Prince of Honor (House of Terriot Book 1)

by Nancy Gideon

  Cale sat on the bar, the same bar where James had stabbed him in the back what seemed like years but was only months before. Beer in hand, his queen seated on a stool between the squeeze of his knees, he laughed at something she was saying, his smile wide and relaxed, his free hand playing with her pale blonde hair. Awareness of a change in the room brought his gaze up. Delight at seeing Turow quickly altered to a colder, darker intensity as his brother drew up before him.

  Turow went down to a respectful knee, the gesture humble and sincere. Even then, he retained his grip on Sylvia’s wrist.

  “Stand up, brother,” Cale insisted, waving off the formality. “It’s good to see you. I was worried when I didn’t find you here when we arrived.”

  “You’re looking well, my king.” Turow rose, his attention on Cale as if no one else was in the room. “It’s good to be home.”

  “You’ve brought my prisoner.”

  “No, my king. I’ve brought my princess.”

  CHAPTER NINE

  For a long, deadly-silent moment, Cale just stared at the two of them, eyes blanked of comprehension. Then, slowly, a harsh ruddy color rose into his face.

  “I must have misunderstood what you just said to me.”

  “No, my king. You understood just fine.”

  “I don’t think I did. Because I remember telling you to bring that bitch back in chains to face our family’s justice, and now you’re telling me—What the hell are you telling me?”

  Turow explained without words, drawing the neckline of Sylvia’s sweater over far enough to expose the faint scarring of his mark just below the junction of throat and shoulder.

  Alarmed by the fury massing in their leader’s expression, Sylvia restored her clothing and tried to distract his temper to her. “Cale, it’s my fault.”

  “Shut up, whore!” he snapped. “I know it’s your fault! And mine for not ending you myself in New Orleans!”

  “Use a respectful tone when you speak to or about my mate, or you won’t speak to me again.”

  Said so softly, with no undue emphasis or emotion, the content of Turow’s remark took a moment to register. Sylvia’s gasp was as loud as a scream as a deeper, expectant silence fell over the room. She stared up at him, stunned, aghast, but Turow didn’t look at her. His stare was fixed in unblinking challenge upon their new leader.

  Equally surprised as the weight of his brother’s words settled with the impact of a fist, Cale reared back slightly as if from an unfair blow. Struggling for a response, fury narrowed his eyes into a dangerous squint.

  Instead of giving him time to frame an answer, Turow took the insult one unforgivable step farther. This time, an unbending whisper of steel underlined his single demand.

  “Apologize.”

  Cale’s jaw sagged then clamped shut, muscles spasming over the grind of his teeth. He drew in a deep breath through the flare of nostrils.

  Sylvia saw their doom in that sharp inhalation.

  Clasping Turow’s arm, trying to tug him from his fatal stance, her anxious gaze cutting between the two unbending figures, she laughed off the tension.

  “That’s not necessary. No insult was taken that wasn’t deserved. There was trouble. He was injured. He’s not himself. He didn’t mean it, my king.”

  “I did,” Turow disagreed in quiet rebellion, adding even more forcefully, “And I do.”

  Terrified by the volatile situation, Sylvia cast a desperate glance to a most unlikely source.

  With subtle nuance, Kendra stroked her fingertips across Cale’s fisted hand. Her words didn’t reach beyond the four of them.

  “Gently, my king.”

  The moment stretched out, quivering with explosive possibility. Finally, Cale drew another slow breath. His aggressive, forward-leaning stance eased back. His attention slid to the focus of dissention to address her in a flat, even voice.

  “That was no way to address a princess in the House of Terriot. It won’t happen again. Please accept my apology.”

  Trembling with relief, Sylvia managed to draw up a regal pose. “Gratefully, my king.”

  With a death’s head smile, Cale looked to Turow. “My brother and I have things to discuss.” He motioned to Tony, the other watchdog who was never far from his side. “See the princess to her mate’s room. She can wait for him there while he and I have a word.”

  Kendra slid off her stool in quick intersession. “I’ll go, too, and see she’s settled in properly.”

  Cale’s displeasure wasn’t obvious to any other than the two of them. “Thank you, my queen. Make sure our sister feels at home.” He hopped down from the bar and barreled through the room with his brawler’s stride, never checking to see if Turow followed. Knowing he would, a silent shadow.

  Leaving Sylvia to face the room’s violent undertow alone.

  She knew them all. Some had catered to her whims to get into her inner circle, or her bed. Some had been the victims of her wrath, or worse, her spite. Most looked at her with a loathing so strong it hung on the air like a palpable scent. Animals sensing weaker game.

  Her half-brother Wesley stood off to one side with James’s silly cousin whose name escaped her. Slowly, he nodded, sharing a small, congratulatory smile. She clung to the fact that he didn’t openly disown her. A tiny victory.

  Following as Tony cut a swath, Kendra hurried the clan pariah through their murmuring family out into a cold only slightly more bitter than her mood. Traveling the same path where the petite blonde had knocked her rival to the ground with a surprising right hook, Kendra let loose a fury to match her king’s.

  “I warned him. I knew he wouldn’t listen. How could you do this? How could you ruin such a good man?”

  Because that claim cut as close to the bone as the wind chill, Sylvia didn’t bother with a lie. “It was the only way he’d let me save his life.” Kendra’s probing look demanded more, but Sylvia didn’t elaborate in her defense.

  They weren’t friends. They’d been fierce rivals, even though Sylvia now knew she’d never stood a chance with Cale. For him, it had always been Kendra. How that always stuck in her throat. She couldn’t blame Kendra for their new king’s singular devotion. But she had. And resentment still growled beneath the surface, especially since the clan’s popular queen insisted on treating her fairly and even considerately. How she hated that about the other female, that ability to rise above petty jealousies to be the better woman.

  Of course, Kendra could afford to be generous. She’d won everything, had everything. What did it cost her to throw a few crumbs of kindness down to a fallen foe? It only made their people love her more.

  At the moment, Sylvia was too ragged to indulge in self-pity.

  Until she saw where she’d be housed. In a third floor studio-sized apartment with the picture of a stern-faced old woman glaring down at her.

  Sylvia was no stranger to the dorms for unmated males. In fact, she’d visited this particular tight and tidy square almost ten years ago when initiating a virginal Turow Terriot into the ways of the world. Right beneath his grandmother’s scowling stare. And now, she was back and it seemed nothing had changed. Nothing, and everything.

  Kendra stood just inside the door, glancing about in curiosity. Not much to see, but it said everything about the man in question. Stark, beige and bland, with no color or comfort anywhere. Especially not from the scrutinizing eyes of his grandmother’s portrait hung awkwardly above the twin-sized bed he’d had since he was an adolescent. The two females exchanged cautious glances.

  “Thank you.” Sylvia extended that reluctantly.

  “Cale would never harm Turow.”

  “So why did you step in?”

  A faint smile. “Because he doesn’t feel the same way about you.”

  “So you did this for me? Why?”

  “Because if you were punished, it would hurt Turow, and being the source of his pain would wound my king. They don’t deserve that.”

  “But I do.” A flat statement and a flatter st
are daring her to deny it.

  “Oh, yes. You deserve everything Cale planned for you, and you know it. But I won’t have them suffer for your foolish and selfish actions.” For an instant, Kendra’s true feelings burned hot in her dark eyes. Then the hostility was cloaked once again in mildness. “I’ll have Tony remain outside your door until Turow returns.”

  “In case I decide to run away? Where would I go?”

  Kendra’s reply ripped her sarcasm away.

  “To protect you in case others don’t feel as forgiving as our king. If you break Turow’s heart, I’ll be one of them. Sleep well in the bed you’ve made.”

  The door closed soundlessly and at the same time echoed as loudly as the slam of a prison cell.

  Too tired to pretend she didn’t merit those harsh parting words, Sylvia looked about the unwelcoming four walls. Not even a television. What did her Terriot prince do to entertain himself? Mediate on ways to grovel before their new tyrant king?

  Ashamed of that undeserved thought, Sylvia dropped wearily onto the edge of the bed, perplexed by a crinkling sound. Lifting the mattress, she gave a lusty chuckle.

  Her virtuous prince liked porn!

  “Good for you!”

  Tucking the naughty girly mags out of sight, she caught Grandmother Mildred glowering down in disapproval. Sylvia turned the picture to face the wall.

  “What you don’t know won’t hurt him.”

  And knowing about her grandson’s choice of mate would probably give the old bat a heart attack.

  With nothing to do except worry about what was transpiring between her protector and her potential executioner, Sylvia lay back on the narrow bed to close her eyes. She’d survived the first encounter with her well-deserved fate. No sense borrowing trouble by anticipating complications to come. And no sense torturing herself over the truth in every word Kendra had spoken.

  She’d made her bed. She had only herself to blame if it was hard and unwelcoming.

  Turow knew there’d be trouble the second he saw a tic jump in his brother’s cheek.

  “So,” Cale drawled out, “you wanted to fuck her, so you made her a princess in the House of Terriot.”

  Cale closed the door behind them for privacy. The room had once been their father’s office. The faces of his Twelve of the House of Terriot had paraded across the wall, bright with the ignorance of youth. His sons. His legacy. They’d never entered to stand before Bram the Beast without a sense of dread. Everything had been stripped from that den of madness right down to the dark paneling and remade to suit his brother’s relaxed rule. Even the suffocating smell of oppression and ill-will was gone.

  But that didn’t make Turow any more comfortable as he faced his king.

  Tension spasmed in his own jaw. “That’s not why we bonded.”

  Instead of taking one of the rustic sofas and inviting Turow to do the same, Cale squared off with him in the center of the room, getting in his face. Still simmering with insult and upset as he demanded, “Then it’s a love match? One of those written in the stars kinda things you see in chick flicks? Has she sworn her undying devotion to you, in sickness and in health, et cetera?”

  The sneering words bristled the back of Turow’s neck. He answered stiffly. “That didn’t come up.”

  “Oh. I see. A political hook-up, then. I can understand the advantage of that. If either one of you was in a position of power for it to matter a damn!” His voice escalated to a roar.

  Turow never saw his hand coming. The smack to the side of his head had him stumbling before he caught himself. If their father had been behind that blow, his jaw would have been broken. As it was, his ears rang.

  “What the hell were you thinking? What were you thinking with?”

  “You and Kendra—”

  “Me and Kendra, what?” his brother raged at that weak defense. “We’d been in love with each other since before we were teenagers. We dreamed of making a life together and fought to make it happen because we couldn’t imagine not being in each other’s lives, of completing each other’s futures. Yes, we wanted to fuck, and yes, it was political, but those things didn’t push us to mate or, for fuck’s sake, bond! That’s forever, Row. For fucking ever! You share your dreams, your genetics, your families. Every fucking thing!”

  “That’s what I want with her,” Turow told him quietly.

  That stunned his brother into a moment’s silence. Then, as if they faced each other in their father’s arena with weapons of choice, Cale attacked. “And what does she want with you? What does she want from you? Did you ask? Would she have jumped just as quickly if Rico or Colin had asked her back into the heart of our family under their wing, into their bed? Did you put your dick away long enough to even wonder?”

  He was wondering now.

  “Dammit, Row! I thought I could trust you to be the level-headed one.”

  Before Turow could reply to the killing thrust of that lament, Cale snaked an arm about his neck to pull him in tight, to speak gruffly against his ear.

  “There’s nothing I can do to change this. I wish I could.”

  “I don’t want you to, Cale.”

  His answer surprised them both. Once he’d put it out there, Turow realized the truth in his own heart. He had no doubts or regrets over what he’d done, and wasn’t ashamed to admit it.

  “I chose her, Cale. I want her. I have since the first time I saw her. I haven’t been able to think about anyone else. I don’t want to be with anyone else.”

  Cale palmed the back of Row’s head, clenching fingers in his hair to give him a hard shake. “You blind sonuvabitch. She’s going to eat your heart and crush your soul. And it’s my fault. Kendra warned me that you had feelings for her. I didn’t want to believe her.”

  “I’m sorry, my king. Not for how I feel, but because I’ve failed you.”

  Cale leaned back to bump foreheads with him then pushed away. He dropped onto one of the couches, head in his hands, shoulders slumped while Turow remained stiff and still. Cale waved impatiently in his direction.

  “Sit down, for fuck’s sake. I can’t stand you staring at me with those loyal puppy eyes after I’ve just kicked you.”

  “Forgive me, my king,” he mumbled, taking a seat but not lessening his stilted attitude.

  Rubbing his temples, Cale heaved a weary sigh. “Stop it. I forgive you. Hell, there’s nothing to forgive. I know what it’s like when you get their scent up your nose and your brain drops into your pants.”

  “That’s not what happened.”

  The prickly response made Cale laugh, not unkindly. “I know that, too. That’s why the both of you are still alive after cutting the legs out from under me in front of our brothers.”

  “I’m—”

  “If you say you’re sorry one more time, I am going to have you killed!” He flopped back against the cushion, scowling irritably.

  “I wasn’t, my king. I was about to say I’m going to do everything I can to see you don’t regret your mercy.”

  Cale sighed and shook his head, “Why do I put up with your shit?”

  “Because you love me like a brother?”

  Another genuine chuckle softened the tense line of his shoulders. “Yeah, I do.” He scrutinized Turow for a long moment, noting the faded bruises, the way he favored his side while pretending not to. And something else. Something missing.

  “Your diamonds.”

  Turow’s hand went immediately to an empty earlobe as if surprised by their absence. “Desperate times, my king. I pawned them to get us away from James alive.”

  “To save her. You throw away your family for her.”

  “For you. To finish what you sent me to do. I don’t carry my love of family in my ears. I carry it here.” He placed his hand over his heart. “We had to get out of Las Vegas, and I didn’t know who I could trust here.”

  “Me. You could have trusted me.” Again, insult narrowed his stare.

  “I couldn’t reach you, my king. It was just the two
of us, alone and in trouble. My fault, I’m ashamed to admit, but there it is. I did what I had to do to make things right.”

  Cale studied him for a long moment, wanting to latch on to some argument because he was still mad as hell, but unable to find one. He sighed. “She said you were injured. Tell me what happened out there, Row?”

  Turow respected his king too much to give less than the unvarnished truth, even though it made him look foolish in his own eyes. Sylvia outsmarting him. James’s men catching him with his literal pants down. Having to blackmail his mate into accepting his bond and depending on her to drag him out of harm’s way when he got the crap knocked out of him. Coming home a disgrace to his clan.

  Had she been playing him for that fool all along?

  Cale listened without comment, expression closed down tight, frown line deepening between narrowed eyes. And when the embarrassing narrative was complete, all he asked was, “Who betrayed us, Row? That’s what I need to know.”

  “You mean other than me?”

  Cale stared at him for a moment then grumbled, “Damn, there are times I could beat you with a heavy stick. I mean who not sitting here wallowing in guilt, spilling his guts over things I do not need to know is plotting with the brother that did try to kill me to steal my crown and destroy our people. That who.”

  “Thank you for clarifying, my king.”

  “No problem.”

  They continued to talk and speculate until the hour was late and Kendra peeked in to remind them of it.

  “My king,” she chastened softly, “we have plans this evening.” Just that.

  Cale was off the couch as if it had caught fire beneath him. “Thank you for the reminder, my queen. The time got away from me.”

  “You won’t get away from me that easily.” She sent a wink toward Turow, making him redden both with embarrassment and at having to be gently reminded that he had someone waiting.

  In his room. In his bed.

  Alone and probably scared witless.

  What a thoughtless idiot he was!

  He mumbled a quick goodnight to his already cuddling sovereigns and dashed out into the snow, slipping and sliding his way to his own pathetic room where a stoic Tony greeted him with a nod.