Nectar of the Wicked (Deadly Divine, #1) (69)

I didn’t need to ask him to convey exactly what he’d meant. He was just as in need, perhaps even more than I was, and he would have to remedy that if I wasn’t careful.

My thawing heart stuttered and drooped as what he’d said before failed to keep from nagging at me. I couldn’t help it. Couldn’t stop myself from saying, “You fed during the time we were meeting at the Lair of Lust.”

His eyes darkened.

I turned away, my teeth catching my lip. I hadn’t the room to care about the rouge. A red haze blurred my vision and swept through my body to tighten every organ. No matter how much I reminded myself that it didn’t matter.

After what he’d done, it certainly shouldn’t have mattered.

But for some reason, it did.

Florian’s hand caught mine when I rose from his lap. “We need only stay an hour for appearance’s sake. Then we can leave.”

I painted a smile on my face and tugged my hand free. “Then I would like to spend it enjoying the festivities rather than tolerating them and your presence.”

He scowled, a warning within his eyes, but he didn’t stop me from taking the two steps down from the dais to the grass.

Maybe he knew my own patience was at an end, and if I remained, we would cause a scene by continuing to do as he’d warned we shouldn’t—argue until one of us snapped in a way we could not take back.

The thought of humiliating him in front of so many onlookers both thrilled and nauseated me. That awakening part of me, likely tied to the heat, liked the idea of claiming that devious mouth in front of so many far too much.

Though the rest of me knew that to do so would only further suit his plans—and make me and my father’s kingdom appear weak.

Two guards trailed me as I entered the thick throng of faeries. Scents crashed into me and caused my head to swim. Overwhelmed, I bumped into bodies when a female with hooves for feet nearly squashed my slipper-covered toes.

Her features might have been dusted in a light layer of fur, and her eyes that of a bovine, but I didn’t miss the sharp sneer she gave me. Nor that from the cluster of goblins she’d been dancing with.

I could no longer see the warriors but knew they were watching from somewhere. My eyes caught on the twinkling throne I’d steadily moved away from, and I soon realized why the king had let me go.

A female with glowing crimson hair curling around slim shoulders now stood at the side of the podium.

Florian no longer sat on the throne.

I moved out from behind a line of dancing females, wine bouncing from their goblets, to see he’d descended the steps to speak with the red-haired female. She wrung her hands before her, but her smile was wide and bright. I could only see Florian’s broad back and the crown atop the hair he’d tied to his nape, but I could tell from the glow of her face that they were not family.

The king of Hellebore had no living family.

For if he did, I would not be standing here, dazed in a field of faeries.

Needing air, and to keep from marching back to stop the king from standing so close to the creature of whom he was evidently very familiar with for him to leave his royal perch, I made my way to the tree line.

As predicted, the guards had followed.

A lightly muscled male with piercing brown eyes smirked when I neared him. “Looking a little unwell there, Princess.”

The female beside him knocked his arm with her elbow. Her gaze remained steadfast upon the festivities, as if more of Molkan’s spies might emerge and snatch me at any moment. “Don’t, Fellan.”

“Don’t what?” he said, giving the female a feigned look of outrage. “I was only going to tell the princess not to worry, for dear Nalia is merely our king’s only permanent lover.”

He would only be merely screaming when I gave in to the temptation to snatch his dagger from his waist and bury it in his groin.

Shocked and a touch sickened by the flare of my violent temper, I closed my eyes and pleaded with the skies for this ghastly heat to hurry up and end. I couldn’t keep feeling and acting this way.

I couldn’t keep longing for something I couldn’t allow myself to have—especially when all I truly needed was to find the father who’d sent me to the middle lands when I was born.

If nothing else, at least it was now clear that Molkan had been trying to protect me from Florian’s wrath. A forgivable heartbreak, if only I was given the chance to give that forgiveness to him.

I didn’t need Florian and the useless feelings and desires he conjured.

And right now, I just needed Fellan to shut his irksome mouth.

“Decades, I think it was. Wasn’t it, Lorri?”

Lorri sighed. “I honestly don’t care to remember.”

“No, it was.” Fellan went on. “She practically lived with him, Princess. Though I do believe in different rooms, so don’t you worry.”

My teeth met and gritted.

“Oh, the fun they had. Hardly monogamous from what I recall, but they were always together for every wild gathering.” He laughed then. “I had a friend who walked in on one once. Females everywhere, he’d said. An endlessly magical sea of tits, cunts, and ass.”

Lorri had apparently decided she did not wish to hear another goading word. I was tempted to follow her as she walked back toward her king.

Too curious and apparently masochistic for my own good, I stayed. It would help, I thought, to hate him just that little bit more.