Scorpius had lied.
I didn’t mind.
A week after Lothaire’s visit, Corvus tied a blindfold around my eyes and told me to be a good girl as he led me down the hall.
I shivered at his deep baritone voice, stomach tightening with need.
We slept together and shared chaste kisses, but the men said they didn’t want to pressure me into anything. They said we had all immortality to be intimate and that I needed to focus on recovering from the war.
Personally, I thought sexual relations would accelerate my healing process, but that was just me.
“Surprise,” Corvus whispered gruffly as he pulled off my blind fold.
I burst into tears.
Sadie and Jinx stood at the doorway with wide, excited smiles—well, Sadie was smiling, and Jinx was scowling while Cobra stood behind them with a scowl.
I threw myself at Sadie and nearly brought us to the ground.
“I missed you so much!” she wailed, and I mumbled unintelligible things against the top of her head as I peppered her with kisses.
After a few minutes （a good hour） of tears, we pulled apart.
“You look amazing,” Sadie said as she poked my face. “I didn’t know you could tan? You no longer look ill. I like it.”
I brushed her white hair over her shoulders, and it glittered. “Did you get gold put into your hair?” She nodded, and my jaw dropped. “I’m obsessed.”
The conversation continued with compliments for another twenty minutes before Jinx made a rude comment.
For the first time, I took her in.
Jinx was tall, really tall. She was my height and had a surprisingly voluptuous, unathletic-looking figure. I silently felt bad for her because her string-bean arms were not going to be helpful in a fight.
I made a mental note to give her mace to carry around.
“You got a prosthetic!” I exclaimed as I realized what was different. “You can’t even tell.”
She glared back at me and drawled, “Obviously.”
Her words felt more hurtful now that I knew she wasn’t going through a teenage rebellion.
Ignoring her squeal of disgust, I pulled her into a bear hug. “Are you okay?” I whispered quietly into her ear so no one could hear. “Are they still hurting you? Do you need help?”
She went stiff in my arms.
“I’m okay,” she whispered back, then relaxed in my embrace and returned the hug. “I promise. I have a plan.”
I held her back at arm’s length and pinned her with a serious gaze.
Lately, I’d had a lot of time to think about my future, and I’d realized what an asset Jinx could be.
“If I claim the fae throne,” I said slowly, “I’m going to need a regent to rule in my absence.”
“What absence?” Sadie asked.
Corvus asked, “What do you think you’re doing?”
Jinx’s lips pulled into an evil smile as she understood exactly what I was saying.
She nodded and said, “I’d be honored to whip that realm into shape.”
Sadie hit both of us to get our attention. “What’s going on?”
I explained, “I have to reclaim the fae throne, but I don’t want to rule because I’ll probably suffer from PTSD.” I shrugged. “So I’ll go claim it back, and then Jinx can rule for me—if she wants to. Otherwise, I’m sure we can find someone else.”
“I want to,” Jinx said eagerly.
My men tried to interrupt, but I cut them off as I gave the girls a tour of the estate.
We spent the night talking under the stars. Well, Sadie talked. Jinx spent most of it in silence, but she voluntarily sat next to us, which for her was a declaration of undying love.
We used Sadie’s inter-realm enchanted phone—still had no idea how they’d acquired such a device, because they weren’t supposed to exist—and called all the girls back in the manor.
Apparently Jax was sheltering the girls. He still hadn’t let Jess get tested because he was afraid of the High Court’s machinations and didn’t want her registered in their database.
She was disgruntled but understood.
Meanwhile, Jala was a ball of energy and kept going on about how Warren had hot friends that they’d been introduced to.
The phone was ripped away by tattooed fingers.
Ascher launched into a disturbing but highly educational lecture about boys and sexual relations.
We lost connection while he ranted, which was a shame because I was learning a lot and he was just getting to the juicy part. Apparently men had needs that women didn’t because they had a prostate.