By the time they finished, Samael’s hand ached from shaking, and every muscle in his neck and shoulders screamed with tension. At least the silence had disappeared in favor of a neutral buzz of voices. By this point, he was numb from forcing his true emotions to a dark corner of his mind, and he wasn’t sure if the buzz was positive or negative or if the guarded smiles directed his way were sincere.
How much worse for Meira as an empath.
Gorgon turned to Samael. “I’m ready to return to my rooms.”
“My king,” Samael acknowledged.
Shifting the smallest part of him, he sent thoughts ahead to his team to clear the path. The king had yet to try to shift since his return to the clan, which meant sticking to the human-size walkways. Leading the small band, Samael escorted Gorgon and Meira through the halls and back spaces of the mountain. The deeper they moved, the more instinct told him something was wrong. Not dangerous. Not a threat. Just wrong.
He almost turned to Meira to ask if she had any insights, could feel emotions ahead of her maybe, even had his mouth open, but realized in time that their relationship wasn’t casual like that anymore and snapped it shut with a clack of teeth.
About halfway there, Meira’s gasp had Samael jerking around, already assuming a defensive position, only to find Gorgon slumped against the wall, Meira trying to hold him up.
“What happened?” he demanded as he rushed to his king, looping Gorgon’s arm over his shoulders and hefting him to standing.
“A little dizzy,” the king slurred.
Dammit. They shouldn’t have held the clan meeting today. Gorgon hadn’t been ready.
“We need to get him back to the room quickly,” Meira said. “Is there a mirror anywhere close by?”
Samael considered where they’d stopped. The buzzing sound of the massive generators that powered the entire mountain surrounded him. He’d taken them the back way near the inner mechanisms of the mountain—an area he knew from childhood, when his father had worked down here keeping the plumbing functioning, such as it was in that era. “This way.”
Hauling Gorgon, who could hardly lift his feet, Samael made his way to a room that didn’t have a mirror but did have a full wall of glass that was a one-way mirror. His dad’s bosses had sat behind it, watching every single move the men down here made. Judging. Meting out punishment. Adjusting shifts based on production and favoritism.
Sam remembered that part well despite his young age and the centuries since.
Meira glanced his way once she spotted it, questions in her eyes, but said nothing. She lit her fire with ease and, hand on his shoulder burning through his clothes to his skin, though he was certain she didn’t let the flames touch him, walked all three of them through the mirror into Gorgon’s room. Samael laid the king down on the bed, and she sat at the foot to remove his shoes.
Samael stepped back and, in a moment of pure weakness, watched her. The graceful moves of her hands, slender fingers working to untie the knots on Gorgon’s fancy leather shoes. The way she tucked her hair behind one ear to get it out of her face. The glow of her skin, even in the pale light coming from the daylight mimicking strips along the ceiling. It must be cloudy outside today, because the strips only cast a dim light in the room.
Gods above, I need her.
“I’ll inform the men.” Samael stalked from the room before he could do something stupid like confess his plans or beg her to choose him despite the way such an act would rend her loyalty, pulling her in too many directions.
He couldn’t do that to her, force her to make that terrible choice between him and her sisters.
“Samael,” Meira called.
He ignored her and kept walking.
“Samael, stop.” She was closer now, the patter of her feet in the hallway.
Not pausing, he shook his head. “I need to make sure—”
“Sam, stop. Dammit.” Her voice broke on the last word, and he couldn’t keep going. He stopped and closed his eyes, head bowed.
“Don’t do this,” she begged, closer still.
Which meant she had a pretty accurate idea of what he was planning. Confirming it would only mean arguing about it.
“Sam.” A touch, soft as a kiss, landed on his shoulder, then traveled down his arm until she threaded their fingers together.
Gods help him, he let her.
“Don’t do this,” she said again. Still quiet.
“Do what? I’m organizing my men. You should be helping the king.”
She tugged on that hand in a move that communicated her feelings sharply. “I’m far from stupid.”
“Don’t I know it,” he muttered.
Then he disconnected their fingers and turned to face her, arms crossed so he didn’t reach out for her. Deliberately, he assumed the same hard-ass expression he used with new recruits he was training and tried to stuff his emotions as deep as he could. Deep enough that they wouldn’t touch her. “I have a job to do. So do you.”
Meira’s eyes widened, then narrowed. “That’s how it’s going to be, huh?”
“How it has to be, and you know it.”
Rather than disagree, Meira tipped her head, irises the closest to white he’d seen before. Why did he get the gut-sinking feeling she was about to try to rescue him from himself?
“Fine.”
Fine? That was it?
Without another word, she turned away, heading back to the king.
Unbidden, possessiveness rose up inside him and short-circuited any intelligent decision making. “Fine?” He stalked after her. “None of this is fine.”
He reached for her, but Meira spun to face him, plowed into him, driving him back. “At least you got that part right.”
Then she kissed him, soft and sweet. Fuck, he was so screwed.
Surrounded by the taste of her, the scent of her, the softness of her body against his, Samael went wild. With a grunt of pain-edged pleasure, not taking his mouth from
