“Nine years.”
It seems to defy belief. By thirty, I was nearly ten years into running this territory. I was a thousand times harder than Aurora is, even with her spikes and fiery temper. For all that the Underworld exposes her to all manner of vices, I can’t help feeling like she’s been sheltered this entire time. I push the thought away and focus on the subject at hand. “In all those years, you’ve only slipped once.”
Her eyes flash. “What are you talking about?”
“Everyone else seems content to forget that you were willing to literally burn Hook’s home to the ground when you thought Tink was in danger.” I smooth a hand down my hip. “One blink of your big eyes, and they’re half sure they imagined that fierceness.”
She blinks those big eyes at me right now. “How did you even hear about that?”
“Come now, Aurora. You know better. I hear everything of value that happens in the territories that border mine.” I’ve been around long enough to remember what that territory was like under Peter’s rule. I had no interest in dealing with him as a neighbor again. Hook might have a misguided honorable streak a mile wide that occasionally makes him inconvenient, but he’s not a malicious fool. If Peter had taken back the territory, I would have been forced to make a move to crush him. Not that I’m interested in explaining that to Aurora.
She considers me. “Even Ursa’s?”
“Of course. Neither of us is so sentimental as to let friendship get in the way of business.” The friendship is genuine, but we’re both smart enough to understand that it’s beneficial to both our territories for us to work together on occasion. Between the two of us, we hold nearly half the city. Striving for more is just greedy and runs the risk of hampering our ability to lead. “The only way to maintain power is to expect a knife in the back at every turn. A good territory leader knows that.”
She shuts down. I didn’t even realize she had opened herself up a little until she’s withdrawing from me. I can practically see the shutters closing over her eyes, shielding her thoughts. Aurora finally looks away. “I’ve very tired. If that’s all?”
I don’t want to leave this room, to end this conversation. The realization has me turning and walking away from her. These two weeks are about getting this woman out of my system, not about indulging in small talk. “I have work in the morning. Be quiet and entertain yourself until the afternoon.”
“Yes, Mistress.” There’s a snarky little lilt to her words, but I choose not to call her on it. Not when it means staying in this room a second longer.
I close the door softly behind me. There’s too much broiling energy inside me for me to sleep, so I stride down the hall to the entrance. It takes exactly two minutes to put on shoes and ride the elevator down to the floor that houses my security team. Sara meets me the second the doors open. They raise their eyebrows but fall into step next to me as I head for their office.
I don’t speak until we’ve closed the door. “Report.”
If anything, their eyebrows rise higher. Sara has the bearing of former military, but they’ve been in private security since graduating college. When I left Sabine Valley, I poached them and brought them with me. Because of that history, because of all our years together, I trust Sara with more than my life. I am good, but even I don’t know everything. An excellent head of security has to be comfortable enough to speak up in order to keep me safe and enact the things I require. Someone easily cowed would have been run out long before now.
Sara props a hip on the desk. “There’s nothing to report. Everything is running as it should. The only new development is upstairs sleeping in your guest room.”
Aside from the landing outside the elevator and the emergency exit leading to stairs down, I don’t have cameras in my private residence. Just like I trust Sara to handle small things that arise without bothering me with it, they trust me to handle anyone I allow into my home. “I have it under control.”
“No one says you don’t.” They consider me. “Did you need to spar?”
Yes. Undoubtedly. The scene didn’t provide the release kink usually brings me. Instead, Aurora’s presence in my building, in my home, is a buzzing beneath my skin. I’ve never been one to waffle about things once I decide on a course, but I can’t settle on a route with this woman. I want to ice her out. I want to drag her by her hair to my bed and make her come so many times, she loses the ability to speak any word beyond my name.
I hold Sara’s gaze. “I’m fine for tonight. Maybe tomorrow.”
They nod. “As always, the offer stands.”
I don’t know what I’m doing down here. I run a hand through my hair. “When’s the last time you slept?”
“Luna is taking over in ten minutes.” It’s not really an answer, which is answer enough.
Neither Sara nor I have ever been that good at getting a full night’s rest. Another thing we share in common. Luna is a Sabine Valley transplant as well, just like the rest of my personal security team. There’s nothing wrong with the people we’ve hired in Carver City, but old habits die hard. No matter how long I’m in this place, the only people I really trust are fellow Amazons. We’re a varied people with different goals and personalities, but the loyalty to our queen—to my sister—is the thread that holds us together.
Maybe that’s what’s bugging me. It’s not Aurora at all. She’s a symptom of the problem, not the issue itself. Yes, that must be it. “I don’t like what happened at Lammas.” While Carver City has Hades and the Underworld to provide neutral territory to handle disputes and small power struggles, Sabine Valley takes a different route. Its roots go back farther, to darker places. Four times a year, during the pagan feasts, all three factions gather and deal with things in a way that’s designed to avoid bloodshed and an all-out war. Lammas is for ritual battle, a time to safely settle disputes and grudges between various people so they don’t fester into true conflict.
The faction leaders, in their arrogance, made a bargain this Lammas that they can’t take back. Now two of my nieces and my youngest brother are trapped in handfasts with men they didn’t choose for themselves, playing a role in revenge for an act my sister committed.
I press my fingers to my eyes. “I should—”
“No.”
Reluctantly, I drop my hands. “You don’t even know what I was going to say.”
Sara gives me a sympathetic look. “I figure it’s a fifty-fifty chance that you were going to say we should just sneak into Sabine Valley and assassinate the Paine brothers or that we should go back there and whoop your sister’s ass for letting this happen. Neither is an option.”
“Honestly, I was considering doing both.”
They shake their head. “My response stands. The laws are there for a reason. You can’t just ignore them because you don’t like the outcome. Especially since we’ve spent two decades in Carver City. You’ll always be an Amazon, but you’re an outsider now. We all are.”
“I know.” It’s the price I’ve paid for my ambition. I could have stayed in Sabine Valley and taken over as CEO of one of my mother’s many corporations. But I would never lead there, would never be queen—or what passes for it. “It doesn’t mean I like it.”
“None of us like it.” Sara crosses their arms over their chest. “Maybe you should call your sister.”
Something I’ve been avoiding ever since I heard the news. What is there to say? To coldly detail how she’s failed, how disappointed our mother would be? Even after all these years, there’s no way Aisling hasn’t shared the same recriminations for herself. No matter what else is true, she’s a good leader. Most of the time. “Perhaps tomorrow.”
“Yes, maybe.” Sara’s tone says they know I won’t do it.
I glance at the clock. It’s late—or early, depending on how one looks at it. Avoiding going back up to my penthouse any longer is a delay reeking of cowardice. I chose this. I am the one in charge. Fleeing the space because Aurora occupies it is unacceptable.
Tomor
row. Things will be clearer tomorrow.
I glance at Sara. “Get some rest tonight.”
“Only if you do.”
That draws forth a small smile. “Consider it a bargain.”
We walk back to the elevator, and Sara clears their throat. “This might be out of line.”
“When has that stopped you?”
“A valid point.” They grin. “Stop thinking so much and playing out scenarios with that girl. You want her. You already effectively have her for the next two weeks. Take her and work out some of this stress.”
Deceptively simple advice. Easy to agree to. More difficult to pull off. “I’ll consider it.”
“Sure you will.”
I step into the elevator. “Sleep.”
“I will.” Sara turns and walks back down the hall as the elevator doors close.
I’m in danger of becoming a nag in order to avoid my own thoughts. How unforgivable. Sara and I have the history to let it slide, but I don’t have that same history with everyone I interact with. I have to lock it down, to push these uncomfortable thoughts away. It’s never been an issue controlling that before, but now they bubble up inside me.
It’s not even a choice to pause outside the door of the guest room. My body has taken over, even as my mind details the ways this is ridiculous. I can’t seem to help myself. My hand falls to the doorknob, and I turn it, silently stepping into the room.
Aurora sleeps the way I imagine a child sleeps. All tangled sheets and trusting abandon. She must have gotten out of bed when I left, because her hair is covered by a silk wrap in a pretty floral print. She’s only half beneath the covers, one long leg exposed, leading my gaze up to where her nightshirt has rucked up around her hips. It’s just an extra few inches of skin, but it feels like seeing her like this is sharing a secret with me.
A secret I most assuredly do not deserve.
I back out of the room as silently as I entered and shut the door behind me. What am I doing? Topping her, dominating her, fucking her. All those are reasonable courses of action. Standing over her bed and watching her sleep? Wanting to touch her, to stroke my fingers over her skin simply because? Unacceptable.
I stride back to my bedroom. This is ridiculous. Tomorrow, things will make more sense. I simply need some sleep to get my perspective back.
Yes, tomorrow will be better.
8
Aurora
I sleep late. Or maybe it’s not late at all. Working in the Underworld for so many years has turned me into a nocturnal creature. I’m rarely up before noon most days. It takes me several long seconds before I remember where I am and why I’m here. Malone’s.
Two weeks of kink. Revenge. Murder.
Damn it, I didn’t mean to fall asleep. I fully intended to wait for her go to bed and then take a look around the penthouse to see what I could find. I stare at the ceiling, and I can almost hear Allecto’s voice in my head. You call that a plan?
“It’s better than nothing.” I feel so unmoored. It’s not just that I have nothing to do until this afternoon. For so long, the possibility of my mother someday waking up was what kept me going each day. But as the years ticked into decades, that hope became more fairy tale than reality. The truth is that the doctors were right when, three years in, they told us there was no possibility of her waking up.
I didn’t take that answer as truth then.
Now, lying in the guest bedroom of my enemy, I can’t help wondering where I’d be if I’d just…let her go. If I’d grieved her back then, at thirteen, instead of making the trek to the Underworld and throwing myself at Hades’s mercy. If I’d allowed myself to admit that she might be my mother, but she was barely more than a stranger to me, and the fantasy future I’d painted in my head was exactly that—fantasy. Would I have moved away from Carver City after high school? Maybe met a nice person and fallen in love? Had a couple kids and a white picket fence?
I don’t know. When I try to picture what that life might look like, it’s as flimsy as mist.
Frustrated with myself, I sit up and look around the space that is mine for the next two weeks. The guest room is a replica of Malone’s, though on a smaller scale. The color scheme is all gray and black with those same pops of red I’ve seen in the rest of the penthouse. Even the bathroom follows it: classy gray tile interspersed with a delicate, red-rose tile. Black marble counters. A large, white claw-foot tub. Deep-red towels.
I shower and decide to explore the closet. I’m not sure if she wants me wandering the place naked, but I’d feel better if I had some kind of clothing on while I’m snooping.
I stop short in the doorway, shock rooting my feet to the floor. This is… She… The closet is half full. Does someone else stay here? As far as I—or people at the Underworld—know, Malone is single and doesn’t even have a normal fuck buddy. Certainly, no one close enough to keep clothing at her place.
But when I finally manage to walk the rest of the way into the closet, I find the clothing is a wide variety of lingerie in pink, black, and red. There are some dresses and even a suit, but it’s primarily sexy stuff designed to seduce.
It’s all in my size.
Coincidence. It must be. Except I don’t really believe that, do I? Last night, she said she had everything she needed for the next two weeks. I assumed she meant toys and the like, but Malone is the type to prepare for any eventuality. She planned this, must have planned this for some time, because I recognize several of the pieces as ones designed by Tink and, these days, the waiting period for her stuff right now is measured by months.
I run my fingers over the lines of the suit, feeling conflicted. The pieces are gorgeous and, yes, probably things I would have chosen for myself. The fact that Malone not only knows my size—or at least did the homework to find it out—but my style… I don’t like it.
I’m not exactly surprised she did this if I think about it logically, but there’s nothing logical about the fluttering in my chest. Panic. It must be panic. All I’ve wanted for as long as I can remember is revenge for what Malone did to my mother. She could have taken over the territory without that one-on-one fight. She practically already had at that point. My mother might have been ruthless and occasionally cruel, but she wasn’t a warrior. Malone had to know that, and she didn’t care. She simply wanted to remove an obstacle, and she never once considered who that obstacle might be to other people. Mother, daughter, loved one.
I want to make her pay.
Standing here in this closet full of evidence of how many moves she thinks ahead, I start to shake. Maybe Allecto really was right. I’m never going to be able to pull this off if I’m just reacting. That whole thing about playing checkers while your opponent is playing chess. I can’t take the woman in a fair fight. I’ve had years to examine her legal business in an attempt to find fault to exploit. There is none. On the criminal side of things, her people love and fear her in equal measure. There’s no turning that tide.
It makes me want to shatter something.
I reach for the first piece of lingerie, a black lace bodysuit, intent on shredding it to ribbons, but stop myself before my fingers make contact. This isn’t the best option. I’ve come too far to let my chaotic impulses get the best of me. There’s a way forward; I just have to find it. I’ve never been so close to actually making progress before. I just need to be patient for a little while longer.
In the end, I don’t change out of the nightshirt I slept in. A quick check in the mirror shows that I look a bit rumpled and pretty low-key sexy. That’ll work.
As satisfied as I’m going to be, I head out of the room. The penthouse is eerily silent, or maybe that’s just my nerves threatening to get the best of me. I make a round quickly, walking through room after room to ensure I’m alone. Empty. All of them, empty. Good. There will be time to look in more detail later; I need to take advantage of this opportunity while Malone’s gone. With that in mind, I make my way back to the hallway with my room, the playroom, and Malone’s room. I
consider the trio of doors. I highly doubt that she’s left anything useful out where I can find it, but it can’t hurt to check.
I take a step toward her bedroom and that’s when I hear it. A low yowling sound that raises the small hairs on the back of my neck. I turn slowly to find a white long-haired cat standing in the middle of the hallway behind me, its back arched and hair standing on end. It hisses.
It’s a gorgeous creature, but there’s no denying it’ll try to take a bite out of me if I approach. Figures. “She would have a feral fucking cat.”
“Rogue is simply a creature of habit. He doesn’t like change.”
I let out a surprised shriek and spin around. I’m distantly aware of the cat fleeing, but the majority of my attention is all on Malone. She’s wearing a black suit with a white silk shirt that’s just shy of being too sexy for corporate work. And she’s barefoot.
I don’t know why that detail sticks in my brain and derails every thought in my head, but I can’t quite drag my gaze from her pretty red-painted toes. She was barefoot last night, but somehow it didn’t register the same way it does while she’s in business clothing. “You have a cat.”
“Yes.”
“Where is your cat stuff? Cats have stuff, right? Like a litter box or whatever?”
“There’s a specially made cupboard in the laundry room.” Malone snaps her fingers, and I’m obeying without making a decision to move my body, walking to her side. She pivots easily and leads the way into her bedroom. “This way.”
I manage to stay silent despite the questions swirling through me. When she said she had work, I just assumed she’d left the apartment. That was careless of me. If she catches me snooping, I’m not sure what she’ll do. I’m still under Hades’s protection right now, so I doubt she’d toss me out a window, but there are a number of less lethal ways she could punish me. I have to be better than this. To be better than her.
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