Thayer’s brows jump. “Really?”
“That would have come from the queen, right?” Grieves asks.
“Isadora certainly wouldn’t have made a statement like that without consulting my grandmother first.”
“She’s all but saying if we bond her, we can finally claim Piers as ours,” Court says, bouncing on his toes. “Publicly.”
The prince gives a slow nod. “Yes.” A smile spreads over his face and he crushes Piers to his chest. I stumble back a step, feeling both filled and hollow at the same time. “We can finally claim you, love,” he murmurs to his beta, stroking a hand down his back. “Everyone will finally see what you mean to us.”
Piers deserves this. And didn’t I always know this was how this was going to end? With one statement to the press Isadora and the queen granted them the ability to do something that should have been done years ago.
The queen will sanction their bond with Piers, accept him into the royal family, so long as they bond Isadora.
And that’s what leaves me hollow.
There’s a long moment where the five of them stroke and kiss and murmur to each other and I stand on the outside looking in at what this pack should have always been. A contradiction of emotions swells and swells. Happiness and hurt. Gratitude and resentment. Hope and loss.
Tears prick my eyes and I don’t know if they’re the good tears or the bad. Only that when I blink they’re spilling over my cheeks silently. I need to leave, need to get out of here. Need to get space from them.
And they need time to process this as a pack. Without some interloper watching on like a creeper.
I step back on quiet feet, intending to sneak out the door and go to the big house, let Haven wrap me in her arms and hold me close. Or if she’s busy with one—or all—of her pack, I can go home. To my mother’s and cuddle with Ginny on the couch instead.
I swipe at my cheeks, my eyes, and turn to flee.
“Where do you think you’re going, bubbles?”
I pause, one foot lifted and look over my shoulder to find all five of them watching me, Piers still at their center, like he should always be.
“I’m just… I’m going to give you space to discuss this as a pack.”
“And you think that doesn’t include you?” Thayer asks, in that professorial way of his.
“It doesn’t.”
A chorus of growls meets that statement, their displeasure at me clear. And under any other circumstance, with any other groups of men—of alphas—I would quell under it, my omega cowering under their dominance. But not here. Not with them. They don’t deserve my submission. So I twist back around and face them, square up to them, lifting my chin and glaring at them.
“Oh, I’m sorry. Do you think offering to make me your mistress makes me a part of your pack? Do you think doing the bare fucking minimum to make sure I’m not dying means I’m suddenly a part of you? You haven’t actually offered me anything beyond being your dirty little secret, you do realize this, right?”
Forsythe’s jaw ticks. “We can discuss this more later. Right now we need to think about going back. This is a concession on the part of the queen and we need to capitalize on it. We’ve been gone too long.”
I blink at him, at the way he just brushed aside my concerns, my truths.
The rest of the pack looks at me, waiting to see how I take this. “Are you willing to give me more than a cottage in the country and a quick fuck every now and then?”
The prince, who had apparently been caught up in his plans for the future, jerks his attention to me, his gaze sharp. “My heart. Our hearts. Our love. Our devotion. Everything.”
“Everything but your time, right? And probably not your bonds. Hell, I wouldn’t even have freedom, would I? I’d have to stay hidden or people would wonder why I was in Bravonne, wouldn’t they? No, they wouldn’t even wonder. Because everyone knows we’re fated mates. They’d know and they'd also know that you still picked Isadora over me.” I shrug, folding my arms over my chest. “Until you can give me more, I’m not going anywhere.”
“Killer, come on. We’re talking about your health here. Your life.”
“I don’t need you to remind me of that. It's my body, my pain, my fever. I’m well aware of what it’ll mean for me when you go. But I’m not willing to give up my entire life, my family and friends, my community, to be your kept whore.”
Court makes a wounded sound. “You know that’s not what you are to us, Pix. You couldneverbe that to us.”
Just like I can never be their chosen mate. Not until they get over their misguided sense of duty. Maybe I’m being unfair. But I don’t think I am. I deserve better than this.
I have no fucking clue what fate was thinking when she pushed us together.
