Total pages in book: 154
Estimated words: 145721 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 145721 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 729(@200wpm)___ 583(@250wpm)___ 486(@300wpm)
“I’m promised to someone,” she said breathily. “He is of high rank among the Men of Valor.”
“Is he now? Then perhaps I would know who he is.”
“Perhaps,” she said. She twisted her wrist gently, and her hand slid out of his.
“Then who is he?”
“When I find him, I’ll introduce you.”
“I think not,” he said instead. His hand slid around her waist, holding her tight against him. She fought to keep from shivering as he radiated cold. “All of you lot are available. It’s his fault that he left such a wild rose free to bloom alone.”
Kierse batted her eyelashes. “I think that perhaps . . .”
“We didn’t pay for you to think,” he snarled.
Then he slapped her across the face.
Shock stung her more than the hit itself. It wasn’t to cause pain. It was to keep her in her place. He had clearly done it many times. He’d probably even known exactly how hard to hit her so that it wouldn’t leave any kind of mark. She knew, because Jason had hit her like that more times than she could count. She pushed down the familiar memory of that hit. Pushed it far, far away.
Her hand went to her face, but she kept her eyes carefully away from his. Because she knew that in them smoldered a dark intensity that said she would kill him where he stood for touching her.
“Now, you will be with me. I already have a room,” Wilson said, grasping her upper arm with more force and shuffling her toward an exit.
Kierse almost sighed with relief. Yes, a room would be lovely. That would mean she could incapacitate him somewhere private instead of in front of everyone in the ballroom. She’d have to be sure not to get too much blood on her corset. Though with this crowd, who would even notice?
She was nearly to the door when a hand clamped down on the man’s shoulder, dragging him to a halt. “Wilson Bellack.”
Kierse had to fight to keep her face neutral when she saw Graves standing before the sniveling vampire.
“Yes? Are we acquainted?” Bellack asked.
“I don’t believe that we are,” Graves said, dominance on full display. The force of his magic made him nearly blinding to look at. She hadn’t realized that the fear he inspired was, in part, a product of his magic. It was easy to see why others shrank from him. “But you do seem to have my property.”
“And who the hell are you?”
Graves just smiled at him. Something cold and lethal. “That’s not any of your business.”
“Are you of the Men of Valor?”
Graves nudged the winged pin at his lapel in answer. “Now, would you release my property?”
Wilson flung her arm aside as if she were a doll. He looked like he wanted to say something more, but he just strode away furiously.
“I don’t think he likes you,” Kierse reasoned.
“No, I suspect not,” Graves said.
“What took you so long?”
He flashed the pin at her. He must have taken it off of someone.
“Miss me?” He drew her closer. His eyes skated down the skimpy outfit.
“Hardly,” she teased right back.
“I approve of the outfit. Wear it for me later?”
She wasn’t sure if he was joking. And part of her shivered at the thought, but she couldn’t consider it here.
“We’re wasting time,” she told him.
He nodded just as a hush fell over the room and the exits were barred. Kierse swallowed and glanced at Graves. He shook his head minutely.
“His Royal Majesty, King Louis,” an attendant declared.
And onto the head dais strode the King of the Underworld.
Chapter Fifty-Five
“Greetings, my fellow monsters,” King Louis crowed.
Kierse met Graves’s eyes, and together, they took a step farther from the ring of monsters. They were supposed to be gone before Louis’s big announcement, but Graves had been delayed. And now she was finally getting her first look at the monster.
King Louis was larger than life in every way imaginable. From his over-the-top seventeenth-century Sun King outfit, complete with a long golden waistcoat, puffy sleeves, knee-high tights, and heeled boots, to his long, curly-haired powdered wig, his look reveled in the moniker he had taken for himself. He held a staff in front of him and strut forward to his awaiting audience, who cheered wildly.
Graves sighed at her side. “He couldn’t even get a historically accurate wig.”
Kierse forced her face neutral to keep from laughing. “What?”
“They weren’t powdered for another hundred years.”
She shook her head at him. “Only you would know that.”
King Louis continued, raising his arm and gesturing into the air. “Welcome to my Winter Solstice celebration!”
Despite the ridiculous powdered wig, he cut a formidable figure. He had a manic look in his eyes, and power radiated off of him—it was easy to see how he had come to rule despite his eccentricities. His very presence exuded authority and danger, as if he might start murdering everyone in attendance just for looking at him wrong.