“What the hell are you doing? We’re going to be late,” Philip grumbles, tightening the leather queue around his mousy brown hair. Suddenly, the idea of going to the den sounds as appealing as a kick to the bollocks.
I take a halting step away when a hand wraps like a vine around my forearm. Aeron looks past me, toward the beguiling woman who has captured me in her thrall without even knowing I exist.
“What’s in your head, Senan?” he whispers.
“I’ve had enough of that wanker. I’m going back to the castle.”Eventually.
The flat expression oozing disapproval doesn’t suit Aeron at all, making him look like our tyrannical father. His quicksilver gaze darts to the woman, then swings back to me, and I knowwhat he is about to say before he even opens his mouth. “Look. Don’t touch.”
It’s the same warning my mother once gave me when we went into a shop filled with ornate glass baubles blown by the city’s most reputable artisans. Do you know what happened then?
I shattered ten.
“Says the man about to go to the city’s most expensive flesh den.” He is so infuriating when he pretends to care about the rules, like being eleven months older makes him my guardian. Prince Hypocrite should reserve his judgement for someone who deserves it. We both know he’ll be cloistered inside one of the den’s private rooms, buried between the legs of some whore, within the hour.
Look. Don’t touch.
Because touching creates connections.
And connections outside of our castle’s lofty towers are forbidden, all because we’re betrothed to princesses from far-off kingdoms. Hell, even my baby brother Kyffin has a fiancée, and he is only five.
The occasional fuck is just fine, but attachments? Not a hope in hell. TheprestigiousVale family does not mix with common folk, lest we taint our pure Scathian blood.
Aeron’s hand falls away, and he heaves a resigned sigh. “Just don’t get caught, all right? I don’t want to deal with Father. Or Boris.”
Why did he have to go and bring our eldest brother into this? The first in line to the throne of Kumulus, Boris makes Philip look like a saint.
If our father found out, we’d be sternly reprimanded. If Boris found out, he’d make our lives hell.
Luckily, I know how to get around the city without being spotted. It’s not like anyone will recognize me without my wings.Thanks to my glamour, my hair isn’t black either, but a nice, neutral brown. Like a potato. I am an invisible potato. “I won’t,” I promise.
With that, Aeron and Philip continue their trek toward the edge of the inter-connected balconies where they hold the Scathian market. From there, they’ll fly down to the river and land where the wingless Tuath live beneath the clouds.
I, on the other hand, am going to speak to the woman with the enchanting laugh, who has moved on from the apple cart to a different merchant selling citrus fruit. When the man behind the table catches her browsing the stack of yellow lemons, his eyes make an unabashed sweep from her hair to her chest.
She is too busy turning a lemon over in her hand to notice the way the pervert’s gaze fixates on the front of her jerkin. A pair of brown-speckled wings appear at his back as he runs a thick hand through his wheat-blond hair.
I’ve never been a violent man, but for some reason that I can only put down to foolishly skipping breakfast, I want to gouge out his eyes.
“What is a pretty thing like you doing all alone on market day?” he asks, all smarmy smiles and lingering eyes.
When the woman smiles up at him, something pinches in my chest. “Who says I’m alone?” Her voice, as sultry as her laugh, makes my knees weak.
Does she have a companion? I scan the marketplace, but no one seems to be paying her any attention. If I’d arrived with her, I’d be hanging on every word that fell from her perfect lips.
She holds up the lemon. “Do you have any lemons that are riper? These seem a little firm.”
Ripe. Firm. Fucking brilliant. Now I’m the pervert gaping at her chest.
Head up, creep. I lift my eyes to her face but get distracted by those parted lips, the same shade as a blush rose’s petals. I wonder if they’re as soft.
The man winks and tells her he’d be happy to have a look “around the back.” What a git. The woman’s smile never wavers, like she doesn’t realize the double entendre in his statement. He turns and struts into the store, his wings stretching and flapping before tucking into his spine.
Pathetic.
Good thing I’m here to swoop in and steal her away from the arrogant fool. When I’m finished, citrus fruit will be the last thing on her mind.
I slip into the empty space next to her, lean my hip against the front of the table, and throw on my most dazzling smile. The problem is, she doesn’t look up from the yellow fruit still clutched in her hand. I should probably say something to announce my presence. Something spectacular that she will recall for the rest of her days.