In Malice (The Stolen Queen Book 1)

by A. M. Hodges

  Lucah inhales slightly, like he’s sniffing the air, and smirks at Jeb.

  "Reyna, you are looking delectable today," Lucah croons.

  Jeb lets out a low growl behind me.

  "Don't. Push. Me. Lucah," Jeb warns through gritted teeth.

  I turn sideways to look between the two males. Lucah is completely relaxed with a smug look on his face. Jeb on the other hand, is standing with every muscle in his body tense, his fists balled like he is ready to fight. The muscle in his jaw is ticking as he clenches his teeth.

  "Come on Princess," Lucah walks towards me, "bring it in for a hug."

  As he reaches out to hug me, Jeb is between us in the blink of an eye, his hand around Lucah's throat suspending him in midair. I gasp in shock as I try to shove my way between them, but Lucah is just hanging there, grinning from ear to ear.

  “Jebediah you put him down this instant!” I beat on his chest.

  "Don't Reyna," Lucah laughs, "I deserve this. I just had to be sure."

  "Sure about what?" I’m still struggling to get between them.

  Lucah merely cocks an eyebrow at Jeb and he releases him, still looking like he is ready to throttle him.

  "The mating bonds. I noticed the change in your scent the second you walked in. Plus, it's always fun to get a rise out of him," he angles his head towards Jeb, “Just a heads up, he’s going to be obnoxiously territorial for a bit.”

  "My scent? You can smell me? That's just disgusting Lucah. Keep your nose to yourself."

  He shrugs his shoulders, "Wish I could Princess, but being in the same room with the two of you in like walking into a perfume store. You reek."

  "Disgusting," I wrinkle my nose at him, "just keep your hands and your comments to yourself before I break your nose, or Jeb kills you."

  He throws is hands up in surrender and heads for the door.

  Jeb's face softens instantly when he looks at me, "I'll get my bags. You should probably come with me if you value Lucah's life right now," he warns before turning towards his room.

  Saying the ride home is tense is an understatement. Thankfully, Lucah keeps his mouth shut and Jeb is calm as long as his free hand rests on some part of my body at all times. When we pull into my driveway Lucah gets out and gives us a mock salute before turning to head towards the mansion. I turn to Jeb and he pulls me into his arms.

  "I won't be able to come over tonight, but you do need to practice with your wings. Promise?"

  I groan, "Ugh, I promise."

  With a satisfied grin, he kisses me and then takes off for the mansion. When I walk inside, the old man isn't home, which I expected. I drop my things by the stairs and head up to my room. Pulling out the old book that Jeb gave me, I sit on my bed and curl my legs underneath me as I begin to read:

  "In the beginning, the continents stood together, united under one name..."

  Rune

  They are taking too long.

  I need her here immediately. They had one duty, go to her realm and retrieve her, then bring her home.

  It was a simple task. They are trained for far more complicated things than this. I sent Lucah to keep Jebediah in check, but I guess that isn't going well.

  "Roark," I summon. The warrior appears from the shadows.

  He kneels before me, "My king."

  "Bring me the girl. If the others stand in your way, kill them."

  ∞∞∞

  Waking up for school this morning is dreadful. I'd give anything to go back to the bar and the penthouse right about now. To make it even worse, it's midterm week. I have my first two today, which sucks, but I have no doubt that I’ll do well. I’m walking past the women's bathroom on my way to Physics when I stop.

  Something is wrong, very wrong inside. I don't feel danger, the telltale prickling on the back of my neck isn't there. No, this is something else. Pain. So much pain. Someone's heart is breaking, and it’s being thrown at me like grenades. It isn't the usual teenage heart break, that's a feeling I got used to quickly being surrounded by hormonal teens in a high school. This is different. This pain is suffocating, nearly choking me.

  I don't have a midterm in physics today, so I decide to enter the bathroom. At this point I don't even care about the class; I just want to make the pain go away. It’s like a compulsion, the need to soothe their hurt. When the door closes, I check to see if anyone is in the stalls and lock it behind me. Because in the corner of the bathroom, curled up into a ball beneath the sinks, is Paisley Prince.

  I rush over to her, gently resting my hand on her knee to get her attention. She slowly raises her head and brings her eyes to meet mine. They are glazed and blood shot, the skin around them bright read and puffy. Fresh tears still stain her cheeks. She shoots out from under the sink and wraps her arms around me, holding me so tightly that it seems like I am the only thing keeping her from falling off a cliff.

  When she opens her mouth, I understand why.

  "S-s-soldiers showed up at our house this morning," she sobs.

  Oh no.

  I know what she is going to say. Even if I couldn't feel her pain, my heart would already be breaking for her. But I remain silent and let her continue.

  "M-my daddy. H-he, he's gone. He was out scouting with his u-unit and they were ambushed. There was n-no n-no ssurvivors," she wails in agony.

  Her heart isn't just breaking, it is completely shattering.

  "My daddy is gone, Reyna. He's gone and he's never coming home," she screams, "He promised! He promised he would come home! Why isn't he coming home! He left us all alone," she slams her fists into my chest before collapsing into hysterics in my arms.

  I know she isn't trying to hurt me. She needs this. The pain, the anger. She needs to get it out. I hold her close to me and whisper to her in soothing tones while stroking her hair. Do something. You can take it away. You can help her.

  I pull her away from me, placing both of my hands on either side of her face. I start rubbing my thumbs over her cheek bones as

  I look into her devastated eyes, "Be calm," I command as gently as I can, fresh tears free falling down my own cheeks.

  Her tears don't stop, but they slow to just a trickle down her cheeks. She curls up in my lap and as I stroke her hair, her breathing slowly returns to normal as she falls asleep, clutching what I can assume are dog tags in her hands. This is how we stay, and I send a text to Miles telling him to inform the principal on why the bathroom is locked. He responds saying that everything is taken care of and my teachers have been informed where I am. We stay this way until the final bell rings, and she stirs in my arms.

  "What's wrong," Jeb’s worried voice rings through the mating bond. I forgot there is no distance limitation to our telepathy now. He hears and feels everything that I do through the bond.

  Paisley's eyes flutter open to look up at me.

  "Later," I answer.

  She gives me a strained smile and moves to sit up. She goes to say something, and I lightly shake my head.

  "No words are needed P, I understand," I murmur.

  She nods as fresh tears drip down her face.

  I walk her to her house before heading to the mansion. As soon as I walk through the doors, I run into Jeb's waiting arms and break down into sobs. I tried so hard to stay strong today, even though I could feel every bit of her pain. My ability is a blessing and a curse. A blessing because I was able to help ease her pain. A curse because I still felt it long after she was gone.

  Jeb holds me tightly against his chest while I choke out what happened.

  Once I calm down, he pulls away and looks into my eyes, "We are no strangers to the casualties of war, my love. Soon, you won't be either. You need to prepare for that. We mourn the lives lost and we carry on so that they were not in vain."

  I nod and wipe at my eyes. He gives me a soft kiss and leads me towards the patio. Lucah is waiting to start my warmups.

  "I want to try something different today," Jeb informs.

  We both look at him in questi
on.

  "You used your empathic abilities at will and on your own. While the situation was not ideal, it shows that they are evolving. Today, I want you to practice using them without touch. To start, I want you to cast doubt on Lucah," he crosses his arms over his chest. His broody expression has returned and leaves no room for argument.

  I move to stand in front of Lucah and roll my shoulders back to release some of the tension. Concentrating on his face, I pull feelings of doubt in my mind and try to send them at Lucah.

  His answering smirk is enough to tell me I’m not getting anywhere.

  Before I can react, Lucah kicks out and swipes my leg out from beneath me, leaving me falling flat on my back and staring up at the sky.

  "What the fuck, Lucah," I seethe as I quickly get up to stand in front of him again, fists balled at my sides.

  "You weren't getting anywhere. And anger seems to be a trigger for you. You don't want me to do it again, make me stop," he taunts.

  I adjust myself and concentrate again, focusing on slamming him with as much doubt as I can muster. Before I know it, I am on my back looking up at the sky with the wind knocked out of me, again.

  "Fucking stop doing that!" I yell.

  "Make me," he smirks, "Poor little Princess. Can't even cast a little doubt. You can't fight for shit either. You can't even hold up your wings for more than thirty minutes. How do you except you fly? You're pathetic," he snaps nastily.

  As if it is happening in slow motion, I see his leg kick out. I took one step back, dodging his sweep, and roll my shoulders back as my wings eject and flare out hind me.

  "No, you're pathetic," the words come out in a voice that isn’t my own, cocking my head to the side, "the little shifter trying to keep up with a real warrior. Do you even know how to think without his command? Can you fight without someone telling you every move to make? You can't, can you? I was born for this. You are nothing more than a disappointment. Pathetic males like you don’t belong in my army. You should- "

  "ENOUGH!" Jeb’s command booms through my mind and

  my ears. I feel a hard yank on our bond that snaps me out of my daze. Slowly I retract my wings and look up at Jeb. He looks visibly shaken. When I look at Lucah, he is curled up in a ball on the ground quaking with terror.

  My heart lurches and I rush for him, "Lucah! Oh my god I am so sorry. I don't know what happened. Please don't be afraid," panic quickly floods me.

  "Just give him a minute, Krasivaya. It'll take a bit for the doubt to subside, and for him to get that image out of his head. Let's go sit inside," he lightly tugs on my arm.

  After a few seconds I relent, leaving Lucah shaking on the ground. I flop down into a seat at the table and Jeb goes to the refrigerator and pulls out some fruit. He throws some grapes and strawberries into a bowl before cutting up some watermelon, making my mouth water.

  "What image were you talking about Jeb?" his previous words come back to me.

  He sets the bowl down in front of me before moving to the chair across from me. A deep sigh leaves his chest.

  "After your wings ejected, your face changed. It wasn't like anything I have ever seen before. Your eyes, they glowed, completely melting your contacts. The whites turned completely black. Around them, all the way out to your temples turned deep red, and your eyes looked like they were rimmed with blood. I could see every vein in the red, like you were wearing a mask of black blood vessels," he takes another deep breath

  "And your voice. It changed too. It was your voice, yet it was a thousand voices. I could feel the doubt coming off you in waves, and it wasn't even directed at me."

  My heart breaks all over again and shame washes over me,

  "I'm a monster."

  Immediately he moves to squat in next to me. I can't even look at him. I really am an abomination.

  He reaches up and grabs my chin, forcefully turning my face towards him. I stubbornly stare at the ceiling, fighting back tears.

  "Stop that," he commands sternly, and I reluctantly bring my eyes to meet his.

  "You are not a monster, my love," this time his tone is softer, " this just means that you are more extraordinary than we could have ever imagined."

  ∞∞∞

  We decide to cut training short that night, considering that Lucah still couldn't look at me an hour later. Sitting in my bed studying, I hear a light tap on my window. My smile is automatic, not even having to look. I know who it is.

  Jeb pushes open the window before climbing into my bedroom, retracting his wings so that he can fit through the opening. I really am surprised that no one has seen or commented on the strange male with wings hovering outside my window at night. I guess I can thank my window being in the rear of the house for that.

  He grins as he climbs into bed beside me.

  "You know, you don't need any of this in Malatia," he picks up my calculus book, "if anything you'll need completely different schooling when we get there.”

  "I like to learn. Even if I'll never use it again," I don’t bother looking up from the book in my hands.

  "Nerd," he teases.

  I reach over to playfully slap his chest, but he catches it swiftly pulling me in for a dizzying kiss. With one swift move I’m straddling his hips, our kiss never breaking. When a low moan rumbles through his chest, I know that studying is no longer an option. My thoughts are consumed with nothing but desire for the stunning male beneath me. Ever since I accepted the mating bond, it physically hurts to me away from him. The longer and farther we are apart, the more the dull ache in my chest grows.

  Lucky for me, the old man is once again working late.

  Jeb's seductive grin tells me he knows exactly what I am thinking, probably because he can hear every single one of my thoughts, and his lips meet mine again. My over-sized t-shirt goes flying across the room and his fingers latch onto the hem of my underwear.

  “DO. NOT- “

  Riiiiiip. He gives me a cheeky grin as I stare down at him.

  “You’re taking me shopping for new underwear.”

  “Or,” he runs his fingers up my clit suggestively, “you could just stop wearing them.”

  I lean down and brush my lips over his, “I’ll think about it.”

  He sits up to pull his shirt over his head while I hastily undo the ties of his leather pants. He lifts his hips to help as I shimmy the pants down his long, toned legs before I crawl back up his body.

  When I raise up onto my knees to line him up with my entrance, he roughly grabs a hold of my hips to stop me.

  “Not yet,” he rasps huskily, “I want to taste you.”

  Effortlessly, he lifts me up and puts me back down with my knees on either side of his head. His arms wrap around the tops of my thighs as I try my best to keep my weight off him. He flexes, pinning my ass to his chest with demanding strength. I couldn’t move even if I wanted to. And fuck, do I not want to. Ever.

  My hand darts out and slaps the wall above my headboard as he gives my clit a slow, torturous lick that has my eyes rolling into the back of my head. My other hand is gripped tightly in his hair and my hips grind with the pace of my mate’s tongue as it swirls in relentless circles. I begin rocking my hips in earnest as my orgasm reaches its peak, my body shuddering as I go tumbling over the edge.

  My muscles are still spasming as he flips me beneath him and enters me with one powerful thrust.

  My legs lock around him and my fingers tangle in his hair as he pistons into me, our foreheads touching as we lock eyes. I see my irises glowing in the reflection of his eyes, his pupils dilated to the point that there is no green left. I catch his bottom lip between my teeth, earning me a sexy groan. His pace increases as our lips lock. The way he moans into my mouth as he comes drags me over the edge with him one last time.

  As he collapses next to me, he drags me into his chest, his fingers idly toying with the end of my hair. Before long, his breathing evens out and I fall asleep to the steady thrum of his heartbeat.

  Chapter 16
r />   Midterms are finally over, and winter break is quickly approaching. I haven't seen Paisley in weeks, but I have been making sure that someone in every class is keeping up with notes for her. The principal helped me set everything up and has a designated person that collects everything at the end of the day and drops it off at the Prince residence.

  I send her a text each day, even though she doesn't reply. What she is going through is a tragedy that has long been a fear of my own. I can't even begin to comprehend what she is feeling. If I would have lost Jackson like that, without even saying goodbye, the rage and pain that I would feel would be consuming.

  It’s a fear that all children and family of heroes have. When will be the last hug? The last goodbye? The last smile? The last I love you? I just wanted her to know that she wasn't alone, that there was someone thinking about her. When she is ready to talk, I’ll be here.

  When I walk up to the driveway to my house, I see Paisley sitting on our front porch, staring at her hands. I guess she is ready to talk now.

  Her head snaps up when she hears me approach, and she forces a sad smile onto her face. She stands as I step in front of her and pulls me into a long hug.

  "Thank you," she squeezes me, "I know everything that you have done for me these passed weeks. I am sorry for not responding to your texts, my mind just wasn't in the right place. For a while, I thought you would just stop if I ignored you, like everyone else did. But you didn't, and I will be eternally grateful for that."