Holt’s gaze scanned our casual stance before he met my eyes. The shock of his scent hit me next and I jolted in Sasha’s hold. Chocolate mint and lemon zest. I used to find that scent on my pillows long after he’d left in the morning.
I was proud of my bland tone when I spoke. “Can I help you, Holt?”
He recovered quicker than me and gave me a smile. Soft, warm, open exactly like he used to. Then he met Sasha’s gaze over my shoulder and scowled. “I saw you come in here and I wanted to say hello.”
I waved. “Hi.” And then shut the door in his beautiful fucking face.
Sasha snorted. “Brutal, babe. I’m proud of you. Now if only you did that ten years ago, we could have spent more of our twenties having orgies with beautiful people instead of Ben and Jerry.”
I pulled from his arms and crossed the room to stare out the window. The sky had long ago darkened, but the horizon was lit from below, each city building a beacon. One day, when this was all a funny memory, I hoped to learn how the 2020 class managed to lock down an entire hotel.
I slipped out of my heels and flexed my toes in the silver plush carpet. With my feet soft and warm, I smiled.
Until a pounding on the door dragged me from the calm which had just begun to settle. Sasha reached the doorknob first, but I waved him off and opened it. The tirade queued up in my head, ready to launch at Holt, when my eyes didn’t stop where Holt’s six feet ended but had to travel up, up, up to the almost six and a half feet of the newcomer. He shoved past me and slammed the door. Then made a motion with his long elegant fingers and I felt something solidify in the wood as if the door had just become one with the rest of the wall.
Sasha made a noise behind me. His eyes were wide as he stared at the man currently panting against the door. Who… Oh, fuck.
Did you bow to fairy princes … or curtsy, or make a blood sacrifice? I couldn’t remember shit from my otherworld etiquette class besides they didn’t like to be stared at. Which I did now, no doubt.
He finally noticed me, too close to him, eyes glued to the white gold fall of his hair around his shoulders. Then I couldn’t do anything but breathe in the scent of him. Clean glacier water and primrose … and something else, something woodsy and elemental I couldn’t identify. Which would was impossible because I’d spent a lifetime throwing myself at my hearth craft.
He cleared his throat. “My apologies for the intrusion. It would seem some of our classmates forget themselves around me.”
Play it cool Cameron. Play it cool. “Well, you can stay in here until they get drunk and pass out. Which, knowing those girls, won’t take long. They were adding Malibu to their iced tea during the lunchtime reception.”
He snorted, and I caught the flash of sharp canines. Heat tracked up my neck and hit my cheeks. Damn it. Fairy princes don’t look at nobody hearth witches like that.
I stepped back, giving him some distance until a voice I knew all too well intoned, “Are you fucking kidding me?”
Somehow, Holt had slipped in with Aspen and stood staring between us in the bathroom doorway.
I pointed to the exit, and the huge prince who blocked it. “Get out, Holt. I don’t want you here. I thought I’d made that clear. With the door in your face?”
He smiled, sharp and feral, his buzz cut and piercing emerald eyes making it difficult to focus on his words. “Something tells me whatever Aspen did is permanent.”
“Prince Aspen, you’re not his family,” I corrected, before considering what the Prince might say about it.
Holt raised an eyebrow. “And I’m certainly not going to sit out there in the hallway while you are in here mooning over a hot piece of fae ass.”
I hazarded a glance at Aspen, who narrowed his eyes at Holt now, as if only just picking up on the tension.
Well, this was awkward. Unable to stay still in the face of the animosity building in the entrance, I spun around and walked straight into Sasha’s arms. The only home I’d ever known, the only friend I’d ever been able to keep, the only family I had left.
The other two men entered the room behind me and sat on the very large King bed which took up most of the space. A table sat on the far side of room, an empty expanse of carpet between. “How ‘bout a drink, Roni?” Sasha asked, rearing back enough to stare down at me.
I nodded and he tinkered with some bags and the mini fridge. Then he pulled out a dark blue bottle with crystals floating on the bottom. Knowing Sasha, it contained magic and shit ton of liquor.
“Is this a good idea?” I asked and stared warily at the bottle.
He filled some champagne flutes and handed one to each of us.
I glared at both the men when Holt took one. Sasha held his glass up, the soft lighting glinting off the edge. “To honesty. To love. To a world from a different view.”
No one repeated his words, but we all tossed back the contents of the glass in one go. It tasted like cherries, pineapple, gin, and… I smacked my lips together. “Is that, Water Hyssop?”
Oh.
Oh no.
“Sasha,” I hissed. “You didn’t. How much is in this?”
“Enough,” he didn’t even have the decency to mock shame.
I dropped the glass and gripped his vest, “How much?”
He shrugged, “One hundred milligrams an ounce probably.”
I did some quick math and released him with a shove. “We have about twenty-four hours then.” I rushed to the door and tried to open it. Whatever magic the prince performed on our exit, it wouldn’t budge, not even when I threw what little magic I possessed at it.
Fucking hell. My stomach knotted, burrowing into my throat. I couldn’t be locked in with Holt, or Aspen for that matter. I put my back to the door and took in the men.
Sasha wore smug smirk.
Aspen’s face was unreadable, a blank slate.
Holt simply looked confused, “What did I miss?”
I jabbed a finger toward Sasha. “Ask him. Although I have a feeling if we make it out of this room alive, he might be put on trial in Fairy for drugging a prince of the realm.
Sasha glanced at the prince and laughed. “This man has a better nose than even you, My Dove. He couldn’t be drugged unless he wanted to be.” He stared at me pointedly, like I’d also made the choice on whether to be drugged or not. Then he turned to Holt. “This one, however, is an idiot, and it’ll be good for him. For both of you.”
I wanted to scream at him and throw something, but I didn’t. I walked into the bathroom and slammed the door with a satisfying snap. The extra large jacuzzi tub took up most of the space. I’d chosen this room specifically so Sasha and I could get drunk after the official reunion and float in bubbles. Now we were all stuck together and the plans I’d created to get me through tonight floated away.
A soft knock interrupted the start of a good brood. “Go away, Sasha,” I shouted.
“It’s not Sasha,” a smokey voice that definitely didn’t belong to him, or Holt floated through the door.
I opened the door. “They sent you because you’re the least likely to get soap thrown at your head, right?”
He leaned forward so I could meet his eyes better, his hair sliding over his shoulder. “It would seem so, yes. May I come in?”
I stepped back from the door and let him enter. I shut the door with a softer click this time, then resumed my seat on the side of the giant jacuzzi tub and watched as he surveyed the room. Silence had always grated on my nerves, so I broke it first, “What’s it like in your home, compared to here?”
He didn’t turn to face me, but still spoke, “Cold.” His words held a world of stories and anguish, but I didn’t press further. “Why did you come tonight? After graduation, I assumed this school would never see you again.”
He turned to face me this time. His forehead bunched and his shoulders shifted as he weighed whether or not to answer truthfully. Something must have weighed in my favor because he sat beside me on the tub, “I need to find a wife before an arrang
ed marriage is made with another court.”
“Another fairy court?”
He shook his head. “There is only one of our kind. My family intends to marry me off to cement an alliance among your people or others.”
“No pressure,” I joked.
He didn’t laugh.
“I’m sorry, that sucks. Anyone in particular you are looking for, or just like, window shopping?”
That did earn me a smile and it was worth the effort to watch the hard line of his mouth turn decidedly up. It cleared just as fast and a hollow ache took root in my chest which would only be eased by inspiring another smile, coaxing them out one by one.
A feeling I didn’t understand, considering we’d barely spoken to each other during school, and never once since we graduated.
Ah. Of course.
I checked my watch. The drugs were kicking in. No doubt any feelings on either of our parts was just the Water Hyssop making its way through our systems, relaxing inhibitions, frying all filters for the night.
A soft knock at the door made me scowl at its frosted glass in its pretty chrome sliding track. No. I didn’t want to be out there with Holt. I wanted to be in here with Aspen and his crystal-clear primrose scent.
I leaned back and eyed the jacuzzi tub and Aspen’s big frame. Would he fit? Would both of us fit? Thanks to the Water Hyssop I wanted to give it a test run. I turned on the faucet.
He skittered off the edge in surprise and then glanced down in the tub and watched it fill.
Once a fine steam danced over the full tub, I turned on the jets and stepped in, clothes and all.
Aspen simply watched me. No identifiable features on his face. Until he spoke, “Wouldn’t that be far more comfortable without your dress?”
I shrugged as I settled. “I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.”
“Why would I be uncomfortable in the presence of a beautiful naked woman?”
The heat from the bath had already heated my cheeks or his words would have sent them straight to scalding. I leaned forward and unzipped the scratchy sequined material. Wiggling out of the soaked dress proved more difficult without flashing him. Finally, I tossed the sopping mess to the floor. Then I met his beautiful winter gray eyes and stripped my underwear off too. He couldn’t glimpse much through the jet bubbles, but he didn’t seem to mind.
It only took another heartbeat for him to go to work on the buttons of his shirt and then strip off his pants in one smooth motion. No underwear … did all fae not wear underwear or just him? It didn’t matter staring at the sheer naked beauty of him. So tall with long lean muscles. Like a ballet dancer, but I could see the hard ridges of muscle in every line of him spoke to his training as a warrior for his people. A king ready for battle…
All thoughts fizzled away as he lowered himself into the water. We had to maneuver around each other, his legs framing the edge of the tub and drawing me back against the long line of his body. Well, we didn’t have to, there was a deeper end opposite us. He touched me like he’d always been touching me, like he’d never known a day when his hands weren’t on my skin.
“You feel beautiful,” he whispered in my ear, then added, “amdeh allayah gulatey.”
The sound of the words spoken so closely to my earlobe shot me closer to orgasm than I’d ever been without some sort of stimulation. I cleared my throat with a croak. “My high fae is pretty non-existent. What did you say?”
“I said, you are a woman made for kings.”
I shifted in his hold so I could look up at him. Catch any emotion he might display. “And you, are you a man made for queens?”
He shook his head in the tiniest motion. “No, I am a man made for a goddess.” Then he touched his lips to mine and my entire world ignited. He didn’t just smell like clear glacier water, he tasted like it too. Cool and a little minty in my mouth.
I twisted in his hold so I could get better access and kiss him deeper, harder. I wanted more, so much more.
He didn’t seem to feel my urgency, taking his time to nibble my bottom lip and lick the corners of my mouth before coaxing me open and finally running his tongue along the tip of mine.
It was a kiss, a damn good kiss, but I couldn’t figure out why it felt like every nerve ending in my body was firing at once. I broke away with a gasp and stared up into his unfathomable eyes. Both of us were breathing heavily.
Then the door slammed open and we both jumped.
Holt stood in the doorway, framed in darkness. “Oh hell no.”
I flinched and Aspen wrapped his arms around me holding me to his chest, hiding my nudity and my shame.
“You will leave,” Aspen told him.
When Holt didn’t, Aspen tightened around me like he was prepared to launch out of the tub to get to him.
“No,” I told him and then shifted to look at Holt. “What do you want?”
Holt entered further and sat on the edge of the bathtub, not looking in the water, or at us. “I came to this stupid reunion to find you. To apologize.”
Psh. Did he think me an idiot? “You couldn’t have done that anytime in say… the last decade?”
He did look at me now, and I tried to ignore the beating of my heart like it rattled around inside my rib cage seeking freedom. “It’s the only thing I’ve been doing for the past decade. You don’t have social media. You don’t have any information listed online. No way for me to find you. Except, I knew if Sasha came to this thing you would too.”
As if summoned by his name, Sasha poked his head into the bathroom. When he caught sight of Aspen and me, he gave me a massive grin then crossed the room to peer into the water. His teeth gleamed, “Is he as big as his hands and height suggest?”
I laughed because I couldn’t help it, even Aspen chuckled against my back and neck.
Holt threw up his hands and turned to face all of us. “What is wrong with you people. I’m trying to…,” he broke off.
Sasha’s smile faded away as he glared at Holt. “You were trying to what? Bring up the past? Hurt her even more than you did then? We all know your family won’t accept a hearth witch. Why would they when they are the president’s magicians? You need someone more powerful, more connected.”
Aspen jerked against my back and I ducked my chin the heat on my cheeks more shame than arousal. I guess Aspen didn’t know I was basically powerless either. Awesome.
I moved to get out of his hold, but he tightened his grip and refused to release me. I peered up at his face, but I couldn’t quite tell what he was thinking so I added, “That’s right. I pretty much have no power.” I pulled myself from his arms.
He let me go and I stood naked and dripping in front of the three most beautiful men I knew. My chest aching like an open wound.
Sasha brought me a big fluffy towel and wrapped it around me with the familiarity he’d earned years over.
I stepped out of the tub and waved at the other room. “Can you make me a drink please, Sasha? And not the water hyssop or anything else I would object to. How about a nice and easy gin and tonic?”
Sasha kissed the top of my head and left.
I turned back to face Holt and Aspen who were glaring at each other. I motioned between them… “You two should hook up. Aspen would be someone your mother approves up.” I looked at Aspen. “Holt is one of the most powerful magicians I know.”
I walked out after that. Both turned on and needing to escape the seed I’d just planted. Because when I planted seeds… they always grew.
Sasha handed me a gin and tonic and then an empty wine bottle.
The water draining from the tub in the background couldn’t drown at the still erratic beat in my chest. “What’s this? Were you thirsty?”
He grinned, the corners of his eyes crinkling in the way I loved so much when he really smiled. “That’s for you.”
I turned it over. “It’s empty.”
“Duh. I figured we could all play a game.”
“Like what? Spin the bottle? I don’t
even know if Aspen likes men. Or Holt for that matter.”
Sasha blushed. “He does. We may have spent a little time together in college. Nothing serious. But there are very few things our lovely Prince doesn’t like.”
“Spin the bottle? Really?”
Sasha’s smile faded away. “No. We are going to play kiss for the truth.”
Two
I handed the bottle and drink to Sasha, hiked up my towel, and ventured back into the bathroom. I didn’t know if I wanted to find them kissing, or not, but I didn’t expect the dark look in Aspen’s eyes, or the heated one in Holt’s as they stared at each other in silence.
I entered and they both snapped their gazes to mine. “We are going to play a game.” I didn’t give them a choice or another option, I walked out, grabbed my drink, and joined Sasha on the plush rug near the window.
Aspen entered drying his hair, a towel slung low over his hips. Sasha let out a, “Holy Jesus,” from beside me and I couldn’t help but laugh and agree. Extremely agree.
Holt towered over us. “I’m not playing some children’s game.”
Aspen shoved him toward us, hard enough he hit his knees. He didn’t get up. “When a goddess tells you to play, you play.”
Sasha and I both exchanged a glace. If I wasn’t already wet just looking at him, that little move would have ensured it. I patted the rug next to me and met Holt’s eyes. “It’s not quite the game you are thinking. Sit. If what you said is true, you’ll want to play so you can finish what you started, and I promise to listen.”
Holt sat and glared at Aspen who sprawled sideways on the rug across from us. I shoved Sasha over so he could fan out the circle a little more. I picked up the bottle and spun it. Thankfully it landed on Sasha so I could demonstrate the game instead of explaining it.
“Sasha, tell me one secret, anything at all.” It was an easy one, but he and I didn’t have any secrets, so I was intrigued to see what he’d come up with.
He glanced around at the men and then at me with a smile. “I’d screw every single one of you right now.”
I’d have blamed the Water Hyssop on that answer, but it was typical Sasha. He never held any punches.
Wicked Souls: A Limited Edition Reverse Harem Romance Collection Page 46
