by Lexi Blake
I had to admit, looking down on myself in bed with Dev, I looked pretty damn hot. I always worry about that extra five pounds I carry around, but it was all curves. No wonder Danny liked to watch.
“Zoey?” Dev looked between the two of us, his gorgeous green eyes confused.
The Zoey who wasn’t me cowered and held on to Dev. “Husband, it is a trick. She is a witch trying to confuse you. She will kill us both. Please save me.” She clung to him and gave her role everything she had.
I rolled my eyes and promised myself I would never cower. It didn’t look good on me. Gilliana could look like me all she wanted. The spell hadn’t given her my personality. I looked at Dev with a flat frown. He was trying to pull away from the woman in his arms, but he still seemed a bit uncertain.
“Here’s the deal, baby. I’m going to talk for a minute and you can decide which one of us is real.” I looked down at Gilliana and pulled my knife. She shrank away. “All right, bitch, this is how it’s going down. You get one warning and one warning only. I’m his wife. He married me and not because he was forced to screw me by some spell. He chose me. You had your chance and you blew it. Keep your hands off my husband or I’ll be forced to remove them.”
Dev practically leapt off the bed to get to my side. “The scary one is definitely my wife. What the hell is going on? I was about to come and look for you, but I got so tired. I laid down for a nap and you woke me up with your lovely naked body. I was quite happy to see you.”
“How did you find out?” Gilliana asked, looking petulant and annoyed. “I set everything up perfectly. You should be with Mara now. You should be trying to fix the chaos.”
I reached onto the bed and pulled myself out by my hair. Now the spell broke because her hair felt different from mine. Gilliana screamed as I hauled her off the bed and her glamour fell apart. I was left with a lovely, if bland, blonde. She had brown eyes and a skinny body. She probably had five inches on me, and I bet I outweighed her. The woman also had no idea how to fight. She didn’t punch or try to take out my legs. She just yelled. She apparently thought screaming was going to make me let her go.
“Gilliana.” Dev greeted his ex through clenched teeth. He crossed his arms, and I knew it was to keep himself from hitting her. “How dare you try this on me? I will have you imprisoned for this.”
“Call the guard later, baby.” I started to haul Gilliana out of his room by her long blonde hair. I had a good grip on it now, and she was surprisingly easy to drag. I had way more trouble with the friction of her bare ass on the marble than I did with her weight. Skinny bitches are good for something, I had to admit. “I have a reputation to stake.”
I hauled the witch out of Dev’s room, and she obliged me by kicking and screaming the whole way. Her screeching brought everyone out. Neil, Bibi, and Dev followed in my wake. Dev had slipped on his robe but followed me down the palace halls in his bare feet. He didn’t try to explain anything or apologize. He knew there was no need. He also knew the value of a ferocious reputation. On our home plane, Dev had a reputation as a smooth talker who would smile one minute and stick his knife in the next. He was not a man you crossed.
I reached the greeting room after a long walk, all the while gathering gawkers. There was a huge crowd waiting to see why Her Grace, wife of the High Priest, was hauling a naked noblewoman through the halls of the royal palace. There was no way this story didn’t make the rounds. By the time dinner rolled around, my reputation as a badass would be secure.
I was gratified to see Mara looking on with a horrified expression on her face. I gave her my most savage smile because she needed to remember this.
“Lady Gilliana decided it would be a good idea to trick my husband into her bed,” I announced loudly. “I’m going to persuade her ladyship that this was a misstep.” I let her head drop to the marble and before she could move, I shoved that cold iron into her chest making sure I stayed away from her heart. It would hurt like hell, but it wouldn’t kill her. I stared down into her face, which was contorted with agony. “Next time, I’ll kill you.”
I pulled my knife out because I wasn’t going to waste a perfectly good knife on her.
Dev grabbed my hand and pulled it to his mouth. He kissed my hand gallantly, letting everyone know he approved. When I looked over the crowd I noticed Danny, Lee, and Padric had joined. Danny was laughing but Lee and Padric looked almost paternally proud.
As Dev began to lead me away from the screaming Gilliana, I realized something. It made me frown and turned my stomach a little. If Gilliana had hired the assassin, why would she go to the elaborate trouble of this plan? It was intricate and depended on flawless execution. This had been her plan, not the archer.
Someone else was trying to kill me. It looked like I had a lot of enemies in the palace and it wasn’t even dinnertime yet.
Chapter Five
“Did you want to make it to dinner?” Danny asked, staring at me. His fangs were lengthening as I smiled at him.
His eyes were on the heart-shaped bodice of my dress. It was strapless and left everything from the tops of my breasts up uncovered. The only jewelry I wore was my wedding ring and the Goddess Chain. I slipped into my four-and-a-half-inch heels. “You like?”
Daniel grinned, his dimples showing. “I hope you’re not hungry because you might not make it to the banquet looking that good.”
The way Daniel looked at me gave me just the boost of confidence I needed to make it through the night. I went up on tiptoes and planted a kiss on his perfectly sculpted lips. “I take that as a yes.”
“Oh, I like.” He leaned down to nuzzle my neck. I felt his tongue stroke the long line of my jugular vein. The last several weeks, Daniel had let his freak-flag fly high, and for me that meant dealing with his love affair with my neck. I dropped my head back and let him lick me, wondering if I was going to make it to our first state dinner. It would probably be rude to skip out on my reception because I was too busy in bed with husband number one.
“Damn, sweetheart,” husband number two said, coming up from behind. His big hands slid across the red silk covering my backside. “This is not the dress Declan picked. It’s so much sexier.” He cupped my rear and let his tongue trace the shell of my ear, eliciting a groan from me. “Goddess, you look gorgeous.”
Yep, if they didn’t stop soon I was going to miss everything.
“What made you change your mind about the dress?” Dev asked, rubbing his erection against my backside and letting me know how much he wanted me. Dev’s rubbing pressed me firmly into Daniel, who was in the same condition. I let my hands slip down Daniel’s trim waist to his rock-hard ass. “Not that I mind, lover.”
“I didn’t change my mind about the dress. Someone took it,” I admitted breathlessly.
Both men stopped and Daniel looked down at me, his blue eyes now serious. “What do you mean someone took the dress? Did they take it away because it didn’t fit you?”
I took a long breath to steady myself. If I had known they were going to get all freaked out and stop what they were doing, I would never have mentioned it. I was enjoying the whole “worshipping my body” part of the day, but I had to be honest. “No, I mean they took the dress Declan bought, unless you think he meant for me to wear that thing in the closet.”
The boys exchanged a look and Dev crossed to the closet. He held the awful dress up and shook his head. “My brother would never pick this dress. First, it’s hideous and completely out of fashion. Second, it covers your breasts. He likes your breasts, sweetheart. He talks about them all the time.”
“Remind me to thank him for that,” Daniel said sarcastically.
“I think they’ll leave me alone now.” I smoothed down my dress. It looked like I was going to make it to dinner now and I wanted to be wrinkle free. “I think the word is out that I don’t like people touching my stuff.” I said that with a pat to Dev’s behind. I turned to Daniel. “That goes for you too, mister. Some girl starts in on you and I will take her out.
”
“Good to know, baby,” he said with a sexy smile. “And that thing we just started, don’t think we’re done.”
I was counting on it. This was my weird honeymoon. I’d married Dev only weeks before and Daniel and I had never been on a trip where we relaxed. We needed time together, time to bond.
“Mistress,” a small voice said from the back of the room. I looked over and realized I’d forgotten Bibi was here. I winced because I hadn’t meant to ignore the troll. I just forgot everything when my men walked in a room.
“Yes, Bibi,” I replied, hoping I hadn’t offended her. I doubted the foreplay would bother her, as trolls were open-minded, but I had yet to introduce her to Danny. She’d been introduced to Dev earlier. I made amends now and my vampire happily greeted the troll. Like me, he had a soft spot in his heart for the Huldrefolk. They were a part of our childhood.
Albert had been true to his word and now we were all happily ensconced in the east wing of the palace. Once we’d gotten rid of Mara, we’d had plenty of help moving into Dev’s part of the palace. I had a whole room for nothing but getting dressed and primping. Sarah, Neil, and I had spent the afternoon getting settled in and talking to Bibi about palace life. Neil had been right about the troll. She knew an awful lot about the nobles. She knew who was sleeping with whom and who was cheating. She knew who was feuding and she liked to gossip. Once we got her talking, she had gone on for an hour as Sarah, Neil, and I had all gotten ready.
“It’s time for you to depart,” Bibi reminded me. She had a notebook and a clock to tell time. Though her voice was quiet, I knew she was trying to take her job seriously. “You and His Highness and Master Daniel are supposed to enter last. It’s a great honor. All of the nobles want to see Prince Dev’s first meeting with his mother after so long a time.”
“You mean they want to gawk at a train wreck,” Dev complained. He was nervous. Dev was dressed in traditional Seelie clothes, the emerald color of his tunic making his eyes even more green than normal. I smoothed back the midnight fall of his long hair. It was just past his shoulders. Normally he pulled it back, but now he left it long for the more formal occasion.
Danny had gone the same route I had. Modern. Contemporary. He was in a Hugo Boss suit that had been custom fit at Neiman Marcus. His sandy blond hair was slicked back. He looked hot and dangerous. He glanced at Dev and gave him a reassuring smile. “It’s going to be all right. What’s the worst she could do?”
Dev blanched at the thought but took my arm anyway. Danny took my left side and we began to walk toward the formal dining room where the nobles awaited our arrival. Our friends had gone in earlier and Lee and Zack had chosen to skip the formalities in exchange for taking guard duties.
“I don’t even want to think about that.” Dev shook his head as if to clear it from his dark thoughts. “Are you feeling better?”
It was said to Daniel, who as a vampire should only feel crappy when he was low on blood.
“What’s wrong?” I asked, startled at the thought of him being ill.
“It was nothing.” Danny shook it off. “Just earlier today, I felt weird. I got weak. Maybe I’m coming down with the flu.”
“You can’t get the flu, baby.” I touched his forehead with my hand, seeking any sign of illness. Not surprisingly it was cool. Vampires don’t do sick.
“He was in that hot coffin for two hours,” Dev pointed out.
That shouldn’t make a difference. It might have made Daniel uncomfortable, but from what I understood, it shouldn’t have made him ill.
As we approached the uniformed guard who would announce us to the party, Danny shrugged away his earlier discomfort. “I’m sure that’s what it was. I feel great now. It was actually kind of cool. It made me feel almost human. If it comes up again I’ll be sure to tell Z because she likes to baby sick people.”
“Well, I had to,” I admitted. “When you were alive you turned into the biggest baby the minute you got a stuffy nose.”
Dev nodded that we were ready to be announced and then we walked down a magnificent marble staircase. Twenty steps led us into a huge ballroom that had been set for the royal banquet.
I held on firmly to both their arms because the last thing I needed was to tumble down the stairs and break a limb. I looked out over the crowd and realized Dev had been right. Everyone was hoping for a big scene. They were whispering behind their hands and gawking. They moved their attention between the three of us and the woman at the end of the hall.
I glanced around the room and got my first glimpse of my mother-in-law.
Miria, Queen of Faery, sat upon her throne before me. There was a raised platform with three chairs. Miria sat on the largest of the three in between two slightly smaller thrones. All three were carved from oak and elaborate in their design. Declan sat in one to her right, a look of aloof superiority on his face. I’d been told the seat to her left was the one Dev used. There were several people standing around the queen, and I suspected they were counselors and high nobles. Padric stood closest to the queen. It was fitting as he was both the head of security for the royal family and the queen’s lover.
Miria, Queen of Faery, was gloriously lovely. I was surprised to find she had long strawberry-blonde hair. I guessed the twins got their dark good looks from their father. Miria was fair but by no means bland. Her face was delicately sculpted, with high cheek bones and a lush mouth. Her eyes marked her as the twins’ relative. They were emerald green and sparkled with the same intelligence Dev had.
“Dude,” Daniel said as we approached the throne. “That’s your mom?”
She didn’t look old enough to be his mom, but that was the way it was with the Fae. They reached their prime and just stopped aging. Miria looked to be about twenty-five. Dev was twenty-seven now and would look older than his mother or brother had he not been taking Daniel’s blood regularly. Daniel’s blood stopped the aging process in humans when taken on a regular basis. I’d begun noticing that for Dev, it seemed to actually reverse aging a little. The fine lines around his eyes he got when he laughed had disappeared.
Miria tried to maintain her cool composure but the closer we got the more her eyes ate up the sight of her son. I saw her eyes get glossy with unshed tears, and she reached out to Declan. He patted his mother’s hand and for a moment looked less like a brat prince.
“Good evening, Mother,” Dev said formally as we reached the throne. He bowed deeply.
I could see her son’s formal tone was not what the queen had been hoping for. “Devinshea, it is good to see you.”
Dev didn’t give her anything. He nodded but chose to introduce us rather than reply. “Mother, this is my goddess, Zoey. And this is my partner, Daniel Donovan. I assume Declan brought you up to speed on my living arrangements.”
That last was said coolly and with just a hint of challenge. He was just begging for his mother to say something disparaging about his lifestyle.
Miria had none of that. She smiled broadly and stood, causing Declan to quickly get his butt up as well. She wore a lovely white gown and a crown that sparkled in the candlelight. “Yes, of course. Declan and Padric both spoke highly of your wife and partner.”
Declan snorted at that. He didn’t like Danny. It probably had something to do with the fact that Daniel had kicked his ass the first time they met. “I certainly did not. I spoke poorly of him.”
Miria ignored her elder son. She stepped off the platform and walked to us. “It is so good to meet you, daughter,” she said with what seemed like complete sincerity. The queen kissed my cheek and gave me a long look before turning to Dev and laughing brightly. “Well, Devinshea, you certainly brought a beauty home. You are lovely, dear.”
“She is beautiful but not obedient,” Declan noted. “That is not the dress I told her to wear.”
“Hush,” she admonished. “The dress is stunning and suits her far more than anything in our style. Our styles would swallow her beautiful body. Declan, you were right about her breas
ts. They are delicious looking.”
The last bit was said with a slight breathless appreciation. I felt Danny tense beside me as he tried hard not to laugh at my sudden discomfort. My mother-in-law was looking me over with a sensual smile.
“I told you,” Declan said with a lecherous grin.
Dev leaned over and whispered in my ear. “Mother swings both ways. Sorry I didn’t mention that before.”
I gave him a “what the hell” look but Miria was moving on to Daniel.
“I should be upset with your presence, Mr. Donovan,” Miria said, looking him over. “Devinshea was supposed to keep you under control until I decided if you were dangerous or not.”
Dev started to argue but Daniel stepped up to the plate.
“I assure you, Your Highness, I am perfectly harmless,” he said with more charm than I’d heard him use on any woman but me. Dev was rubbing off on my vampire. Daniel was imitating his smooth tones.
Miria looked Daniel up and down, from his Ferragamo loafers to his perfectly cropped blond hair. “I doubt that, Mr. Donovan. I think you could do some serious damage.”
I saw Padric roll his eyes and mutter, “Not again.”
“How about I promise to be a good boy?” Daniel offered, his voice a dark seduction. I stopped myself from giggling because Danny was getting good at this.
“Please don’t.” Miria’s lips curled up. “Where would be the fun in that?”
“Mother!” Dev said sounding completely prudish for the first time in my relationship with him.
Declan snickered beside his brother.
Miria turned her attention back to her son. “Well, Devinshea, when you bring such lovely partners home, what do you expect? They are exotic and look like they would be excellent bedmates. It would be rude not to admire them.”
Yes, she was definitely Declan’s mom.
“The Earth plane has changed my brother,” Declan complained. “It has turned him into a squeamish old woman. He refuses to even think about sharing Zoey with me. He pulled a gun on me just for cuddling with her.”
