Total pages in book: 124
Estimated words: 115347 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 115347 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 577(@200wpm)___ 461(@250wpm)___ 384(@300wpm)
Hold your silence. Take what she offers.
Do what’s right. Shoving the words past his tongue, he told her, “We don’t know each other. Not really. We have no idea what glamara the other wields.” No, not true. She’d admitted to unearthing secrets. Could she withstand the stigma of being wed to a chimera? And she had yet to see his scars. What if his body repulsed her, the way it had anyone who’d ever glimpsed it? The way it repulsed him.
What’s more, he was soon to be at war with the most feared being in all Astaria. If he had miscalculated his plans in the slightest way, he could lose as his oracle had threatened—and Vee would become Kaysar’s primary target, worthy of double the wrath. That was how the Unhinged One worked.
“Let’s solve this here and now.” She toyed with his hair, and a short, choppy moan burst from him. “What two glamaras do you wield?”
“That isn’t something I’ll discuss.” Not here, not now. Perhaps not ever. His motive hadn’t changed. The less others knew about his abilities, the less likely someone learned his weakness. But...if she were his wife...maybe. One day.
“Are your abilities dangerous?” she asked.
To her? “No.”
“Then I see no obstacle. Especially not today.” Pure carnality, she leveled a coy smile on him. “Isn’t that right?”
She uses the celebration against me. He had only himself to blame. “What of your glamara? How do you unearth secrets?”
“Oh. That.” She deflated a little. “I should refuse to say, like you. But, because you feel so nice pressed against me, I’ll tell you a tidbit. You see, I...commune with nature. Yes. That’s true.”
Communing with nature. The reason she powered the trees? It made sense. What if she could oversee a garden for his—their—people?
Fated...
“Well?” She chewed on her bottom lip, pure feminine charm, and peered up at him through the fan of her lashes. “What do you say?”
His fingers flexed on her. His thoughts spun, merged and twisted. Marriage. Red...his wife. In his arms every night. Draped over him every morning. The fulfillment of deep, hidden fantasies he’d never dared to entertain, now manifested and his to touch.
“Micah,” Elena said, stepping from thin air to reach his side. Concern radiated from her. “Tell me you aren’t considering this.”
How long had she stood nearby, listening, hidden by her glamara? A muscle jumped in his jaw.
Vee released him to rub her temples. “Where’d you come from? Hmm, maybe I should forgo the wine. No, that’s pure silliness. I should probably have more.”
The spy continued, “You need to know what Fayette showed me. Soon, this girl will—”
“Fayette is a traitor,” he interjected. “You know as well as I that the oracle is well able to manipulate the futures she projects.” Through her, he’d learned that anything someone perceived as their fate, whether accurate or not, they actively pursued, whether wittingly or unwittingly. The mind chased what it considered fact, whether those facts were true or false. “What’s more, a predicted future is never guaranteed.”
Protests left Elena.
“No,” he barked, ending her tirade. Change your thoughts, and you changed your words. Change your words, and you changed your actions. Change your actions, and you changed your habits. Change your habits, and you changed your character. Change your character, and you changed your destiny.
He kept his gaze on Red. As usual, she kept her gaze on him, too, utterly unafraid.
Her. She’s my destiny. My fate. I will change the world—my world—to have her.
As if she heard his thoughts, she returned her fingers to his tunic and allowed a new smile to lift the corners of her plump, cherry lips. A sweeter one than before. Playful and beyond tempting.
His muscles tensed one after the other. His temperature rose. To have this creature forever and always...
Leaving one hand on her waist, he lightly pinched her chin with the other. This perfect female liked him enough to hold his gaze and welcome his touch. If ever she betrayed him...
“Marriage is permanent. You are sure you wish to do this?” Sure you desire me the way I desire you?
“Let me answer your question with one of my own.” Eyes full of mirth, she glided her hands to his shoulders, then lifted to her tiptoes and kissed his lips. An innocent brush of her mouth against his, yet his body reacted as if set on fire. “Will you do everything I demand?”
He barked a laugh, the sound rusty, foreign to his ears. Many of his people stopped what they were doing to gawk at him. Some even grinned, a rare occurrence.
He kept his attention on Red, reservations frayed. “There’s a good chance I will.” Here, now, he longed only to indulge her every whim.
“Then there’s a good chance I’m sure.”
The way she purred those words... He had no other defenses to shore up against her. “Very well. Let’s wed.” He would be a father to her children. They would become a family. A unit. He would lay the Dusklands at her feet.