by Lina Jubilee
“Trey? Can you command them to stand down?”
“I could, but as soon as I left, they’d be themselves again.” He swallowed, his eyes going a bit hazy.
“You know about when he commanded his brother to fly, don’t you?” asked Zeke in a hush beside me.
“Huh?” The sound escaped my mouth, drawing Trey’s attention.
“I was four,” he said, his leg bouncing. “And he didn’t actually fly. If it’s not possible, I can’t command it to happen. I commanded him to give me his brand new toy, and then I walked away from him. As soon as my powers stopped seizing control of him, he came back to himself and ran down the hall after me, screaming at me that I was a no-good Natch thief.” His lips pinched. “I told him to fly off the nearby balcony. The door was open. It was just an errant thought.”
“He broke his legs,” added Rio, his face grim. “He survived. As you say, you were but a child.”
“He could have died,” said Trey, his voice shaking.
“But he didn’t.” Zeke spoke bluntly.
My heart ached at the look on Trey’s face. I hadn’t looked into his past at all—hadn’t realized his abilities had caused him such heartache.
“In any case, no, Bry, I don’t think commanding them to stand down would work.” Trey tilted his head, as if thinking. “I could command them to come along and help, but I’d have my hands full making sure none of them cracked and called for backup.”
“We’ll get around them without your abilities then,” I said firmly. I thought a moment more. “Connak?” I ventured. “He was with Rajani when she was taken. He has to feel useless in the infirmary. If he can get a message back to some portal creators to open up a portal here, we can start searching for Xerxes from here.”
Zeke drummed his feet against the floor in the armchair he was in. “But I’m sure he’s under close watch. So making the news it is. What do you have in mind, princess? Stage another rescue? We just patrol the streets looking for someone in need of help?”
“I think even kissing one of you in public might do,” I said, my insides heating. I shoved both hands between my thighs in an effort to stave the throbbing radiating out from my core.
“Why not kissing all of us?” offered Trey, not a hint of amusement on his face. “That would be more likely to get people to do a double-take, get the phones out, the hashtags trending—”
“And however Xerxes is monitoring the news, it’d get back to him,” said Derek. He reached an arm around me and squeezed. “I like it.”
He liked the idea of me kissing all four of them in the middle of town?
My head became somewhat dizzy.
Rio shook his head. “Not that I am against another chance to kiss you,” he said, without a hint of shame about him. I ground my thighs tighter against my clenched fists. “But I fear the plan is too complicated. Ordering the guards to stand down or sneaking out without them noticing—regardless, they would call in the cavalry as soon as they realized what had happened.”
“I can’t just sit here!” I said, tossing my hands in the air. “Please.”
“I can provide a distraction,” said someone new to the conversation. We all turned to find Sage, his hair ruffled, purple bags under his eyes, leaned up against the wall leading to the bedrooms. “We need this fucker caught. I’ve spent a lot of time here with Lacey. I think I have an idea.” His hand settled on my shoulder. “I’m sorry about Rajani,” he said quietly.
“Making the news it is,” said Trey, straightening. He looked between Rio and Zeke. “Who has the most experience driving on the right side of the road?”
“You mean the wrong side?” countered Zeke.
Rio raised his hand shakily. “I have driven in this country many times, but I have to admit I do tend to turn into the incorrect lane on occasion.”
The glint of the sun bounced off a sleek dark limousine in the driveaway, visible through the living room’s recessed window.
The keys were hanging on the nearby key rack right inside the front door. “I’ll drive,” I said, bolting to my feet. “I’d rather make it to town in one piece, thank you.”
Chapter Twenty
Trey, Zeke, Rio, Derek, and I hovered just inside the front door, the keys in my hand, all fueled up on power bars from a quick rummaging around in my aunt’s kitchen and ready to go. Sage pushed aside the very edge of the curtain covering the small window on the back door in the kitchen, peering out. In one hand he clutched a rocket firework he’d found in the basement, in the other a lighter. “It’s clear back here,” he said in a hushed voice.
“They’re still all out front,” confirmed Derek.
“Okay,” said Sage. “Let’s do this.”
Slowly opening the back door, he creeped outside and shut it behind him.
With bated breath, the five of us waited in the darkened living room.
Mere moments later, a shriek whistle pierced the sky, followed by what the unexpecting might think was an explosion.
Uncle Caspian cursed in Spanish on the other side of the door, a shuffle of feet indicating he and the guards had started for the back of the house.
“Go, go, go,” said Trey, and my hand was on the doorknob before he got the second syllable out.
“Open the limousine doors and get inside!” shrieked Trey as we all bolted outside, his command driving us even more than our own brains. “Bryony, go around to the other side and sit in the driver’s seat. And drive!”
This was all part of the plan, none of it unexpected, but I found my muscles moving beyond the capacity I’d attributed to them, my sheer need to follow Trey’s command pushing me to my limits and beyond. Trey had been right that he could get us to move faster.
That little bit of extra speed was just the edge we needed.
Unable to follow his own commands, Trey lagged just a moment behind, scrambling into the passenger’s side seat beside me and clicking his seatbelt into place.
“Seatbelts on, everyone!” he shouted.
We complied.
“What’s going on?” shouted Uncle Bo from the front door, but I was already slipping the key inside and pushing the button to start the ignition, the conveniently backed-up limousine ready to go forward without worrying about driving in reverse.
In the rearview mirror, I saw Uncle Bo trailing after us down the driveway and the dirt road, our long vehicle bumping over every little dip and crack in the path. Bo’s abilities included super strength but not super speed. His strength wouldn’t do him much good.
Uncle Caspian and the bodyguards soon came into view, just little dots in the mirror as we put the house behind us.
Trey chuckled and ran a soft, long finger over my cheek. “I don’t think I’ve ever had so much fun sneaking out.”
I laughed despite myself, my hands clutching the steering wheel as I drove down the driveway and made a sharp turn. The back of the limousine skidded off into the grass somewhat. I wasn’t used to driving such a long vehicle.
“Bryony, you’re in control,” said Trey sharply as he clutched the armrest in the door to keep from hitting the window. “Same for everyone. You’re in control.”
Zeke took that as a signal and flung his hands toward the back of the vehicle. I didn’t see what he was doing, but the plan involved camouflaging the back of the limousine with its surroundings so no one headed after us would know where we’d gone.
My muscles relaxed as I realized I’d still been too focused on driving to let up on the gas.
“Your abilities take some getting used to,” I said, lifting my foot a bit. But then, thinking of Rajani, I put pedal to the metal of my own free choice. We probably only had a few minutes’ lead on any of them, and Zeke’s reach only went so far. They could probably make us out ahead of them through the illusion if they hung back just enough.
We just needed to get to town. Make the news. Then hope Xerxes found us before anyone from Veras did.
“I don’t think you needed my help after all,” said
Trey, pointing to the speedometer. “You do know we’ll have to slow down when we encounter any traffic.”
“Until then, though, there’s nothing standing between me and my goal.”
“Or between your foot and the floor, I venture.”
Even when traffic got heavier, I managed to stay ahead of any pursuers, parking the limo in a parking lot for an ice cream shop on the outskirts of town. We didn’t care if it got towed at this point. We just didn’t want to lead any guards or family members to where we were.
Rio had another plan to put more distance between us and them. One by one, he’d carry us to the decorative water fountain in the middle of the city, where I knew there was always a crowd of people meeting up with friends before heading off in different directions to enjoy what downtown had to offer.
Derek agreed, but Trey and Zeke didn’t think Rio had the strength to carry them, even one at a time.
By the time he put down Zeke about half a minute later, the last of the bunch, Rio had clearly proven them wrong.
“All right, all right,” mumbled Zeke, finger-combing a strand of his hair.
“So,” said Derek, looking around. There was indeed a small crowd, most congregated around a food vendor several yards away from the water fountain. Most were minding their own business, but a few turned their heads, probably looking for the source of concentrated, quick wind that had ruffled their hats or in one guy’s case, sent his sunglasses flying clear off his face.
“So,” I said, throwing my arms over Derek’s shoulders. “Let’s give them a show.”
Derek’s lips found mine before I could even blink, his soft lips hungry, his tongue slipping inside and caressing my gums.
“Okay, mate, her kissing just you isn’t really a show.” Zeke tapped Derek’s shoulder and my best friend stepped aside as the prince’s hands slipped to the small of my back. With a flourish, he dipped me backward, his lips pressing forward to graze my neck, searching for my mouth and claiming it greedily.
Even over the trickle of the water fountain, I could hear a few murmurs.
“If I may?” Rio asked.
Zeke righted me, then gestured toward me, and Rio offered him a slight nod. The Japanese prince cupped my face and kissed my forehead, his lips parking once on the tip of my nose, then on my upper lip, my lower lip, each kiss growing faster, more unyielding.
“My turn,” added Trey, the growing whispers turning to the hum of louder conversation and a few clicks of camera apps. Rio stepped aside and I had to take a deep breath as kisser number four made his way to stand in front of me, threading his hands through my hair, tickling the top of one of my pointed ears. “Kiss me, Bryony,” he whispered, his voice catching on the words and sending shivers down to my toes.
My mouth was on his, sucking, kissing, never finding it to be enough. My tongue entwined with his, my lips growing swollen as he met my force with his own.
For a moment, there was nothing but him and me, the kisses that would never end and never be enough.
He pulled back. “You’re in control, Bryony.”
A slight sense of urgency leaked out from my pores, but if he thought I was done kissing him, he had another think coming.
It was only after I felt a tap on my shoulder that I pulled away, my hands still clutching tightly to Prince Trey’s back.
“We got their attention,” said Rio into my ear. Gazing around, I saw that a circle of onlookers had formed, almost all of them with a phone screen held high or projected in front of them.
Prince Trey pulled one hand away from my back and waved as if posing for the pictures.
I supposed we were. I waved as well, and Derek and Rio followed suit. Zeke grunted and folded his arms over his chest.
Slipping his hand into his back pocket, Derek pulled out his own phone, the centimeter-thick bamboo material comprising the screen glinting in the sun overhead. I’d left my own phone at Aunt Alanna’s.
“We’re trending,” he said.
“That was fast,” said Zeke. He cocked an eyebrow as he got a look at Derek’s screen.
“What?” I asked.
Zeke chuckled.
“‘Hashtag Princess Reverse Harem,’” read Rio from the screen slowly, as if questioning each word.
“That makes it sound like princesses are in the harem,” added Trey. “Hmm…” He had a far-off look in his eyes.
“Don’t you dare even imagine it,” I said, play-punching his arms. “You’re all mine.” The words were out of my mouth before I could even think too hard about them.
They all stared at me, wide-eyed.
Then Zeke laughed. And Rio and Trey. And Derek, too.
I chuckled along with them.
“I was thinking more like if I could clone you,” Trey said, grabbing me by the ass and planting another kiss on my head. “All the interesting things we could get up to…”
The last thing I wanted to think about just then was Hazel and her cronies, but the word “clone” set off an image of Sheila and her doppelgänger ability in my mind.
Her doppelgängers that vanish into thin air on command, kind of like Sheila herself did in the library last night.
Unless…
My stomach felt rock hard and my smile slipped.
“What is it?” asked Trey, all concern.
“I just…” I mean, they couldn’t have messed with the roller coaster anyway. And they were assholes, but were they murderous assholes?
Did Sheila spy on Rajani, Derek, and me, letting her group know once we were separated? Had she been off to tell someone asking about me where I was?
Thinking back, there was the Nelian guard I’d thought was Connak stepping outside of a strangely located portal right before the big explosion.
I’d only seen the Nelian from behind. Why had I assumed it was him?
And the bodyguard… The bodyguard’s suit jacket had seemed a little short at the wrists, like he was borrowing it or throwing on an old one that hadn’t fit him.
He’d been tall, lanky… like Jerry.
I turned to Derek, Trey’s arms still wrapped around me. He was the only one who could really understand.
“I think Hazel and her cohorts might be helping—”
But my sentence was interrupted by a crackle of light in the air as a rip fissured the air beside the water fountain.
Someone had found us as planned. But only the next few seconds would tell if it was someone working with Daddy Alarik or the fugitive who had my friend.
As the crowd let out murmurs and screams and started running away, the five of us turned to the opening, palms out at our sides, knees bent, ready to fight, my men flanking me and slightly to the front so I could project any protection toward them all at once, as planned.
I’d figured, perhaps too confidently, that we could protect any Typicals lingering in the area.
I held up one hand, holding back any attack on my signal in case a friend stepped through that portal.
But then the burgeoning portal before us vanished. There was another crack from behind me, and as I turned around to see the source of it, I came face-to-face with Hazel, the fluctuating glow of an open portal mere feet behind her.
“Good morning, Princess Whore,” she said, and with a pucker of her lips, she blew. My limbs went stiff, my vision went gray, and I fell to the ground, a solid piece of rock.
Dirt caked my cheek, its musty scent invading my nostrils. The back of my head throbbed and I rubbed it, wincing as the muscles in my arm cracked, like I’d been lifting weights the previous day.
Rolling over, I blinked, hard, trying to remember where I even was. Several yards above me was a lattice of green webbing—vines, I realized—woven in a dome shape.
I bolted upright. “Where the hell am I?!”
It was dim in here, but there was a muted beam of dusky light trickling in from one distant point—the mouth of a cave, I realized, the sun already setting outside.
Around me was dirt and this vine-crafted
cage and… Trey, Zeke, Rio, and Derek, crumpled on the floor.
“Wake up!” I said, crawling over to them and shaking both Zeke and Rio at once. Panicked, I reached over their prone forms to jostle Derek and Trey, needing them—any of them, all of them—to wake up and tell me they were all right.
“Oh my god, please.” I put a finger to Rio’s neck, checking for a pulse, found one, then moved on to the others in turn.
They all had pulses. A slight moan escaped my mouth as I realized I’d been fighting back a sob. None of them looked visibly injured—just dirty, disheveled, and out cold.
How? How had this happened? We’d had a plan.
The portal in front of us had been a distraction. There’d been a portal behind us, and Hazel had walked out of it.
Motherfucking Hazel.
She’d turned me to stone, putting me into stasis. Had she managed to do the same to the rest of the men? How fast could she work? And then she’d dragged us… here?
No. She clearly wasn’t working alone.
But she’d surprised us, and that had been enough.
A low groan reverberated beside me and Zeke pushed himself up on shaky limbs. I scrambled to slide my arms around his back, guiding his great bulk to a sitting position.
“Hey,” he said, his sexy accent making the word seem so inviting right now. I threw my arms around him and kissed his cheek.
He turned and kissed me back, full-on on the mouth. Then he looked around. “Where are we?”
Turning around, I gestured to our companions. “On Nelia, if I had to guess.”
“Guess it does look somewhat familiar. Lots of caves on this planet.”
He crawled over to Rio and did the pulse check.
“They’re all breathing,” I said, and Zeke started slapping Trey’s face, a little too hard for my tastes.
“Wait!” I said, but that actually got Trey’s eyes to flicker open. He bolted upward.
“It’s a trap!” he shouted. “No one move!”
Zeke and I stilled. But something felt wrong when it came to one of his commands. Flexing my hand, I stared at it.
