It wasBlake.
I gasped, but whether it was surprise or pleasure I could no longer tell. A sound pierced my ears – a shrill, rhythmic ringing that drew me back from the moment.
The edges of Blake’s face wobbled, and his voice sounded far away.
“What’s happening?” I choked out. My words sounded weird, like I was speaking underwater. The shrill ring in my ears intensified, drowning out the pleasure pulsing through my veins. The room, the boys, the lips and tongues and fingers all faded away as an inky blackness devoured my eyes.
Blake’s grin followed me as I slipped away into oblivion. “Welcome to your wildest dreams, Princess.”
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
MAEVE
Iwoke with a jolt. My eyes adjusted to the dark, and I saw that I was no longer in the Great Hall, but back in my own bedroom. My hands gripped the sheets, bunching them into knots around me. My whole body was covered in sticky sweat and the ache between my legs still throbbed, my pussy desperate to be filled.
What the hell wasthat?
I’ve never had dreams like that before.
I was officially a nymphomaniac. Being around these guys all day, every day was making me mad with lust. And kissing Arthur again seems to have made itworse.
I knew, logically, that dreams were just my brain throwing up random images and sensations during the REM sleep stage, perhaps as a way of processing information that I encountered throughout the day. It stood to reason that my dreams might be particularly vivid or disturbing after I’d witnessed my parents dying like that.
But why was my mind going back to the same fantasy – that orgy in the middle of the Great Hall? And why was that Unseelie, Blake, always there, right in the center of things?
The shrill noise pounded in my ears. I glanced around, my heart pounding. If it was a dream, how did the sound follow me into?—
My phone.
The screen lit up, and it vibrated across my nightstand, the ringing piercing the din. I grabbed for it, noting my sister’s picture on the screen and the time in the corner; 2:28AM.
“Kelly?” I cried, jamming the phone to my ear. “Are you okay? What’s wrong?”
The fae were in Arizona the night my parents died. Corbin said that pouka Kalen was after him, but what if they went after Kelly next? What if?—
Kelly laughed, although her laugh sounded a little wooden. “I’m fine, Einstein. You sound weird. Did I wake you up from a nap or something?”
“It’s after two in the morning! Of course you woke me up.”
“It is? Oh crap, sorry! I thought I had this time zone thing right. It’s supposed to be the middle of the afternoon.”
I groaned.Typical Kelly.I’d explained the time zones to her a hundred times before I left. I even downloaded a conversion app onto her phone. But that was my sister for you. We’d been texting back and forth ever since I’d arrived, but I hadn’t had a chance to talk for more than a couple of minutes. Now, the sound of her voice sent a wave of longing through me.
I missed Arizona. I missed fry bread and chimichangas and the horizon following me everywhere and there not being any fae. I missed being a normal twenty-something science nerd with normal crazy Evangelical parents and normal science-nerd problems.
And most of all, I missed Kelly, even with her inability to get timezones correct.
“Yeah, well…” I rubbed my eyes and turned on my bedside lamp, illuminating only one small corner of my enormous room. “I’m awake now. Go on, tell me what’s up.”
“I just wanted to talk to you.” Kelly’s voice cracked a little. “I’m living with Aunt Florence and Uncle Bob now. They made up a fold out couch in the den. Every night I go to sleep staring at the corner of the pool table. They’ve been great, but…”
“But it’s not home.” My chest tightened again. I understood. Everything at Briarwood had been amazing so far, but it felt as though I was out of time. And I’d met Bob – Matthew Crawford’s arrogant radio preacher older brother who was convinced he was the direct word of God – enough times to know he wouldn’t know what to do with a strong-willed teenage girl like Kelly. Every time we came back from Bob and Florence’s house, our parents would get extra-strict for a couple of weeks, trying to live up to Bob’s ridiculous godly standards.
“Exactly. Bob confiscated my phone and most of my clothes. There’s no internet, no TV, but Uncle Bob does bible study with us every night where he basically talks about how it’s a woman’s purpose to serve her man and have babies,andthey’re trying to make me march in an anti-gay parade.”
Gross.“Yikes. Kelly, I’m so sorry.”
“I know. I tell myself over and over that it’s only for this year. I don’t know if I can stand it. The first week of school wasweird. Everyone was sonice. No one wants to talk to me in case they say something wrong. I made a joke in math class and no one laughed, so then I threw a pencil at Jake Skipper and Mr. Daniel saw but didn’t even give me a detention.” She sniffed. “It’s just so messed up.”
