Page 51 of Zodiac Beasts

Initially I was irritated that someone else had gotten her so hot and bothered without me, but this wasn’t the worst person who it could have been.

I held up a single black gemstone, letting the nearly full moon’s light shine through it.

Sharing Lila with Adrian was impossible, but Ceto might be fun.

Chapter 28

As soon as the door shut between us, I was on the floor, scrambling to find the scattered gemstones in pure panic. My blood felt cold in my veins, my heart was pounding in my ears, and where the fuck are they?

This was my fault for letting myself get caught up with him again, and again, and again. We’d been on and off for less than a year before I ended it, and in that time, even our make-up sex had been hate sex. He was probably right that the real reason I approached Lila was because she smelled like him, and that only made me resent him more. I hated the effect he always had on me, and the way some abhorrent instinct coded into my DNA wanted him.

I managed to find, three, four, seven of my gemstones. I needed all twenty.

Maybe this was a test. He was so worried that I was attracted to his mate, that he put me in a position where touching her would be a bullet through my brain, just to see what I’d be willing to risk for her. Trying to prove some kind of point at everyone’s expense.

How fucking Marcus of him.

I laid on my shoulder and blindly felt around under a display table. Nine, ten, eleven.

It would be fine. I could get a new necklace commissioned by the Warlock Counsel. It would take time I didn’t have, but all wasn’t lost. I’d gone behind my family’s back to get this one made, saving up for years to afford it, but I could just wipe out my savings again. The thought of meeting unpredictable strangers through matchmaking without protection was enough to have my heart in my throat and nausea in my stomach. The only reason I was able to bear with these obligations at all was because I knew I had my trump card hidden around my neck. Without it, I was completely vulnerable.

Another bead in the corner, another under the sportswear display. Fourteen, Fifteen, sixteen.

Marcus liked that. He had a knack for making me feel weak and submissive. Setting aside that he was an Alpha, between the way his compulsion could resist my paralysis gaze, while my blood was indigestible to his vampire, we were unexpected foils to each other, to the point our relationship had bordered on something human. Without our magic gifts to aid us, he was stronger than I was, more confident, and much more bold and brash. Internalized shame mixed with an instinctual desire for a protective figure were my ultimate downfalls, and I knew it. It was my fear that kept pushing him away, and it was that stupid, enticing simplicity that kept drawing me back in.

Let’s all be surprised that an Omega wanting something normal with an Alpha went terribly wrong.

I used a hanger to drag another gemstone out from under the sales counter. Eighteen, nineteen. Almost there. Just one more.

Where is it? Where the fuck is it?

I fully shifted my eyes, and I scanned the room, hoping the last gem might still have enough of a heat signature from my own body to be visible through my snake’s thermal sight.

Nothing. The gems I’d placed on the counter all still glowed in a barely there yellow from my recent body heat, but there were no traces of one more anywhere in the room.

I spent half the night on my knees, searching up and down and everywhere, hoping I’d simply overlooked it.

How is it nowhere? I need all twenty. ALL twenty.

I recounted the gems I had again.

Nineteen. Still only nineteen.

I was so frustrated I wanted to scream.

Did Marcus take one of my beads?

That realization hit me like a gut punch.

He hadn’t been here to set ground rules or assure we had a gentleman’s agreement. He was here to make sure I couldn’t safely be around her at all. He wasn’t simply intimidating me, but forcing my hand, so I had to take myself out of the game.

She was already safe with me, by the fucking stars. It was now me who wasn’t safe around anyone else.

That new necklace could take weeks.

Wait…

I texted Lila to suggest she wear the bracelet I’d given her, back when I wasn’t sure of her designation. I made something up about how it would compliment her sundress, though a harsh black piece of jewelry was hardly in tune with the softness of that design.