He turned, grabbed my hand, and ran it along his cheek as he closed his eyes, and pleasure flooded his face. “I would do anything for you, Rayla Desmond.” He stepped closer, and the heat of his body surrounded me with greedy warm fingers that never wanted to let go.
I lifted my other hand and ran it through his hair, knowing how much he liked it as he sighed while cracking open his eyes as desperate obsession and possession took them over. I guess I was just as crazy because I was starting to like that look of his. It was uniquely Lex.
“Come on”—I nodded toward the office—“let’s go to the meeting.” I turned to go up the stairs when he tugged my hand, not letting go and not moving from his position. When I gave him a raised eyebrow, his eyes flicked to where they all disappeared.
“That’s a Syndicate meeting...” His eyes drilled into mine, trying to tell me he didn’t belong, but I refused to accept that.
“Yeah. And you’re a part of that.” He shook his head, staring at the ground in refusal, but I stepped down, grabbed his chin, and lifted his head to make him face me. “Yes. You are. You will always be a part of us until you tell us you don’t want us. Until you decide you want to sever that connection.” I gave him a crooked smile. “Even if the thread tying us to you is frayed, on the verge of breaking, I will reach out as it snaps and hold on with all my might, forcing you to cut my arm off to be free.”
He swayed into me, and his breathing was shallow as he gulped. “I’m not worthy of you, Rayla.” He pulled out something from his pocket, uncurling his hand to present a golden-pink, jeweled rose clip. The one I gave him all those years ago.
I was so shocked I gasped, realizing this was the way he was able to watch me. He held on to this small, meaningful memento from the moment we met—this was proof of his devotion in the flesh. I took both my hands and gently closed his fingers around it.
“That’s yours. I gave it to you.” Seeing our hands entwined, I realized I was as much of a toxic romantic as him. “Thinking about it now, I wanted a way to tie you to me, having you take responsibility for a piece of me, so when the day came that we met again, I would have something over you... and I don’t want to give up that power.”
His eyes searched mine, finding the truth in my words and squeezing his fingers around the pin harder. “You’ll never be rid of me, my rose. We’ll be together until the end of time. Nothing could tear me away from your all-powerful grip.”
I bent down, kissing his clenched hand as I breathed against his knuckles. “Perfect.”
I zoomed up the first set of stairs, holding my hand out to him with a smile. “Now, I think we have matters to discuss with the others. We got to face the music.” He looked up at me, and resolve filled his eyes as he stepped up and took my hand while walking with me to face the music.
We walked through the door to the war room, and everyone was already seated. My dad at the head of the table, each heir seated next to their dad, and a vacant spot next to my dad waiting for me.
I paused. A war brewed in my heart as I knew where my place was, but that meant leaving Lex alone on his own, and I didn’t like that, either. I was so lost in thought, I jerked as Lex’s smooth, dark voice whispered in my ear, “I’ll be fine.”
I took a short breath, nodded when I let go of his hand, and walked to my seat, and everyone’s eyes were on me as I kept my chin up and sat down.
“Now that we’re all here, I think we should talk about what we each found—” My dad tried to start like he had the upper hand, but I interjected real quick.
“I actually think we should start with why you, and these three, decided it was the best course of action to get captured by some drug dealers without telling any of us what you were doing. What do you all say?” The heirs nodded, and I looked at Lex, him being the decider in this mini vote.
He smiled at my dad’s pursed lips. “I think that’s a perfect spot to start.”
I turned back to my dad expectantly. He grumbled out, “This is an annoying development.”
“It’s my fault.” We all turned to Easton Winstale as he sighed like this was a major inconvenience for him. “I had a premonition, and we just went with it.” He tilted his head in thought for a second before continuing. “There were only two outcomes for this situation, and this one is the preferable one, so I would say it was a success.”
Syris threw his hand out to Easton while looking at all of us. “See! It’s all fine. I don’t know why you all keep glaring at us.”
That made our collective glares more prominent, and he threw his hand up, mumbling about kids thinking they’re in charge now.
Ax smacked his hand on the table, glaring down Syris. “That’s right. We were in charge, and we would’ve done a better job if you would’ve told us. Then we wouldn’t have had this mad scramble to get our hands around everything. We wouldn’t have had to use all our resources and time on trying to figure out what happened to you guys.” Manic eyed his son, and respect and pride shone through. Syris folded his arms and zipped his lips, but he had the decency to wince at his words.
“I think you all now know that you shouldn’t have done that. How about we move on to what you guys found out?” I asked to keep the conversation moving forward.
My dad looked up at Lex before he gazed around the table. “Since we had Easton’s spirit powers on our side, we decided to follow through with his initial premonition of getting kidnapped. I’m sure you saw how that all happened with all the video feeds we let record us. Once we got taken, they put anti-magic cuffs on us, and we couldn’t count on Easton’s spirit magic or our own magic anymore.” My dad cringed for a second. “That was an oversight on our part, but it is what it is.”
He continued with his story. “We were in the van for a bit of time, being thrashed around, before we were taken into this portal that popped us into a lab.”
“A ghastly smelling place with only fluorescent lighting that made the whole place look so dreary. The two humans who looked just as horrible, like they came with the room or something.” Syris gagged, and I pulled my lips into my mouth to keep from laughing.
“Anyway.” My dad continued as he glared at Syris, who turned his head like he didn’t notice. “There was a pretty powerful mage—”
Easton butted in this time in his matter-of-fact voice, “Kevin Quinton, who had always held a grudge against us Winstales for being vastly better than him.”
“Anyway.” My dad grew more and more agitated by his friends’ interruptions, but I was enjoying myself. “He put us into a large cage with a pretty advanced barrier.” Easton opened his mouth, but my dad blurted, “A barrier that Easton and Falcon could easily replicate.” Easton nodded his approval, and I realized just how much of an ego Easton had. “We stayed in that barrier until we had a visitor. Someone that we knew from a long time ago.”
The whole room went still as my dad stared at Lex before continuing. “Vincent Devil came in and said a few things.” My dad leaned back in his chair as all the heirs’ and Cosmo’s attention switched to Lex. “He told us about how he has been planning for years to take over the Syndicate. To make a new era for not only the supernatural community but for a Devil-only ran organization, wiping out all four of our houses soon. He ensured that fact, saying now that he had us, his nephew would take care of the heirs.”
