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.Youare 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 tothe point her eyes watered, and she had to turn her face into the chest of the male she slept upon.
And when her nose was warmed by the rich scent of Beta deliciousness, the tickle of his chest hair on her lips, the hard definition of his body, her straining eyes found new patterns to obsess over.
Black marks twisting over his skin, bleeding their secrets together in sharp angles and soft curves.
A blink. Another blink. A growing tick tapped the back of her brain. Aclick, click, clickthat came in bursts, then retreated. An internal demand that she rebuild her nest. Survey what was needed and what was not.
Tidy a mess she couldn’t quite pin down.
Compulsion drew her twitching gaze away from the slumbering man, to run her eyes over each corner of their sleeping place, Brenya retreating from his arms.
Myriad pillows lay scattered, the story of how he’d fucked her told in splashes of color against the monochromatic Red Room’s monotony.
Until that moment, she’d never realized how colorful the fabrics of her nest had been. How the Beta had provided a rainbow. Different textiles, different textures.
And it wasn’t just the nest coming into focus, but the Red Room she had lived in for weeks. Only yesterday had it been nothing but a room painted red with a dark story and mysteries baked into the walls.
It must have been the excess light, but now half-blind with the brightness, Brenya could see the patchwork of the floor, and the furniture, and the paneled walls changing hues of red lacquer signifying an individualenemy of the statesmeared here and there. One victim’s blood tinted the bedposts deep crimson, while vermilion splattered across the adjacent wall. The inlaid wooden floor was tinged claret with vivid scarlet accentingparquet tiles in alternating patterns. Each a story of the violence committed by Bernard Dome’s founder.
It was disgusting.
Terrible.
