Page 30 of To Tame An Angel

Vallen let out a long sigh and leaned forward, reaching for my hand and threading our fingers together. When I was little, she would do the same thing.

“You feel for them, don’t you?” Her words were low, as if she shared a secret.

“I know it’s because of Ellar,” I said.

The sound of my brother’s name feels so foreign that it made Valle flinch, but she didn’t disagree.

“I always think of him. I cannot help it. He would be a handsome, strapping man by now, but we wouldn’t know him. We wouldn’t be allowed to be proud of him or tease him or anything of the like. He would be a ghost, same as he is now. Just another man for a woman to break,” I murmured.

Valle pulled back with taunt lips. “They don’t need to break, Nalla. Mine are still perfectly straight—and hard. Why do you think I don’t allow mother in my home? She wouldn’t like how I live with them. How the three of us delight in each other’s company. I’ve no need to know which is the father because the child belongs to the three of us.”

I glanced at her. “Don’t they get jealous of one another?”

This made her laugh, and she looked even lovelier than before. “Oh no! They enjoy each other’s company as well.” She paused and looked almost naughty. “Sometimes I just watch them together. It’s quite erotic.”

I’d seen it before, of course, but the way she said it made a blush creep up my face. “I thought that if they produced that scent, you know the arousal, then I would know and ensure we were both enjoying it.”

Valle shook her head and sipped her tea. “That’s a myth. I’ve never smelled it. If it happens, it only happened when I told them the child was coming. But it was slight and then I realized I purchase new bathing oils.”

She laughed, slightly embarrassed by her own confusion.

I was shocked at her words, and the denial was quick on my tongue, but I stopped myself. I realized Valle’s men played at loving her. To save themselves. To not die. That’s when I recalled how often Tannor’s arousal had come. For me. For what I do to him. The cock doesn’t produce the scent… the desire does. A cock hardens on its own. It needed little cajoling and a breast without a woman entices it. But desire is something entirely different.

My eyes found my balcony.

Valle continued speaking about focusing on myself and what I wished him to do for me. She went into a litany of explanations and suggestions, but I hardly listened. My mind was on Tannor, on his reactions, on his words. He smelled my hair while I slept. I was asleep. He didn’t need to convince me of anything while I slept. He did that on his own.

Despite my love for my sisters, I was desperate for them to leave. I needed some quality with my lying angel, and the evening couldn’t come soon enough.

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

TANNOR

Nalla kept me waiting for hours. A bath was brought for me, and I lingered in the water, mildly hoping she would arrive and then angering at myself for thinking such things. I scrubbed my skin with harsh yanks going over and over how I needed to apologize, appease her, and hope she forgot the words I tossed in anger.

But it wasn’t anger at her, it was at me. I had no business studying her as she slept, smelling her hair, caressing her skin. There was nothing that would’ve compelled me to do that. The point was freedom, not staying trapped with her for the rest of my life.

As I dressed, I realized that my anger was the frustration that I desired her. Not just her body and her actions, but her mix of womanhood. How she was kind and tender one moment, fiery and passionate in another, while being innocent and idealistic at the same time. We weren’t to desire women as people, simply as the harsh mistresses who ruled our cocks. But she was more than that. She was so much that I daydreamed of making her happy and other such nonsense.

We’d heard rumors of men who’d loved their women. We’d heard of their deaths. How their wings were yanked from their body, stiff after so long curled into our spines, and how they severed their wings while their lover helplessly watched. Punished for daring to be anything other than master and slave. We never knew what happened to the women, but I could only imagine the worst.

The more hours passed, the more worried I became. Trapped as I am, there’s little I can do to help her should she need it. I took to pacing once more, then to studying the gowns in her closet, then back to pacing.

My nerves were frazzled, and I was ready to pound the door and escape, just to find her and ensure she was safe.

It was early afternoon when she arrived, and relief settled over me in a sharp breath. However, she looked unconcerned. She even sported a rosy tint on her cheeks and the smell of freesias followed her. She was dressed in blue; the sleeves draped down, showcasing her shoulders.

“What happened? What did she want?” I spoke without thinking. Because I was mad with worry. Because she exhibited nothing of the terrible things I thought were being done to her.

She raised a brow and pinned me with a look. It’s her mistress look, the one that speaks of her displeasure at my tone. I didn’t care; I didn’t give a fuck. I’ve been sitting here doing nothing but imagining terrible conjectures.

“What my sisters and I discuss is not your concern,” she snapped and swept into the room, past me, allowing her gown to tickle my skin.

I watched her, feeling frustrated, sensing she hid things when before she’d been so open. But I destroyed that, didn’t I? And now I wished she wanted me, though no woman has truly wanted me, not even my mother.

“You made it clear you didn’t care for my company. That it was only a task. A means of survival,” her voice revealed nothing. It’s controlled. “So tonight, we practice our lies. If you wish to live, you need to convince others you’re enchanted by me, even if you aren’t. You need to showcase devotion, even if you have none. And humility, something you’re terrible at.”

I listened without understanding her implications.

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