He chuckled, and the sound was deep and rich as he swooped down and booped my nose, holding me close as I struggled to get away.
“Is she hurt?” Luka asked behind him. “Did something happen to her face?” Unlike John’s relaxed posture, Luka was rigid.
Tense.
He was focused on the two of us.
At all times.
Luka’s dark eyes flashed with concern as he stared down at me, so I wiggled out of John’s arms and jumped to give him a quick kiss on the cheek.
His fingers pressed reverently against where my lips touched.
Pinpricks of pain trailed across my back. There was something so heartbreakingly sweet about Luka that it made me want to latch onto him and never let him go.
John pulled me back beneath his arm and answered his twin, “Nah.” He flashed his dimples and tried to tweak my nose again, but I ducked. “My wife is perfect.”
“Our wife,” Luka corrected.
Malum said, “She’s not your wife.”
The kings glared at the twins like they were a threat. Malum’s flaming arms were draped over Scorpius and Orion protectively.
For a few seconds, I’d forgotten they existed, and I missed that time because it was peaceful.
The devils moved together and crowded our space as Luka stepped forward protectively.
“Not our wife.” John winked dramatically. “Yet.”
I rolled my eyes. “Whatever you say, husband.”
My stomach swooped, and the pain intensified.
“Shut the fuck up and be quiet,” Malum snarled. “You both know the rules.”
What a sweet man. There was that sunshine and rainbows attitude everyone knew and loved.
His knuckles were white from how tightly he was gripping his mates for support.
Therapy had clearly mellowed him out. Not.
He needed electric shock therapy, or a lobotomy, or both.
I was willing to experiment.
John opened his mouth to speak, and the glare Malum shot at him would have brought a lesser man to his knees.
Central to the war effort was remaining undetected by the ungodly. Since the High Court didn’t know what technology the planet possessed, everyone was ordered to stay indoors as much as possible, and if you were outside, you had to be quiet.
Red flames flickered on bronze shoulders, and the snow falling around us turned into rain.
The kings stared at me with intense emotions.
I stared back with deadened eyes.
I’d stopped caring when he’d forced me to stand out under a sky that rained glass.
“You’re just calling him husband to get on our nerves,” Scorpius sneered.
I sighed heavily. “You think you’re so important. Newsflash, I’m calling him my husband—because that’s exactly what he’s going to be.” I scoffed. “Everything isn’t about you. Grow up.”
Scorpius’s razor-sharp jaw twitched, red flames multiplied, and Orion frowned at me like I’d disappointed him.
I leaned against John, and Luka rubbed my back. I smiled with contentment and said softly, “My husbands are important to me.”
The battle lines between us were clear.
Three versus three.
Scorpius grunted at my words like he’d taken a punch to the gut.
I smirked.
Of course, I was only doing it out of spite; I might be depressed, but at my core, I was a hateful bitch.
“Stop calling them that,” Malum burst out loudly, red staining his bronze cheeks as he stared at me like he was embarrassed that he couldn’t control his temper.
We were all embarrassed for him.
“Let’s go inside, husbands.” I ignored the kings. “Some people don’t know how to obey the rules of the camp.”
John flashed his dimples, and Luka grunted as I pulled them inside the room that was our legion’s sleeping bunker.
A seven-foot-tall flaming blight on the history of womankind stomped in behind us. “I told you to be quiet first,” Malum said unhelpfully.
The fact that this was him trying to grovel to me was beyond disturbing.
“And I told you to shut the fuck up and die.” I yawned. “What’s your point?”
The temperature spiked.
What could I say? The therapy session was making me feel reckless. I wanted payback.
I breathed into my cupped hands to warm them.
Malum’s fists trembled at his side, and his face exploded in scarlet flames.
Orion roughly pulled him back, and Scorpius shouted in his face, “Snap out of it! You’re in control—the fire does not control you. Breathe with me. You’re okay.”
I rolled my eyes as Scorpius talked Malum off the edge of a total inferno for what felt like the millionth time this week.