanging loosely from her shoulders and barely covering the swells of her breasts, she toyed with one of the buttons she had forgotten to clasp. “You may be a traitorous bastard, but you do look quite…tasty.”
“Fuck off,” my brother replied.
Her laugh grated like nails against glass. “How brave you are when you think you no longer have a collar around your throat.”
“How dead you will be when I snap your neck,” Poppy answered, stepping in front of Malik.
Lady Hawley huffed, her lip curling. “Oh, your kind is so deliciously arrogant.”
“Deliciously?” Lord Hawley laughed as he went to the table and picked up a chalice, his gaze skipping over Delano. “More like pathetic.”
“Is that so?” I asked.
The female hummed as she also turned to Delano. Drawing her lower lip between her teeth, she eyed him. “Another wolven. I wonder if you will answer what the other would not.”
Delano said nothing.
“Do you prefer to fuck in this form?” she asked with a high-pitched giggle. “Or in that of a wolf?”
“That is enough,” Poppy said.
“And who are you to decide when anything is enough?” Lord Hawley faced Poppy. “Let me tell you. You may think you have authority over us, but you’re no one.”
“No one?” Poppy’s cloaked head tilted toward Malik. “You failed to mention what idiots they were.”
“I did,” he replied.
“Idiots?” The lady spun on her.
“Yes. Do I need to explain what that is to you?” Poppy offered as I saw the vampry’s muscles tensing. “Foolish. Unwise. Of low—”
