“You think my mate is beneath you?” Lightning crackled around Killian’s clenched fists.
“Stop, brothers.” Cade rubbed his temples as if warding off a migraine.
“Louis,”I read quickly, trying to defuse the situation,“sorry for stabbing you an inch and a half from your vamp heart and leaving you on the floor.”
“I thought we had a pact never to speak of that,” Louis murmured, looking both sheepish and hurt.
“In my defense, you were trying to drain me. You lost your cool, vamp man.”(Barbie no longer called the heirs “sirs.”)“You also stalked me. I forgive you for your lack of self-control because you’ve learned the lesson, and I hope you can grow from now on.”
“You tried to drain my mate, Louis?” Killian’s voice had passed through anger into something arctic and deadly.
“When she entered our realm, her scent was unlike anything I’d ever encountered. She smelled like ambrosia.” Louis spread his hands in a helpless gesture. “Who could resist? I didn’tknow what she was then. My biggest failure was not trusting my instincts sooner. Had I done so, everything would have been different.”
Killian’s eyes narrowed into slits of pure ice. “Are you implying you ever had a claim to my mate?”
“C’mon, Killian. Quit being crazy. You’re missing the point,” Cade cut in, his voice strained. “Let’s just move on. Let Sy finish reading the letter. Barbie and I have always been on good terms, and she has a good time in my House. I’m sure she has something nice to say about me.” He looked at me expectantly.
I read the next line.“Cade: Your budget sucks.”
The mage prince’s face soured as if he’d bitten into a lemon.
“You need to spend money to make money. I learned all about capital growth while locked in your dungeon after your minions forgot my breakfast.”
“Don’t you ever lock my mate away again,” Killian warned.
“You know why I had to do it,” Cade replied with exaggerated patience. “It was a house arrest with five-star treatment. And I’m not cheap! Barbie got me wrong. And I was foolish enough to take that selfie with her behind the bars, with a full table of food in the background. It went viral. I’ve had nothing but requests to book the ‘luxury dungeon’ ever since.”
I moved to the next line.“Now, Rowan! Quit living in a fantasy and pretending to be a gentleman. You’ve got to grab life by the balls if you want to give Sy the life she deserves.”
“Is Barbie a life coach now?” Rowan snorted, though a faint smile touched his lips.
It dawned on me what Barbie was doing. She was trying to lighten the mood, to make us laugh instead of rage. But we were barely holding it together, especially Killian, who looked ready to tear through everything and everyone in his path to get to her.
“If you don’t treat Sy right, if you ever break her heart, I know where to find you.”
I scowled. My sister meant well, but I didn’t need her threatening my man. I’d have a word with her when we got her back.
“Well, I’m running out of ink. This damn pen from the mage house must have been cheap. Anyway, I can stop Ruin, with all of your help.
Yours truly,
Barbie.
P.S. Pucker has instructions. Don’t kill him. He’s already dead and it would just be awkward.”
A heavy silence choked the room, each of us paralyzed by the same horrifying image of what Barbie had willingly walked into.
The letter crumpled in my fist as a sob ripped from my throat. Icy terror flooded my veins as I imagined the unspeakable torments that evil fucker would inflict upon her. He’d take her apart piece by piece. And for the first time in our lives, I wouldn’t be there to share her pain, to bear the misery with her. She would face it all alone.
A dragon’s roar ripped from Killian’s human throat, so full of anguish that the air itself tasted of sulfur and despair. His eyes, blazing with a storm of fury and primal fear, were fixed on a future no one could see.
“Barbie saved us,” Louis said, his voice hollow. “She saved the realm.” The painful truth of it settled over us all. Without her sacrifice, Ruin would have slaughtered every last one of us.
“Now it’s our turn to save her!” Silas shouted, slamming a fist on the table. “We need a plan, and we need it now!”
“I am not waiting for a fucking plan! I need to go after my mate now!” Killian surged toward the door. “Get out of my way!”
But the heirs didn’t yield. They moved as one, a coordinated wall of supernatural strength tackling the chaos king and driving him to the floor in a dogpile. Around us, generals and warriorsmoved, ready to add their weight to keep their king from a suicidal charge.
